Saving the World

by Julia Alvarez

  When Helen slipped into her coma, Alma sat by, waiting numbly for this next important departure. Occasionally, she had wet one of the little pink sponges the nurse had left in a glass and put it to the old woman’s lips. The parched, toothless mouth would open and suck heartily. It was odd to feel that tug, that pull of reflex, that lusty will to live even in this comatose old woman. Helen, Alma whispered from time to time, I love you, I’m here. And a few times, to indulge Helen, to indulge herself, she told her old friend, Say hello to Richard.

  Several times, especially as the wave of stories begins to die down, Alma thinks of speaking up. She has several anecdotes ready and a love poem she’d once written for Richard. But each time her heart, if not her mind, goes blank. Why did she think this was a good idea? Beyond in the haze, she can see the neat, husbanded little plots of land, the earth’s horizon, curved and turning toward the south, where her family came from, where she lost Richard, where the world grows poorer and sicker. What can she say about these two beloved people in the face of that bigger vision?

  Again that feeling wells up in her, an intuition, as the black-kerchief poet called it, and with it that story she has held on to for so long it is now the quivering little needle of her moral compass.

  “Anyone else?” David, of course, is remembering that this was Alma’s idea. Surely, she has something to say. His voice is tentative, gentle—that father gene did get passed on. But Alma has nothing to say or, rather, has a whole story to tell them, the story of Isabel, of how some people, real people, have kept faith no matter what, how she wishes that for all of them. But it feels as if the moment she says so, she will be closing down this baffling world with a homily soaked in her tears. Better let the reverend take it from here.

  “Okay then, let’s bow our heads in prayer,” Reverend Don says, as if reading her mind.

  After a handheld Our Father, the ashes are passed around. Two urns make the rounds. Alma wonders whose is Richard’s? Helen’s? She fills her hands, one fistful from each one. When the urns have gone full circle, the group lines up at the edge of the stony outcrop.

  Alma feels as if she should make a wish, like blowing out candles, like seeing the first star in the sky. But she has entered a world where wishing would only return her to grief. She has to make a bigger leap, into a story that is not just a story, her own and not her own. Richard and Helen, Isabel and Balmis, the black-kerchief poet, Benito—they are inside her now, wanting her faith, needing her hope. So this is how the dead live on.

  No one says, Now! but after the first person flings a handful, the others follow. There is no wind today, another good thing about it being hot, becalmed. The ashes fly out from all their hands—floating on faith, floating on love—blessing the ground.

  Further Reading and Acknowledgments

  THIS NOVEL COULD NOT have been written without the immeasurable help and support of so many generous and special people.

  First and foremost, my deepest appreciation to Catherine Mark, scientific editor at the CNB in Madrid, helper par excellence, for sending e-mails with needed details, dates, and oodles of encouragement. This trusting soul loaned a perfect stranger books from her ample Balmis collection, which books crossed the Atlantic twice, once here and then back. Her own translation of Gonzalo Díaz de Yraola’s The Spanish Royal Philanthropic Expedition: The Round-the-World Voyage of the Smallpox Vaccine, 1803–1810 (La vuelta al mundo de la expedición de la vacuna, 1803–1810), a facsimile of a 1948 edition (repr. Madrid: Instituto de Historia, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2003), along with Michael Smith’s The “Real Expedición Marítima de la Vacuna” in New Spain and Guate mala, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, n.s. 64, pt. 1, (Philadelphia, 1974), are the two most thorough studies of the Balmis expedition in English. Also helpful are articles by John Z. Bowers, “The Odyssey of Smallpox Vaccination,” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 55 (1981), 17–33; Sherbourne F. Cook, “Francisco Xavier Balmis and the Introduction of Vaccination in Latin America,” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 11 (1942): 543 – 60 and 12 (1942): 70 – 101 ; as well as various articles by José Rigau-Pérez, who specializes in the Puerto Rican fiasco.

  Special thanks also to Professor Ricardo Guerrero, whom I had the good fortune to meet as I was touring Galicia, for his gift of Gonzalo Díaz de Yraola’s book, which led me to befriend its translator, Catherine Mark. To other Balmis aficionados in Spain, including Manuel Prada and José Luís Barona, who kindly answered my queries, and José Tuells, whose book is listed below, muchas gracias and many thanks. Also my thanks to Tom Colvin for information concerning Mexican and Philippine portions of the journey.

  Closer to home in my own stomping grounds of Middlebury, Vermont, many thanks to Rachel Manning of Middlebury College’s Interlibrary Loan Department, who brings the world’s treasures here for us to study. To her and to Joy Pile and the wonderful staff at this library, I owe my deepest appreciation and gratitude. To the incomparable Paul Monod, professor of history, for his good humor and patience with all my tireless questions. And to John Quinn, for his legal help with my troublemakers.

  Also to the extraordinary nurses of Addison County Home Health & Hospice and to Dr. Chris Nunnink, for taking the time to help me. To M. H., and her family, for blessing me with your precious time and friendship!

  Many thanks to Brian Simpson, editor of Johns Hopkins Public Health Magazine, and Suzanne Fogt, then working at the Sustainable Enterprise Program, World Resources Institute, for their help on current world epidemics, biological terrorism, and on the increasingly desperate situation of so many of the world’s poor. Jessica Hagedorn and Luis Francia kindly added to my knowledge of latecolonial Philippine history and lore; Liliana Valenzuela stepped in with Mexican history expertise. My thanks also to Dr. Erin Felger for medical-military help.

  As for making my novel seaworthy (all sea lingo and wind direction errors are mine), I want to thank the intrepid Joan Druett, whose wonderful books on sailing, most especially, Hen Frigates (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998), acquainted this landlubber with a watery world she knew nothing about. To Brian Andrews and Deidre O’Regan, who loaned me books and arranged for me to go aboard the Spirit of Massachusetts and experience seasickness firsthand: many thanks. And to Herb and Shayna Loeffler, whom I met aboard the Spirit, for answering any number of tedious questions on board and later by phone and e-mail, thank you both.

  I owe a special thanks to Dr. Ellen Koenig, for educating me about the AIDS crisis in the Dominican Republic. Her clinic in the capital is far and away the best treatment center for AIDS in the country. I want briefly to acknowledge her work here. At a time when very few Dominican physicians dared sully their practices by treating those with this “pariah” disease, Dr. Koenig, then a comfortable American woman in her forties married to a Dominican businessman, decided to earn a medical degree in order to tend to those in such dire need. Thank you and your assistant, Dr. Carlos Adon, for taking time out to accompany me to other needy clinics and for persevering in running a first-rate care facility for AIDS patients in the Dominican Republic. There are Isabels afoot in this world! It is an honor and a privilege to know you.

  In commemoration of the recent Balmis bicentennial, several books have been published in the last few years, all of them in Spanish: two by Susana Ramírez, who probably knows more than anyone about the smallpox expedition and has been writing for years on the subject: La salud del imperio: La real expedición filantrópica de la vacuna (Madrid: Fundación Jorge Juan, Ediciones Doce Calles, 2002) and, along with coauthor José Tuells, Balmis et variola (Valencia: Generalitat Valenciana, Conselleria de Sanitat, 2003); Emilio Balaguer Perigüell and Rosa Ballester Añón’s En el nombre de los niños: La Real Expedición Filantrópica de la Vacuna (1803–1806) (Monografías de la Asociación Española de Pediatría, 2003; electronic book available at http://www.aeped.es/balmis/libro.balmis.htm); Juan Carlos Herrera Hermosilla’s El sueño ilustrado: Biografía de Francisco Javier de Balmis (E
diciones Paracelso, s.l., 2003). Earlier studies include the aforementioned Díaz de Yraola’s book as well as Francisco Fernandez del Castillo’s Los viajes de Don Francisco Xavier de Balmis (Mexico: Galas de Mexico, S.A., 1960). There is also a wonderful booklet put out by the Alicante Rotary Club/Fundación Dr. Balmis, Balmis y los héroes de la vacuna: Expedición Filantrópica a América y Filipinas, 1803. In addition, a new anthology of articles by Balmis experts from around the world, edited by Susana Ramírez, La Real Expedición Filantrópica de la Vacuna: Doscientos años de lucha contra la viruela, will soon be available from Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas in Madrid, Spain.

  The novel’s Isabel chapters follow closely the trajectory and main events of the royal expedition. But the creation of character and circumstance based on these historical personages is my own invention. Isabel, under several surnames, was indeed the rectoress of the orphanage in La Coruña and was the only woman to accompany the expedition. Her adopted son, Benito, was one of the original twenty-two carriers. Only twenty-one are named in the official documents, thus the license to invent Orlando. Isabel did go on to the Philippines with the twentysix Mexican boys, returning two years later to Mexico, and settling down finally with Benito in Puebla de los Ángeles, the City of the Angels.

  In addition to Isabel’s original twenty-two carriers, hundreds of children, slaves, military recruits, and other adults donated their arms to the cause. Without their contribution the chain of vaccinations would have been broken.

  Thanks are also due to my dear editor, Shannon Ravenel, who fortunately is not at all like Alma’s editor and whose faith in the journey of discovery that every novel entails kept me going on stormy days when my faith was tempest-tossed and my craft lost at sea. And to my feisty agent and faithful friend, Susan Bergholz, who—ditto—is thankfully not at all like the Lavinia in these pages, my gratitude for making it possible for me to do my work, for never losing faith.

  Virgencita de la Altagracia, gracias for so many blessings, not least among them the opportunity to learn from and befriend the special people named and appreciated in these acknowledgments.

  SAVING THE WORLD

  A Short Note from the Author

  A Reading and Discussion Guide

  Saving the Writer (With Lots of Helpers)

  A Short Note from the Author

  The seed of Saving the World sprouted in a footnote.

  Researching the history of the Dominican Republic for an earlier novel, I learned that in 1804 when the island of Hispaniola was in the midst of revolution, smallpox broke out. A footnote mentioned a missed opportunity. In February 1804, Dr. Francisco Xavier Balmis arrived in nearby Puerto Rico with his Royal Spanish Expedition bound on its mission to save the world with the smallpox vaccine. The carriers were orphan boys—this was before the days of refrigeration—twenty-two of them, all under the age of nine. But because the Spanish colony on Hispaniola was embattled and unsafe, Don Francisco’s expedition did not stop there.

  Why had I never heard of this attempt to rid the world of a deadly disease? Though the Spanish crown’s motives were praised as noble, I could not stop thinking of those twenty-two boys. Must civilization always ride on the backs of those least able to defend themselves? Little boys! Orphans!

  From then on, I tried to find out more about this smallpox expedition.

  The best bit of information I found was that a woman had accompanied the expedition: the “rectoress” of the orphanage, Isabel Sendales y Gómez, went along to take care of the little boys. I knew this was a story I had to tell. What I didn’t know was that I was about to embark on my own expedition around the world—mostly electronically—to find out all I needed to know to tell this story.

  It’s amazing how tolerant people are of writers with wacky requests. First, I needed to experience the feel of a rolling vessel, salt and wind in my hair, that sinking feeling when the land drops out of view. After all, Isabel had spent months crossing several oceans.

  A local acquaintance has a daughter-in-law who teaches in one of those semesters at sea programs. During Caribbean stops, she has her students read my novel In the Time of the Butterflies. Which is how I made it on board—courtesy of Dee O’Regan—Spirit of Massachusetts, where I experienced seasickness firsthand, an ailment I passed on to poor Isabel and her little boys.

  The tall-ship sailing world turned out to be a small one. Through Dee, I was put in touch with Joan Druett, author of Hen Frigates, a wonderful book on seafaring women. Joan proceeded to educate me with reading lists and expert answers to my questions. “The best way to go is to track your post and distinguish your problems,” she began one e-mail. In another, uncharacteristically stumped, she referred my question to Nick Burningham. “Genuflect when you read that name,” she said. “He’s currently in the Oman building models of Arab boats for the sultan.” In the Oman! It occurred to me to ask, “And where are you, Joan?” “Down Under,” came the reply.

  I decided to do a bit of actual travel myself. Retracing Isabel’s journey, I headed to La Coruña, the port city from which the expedition set sail. I climbed the 234 steps of the Tower of Hercules. The oldest functioning lighthouse in the world, it had beamed a good-bye to the rectoress and her boys. Though the celebration of the expedition’s bicentennial (1803–2003) would not open until later that year, I collected the names of several experts to contact.

  One of them, Catherine Mark, was this writer’s true fairy godmother. An American, she lives in Madrid and works at Centro Nacional de Biotecnología. She seems to have collected everything ever written about the expedition and is the hub of a worldwide assortment of Balmis aficionados informally known as “The Balmaniacs.” As my planned novel expanded to include a contemporary story and another scourge (AIDS), Catherine was ready with studies and statistics. Some days half a dozen e-mails would go back and forth, not all of them full of information. Sometimes it was long-time-a-coming advice on how to deal with that censoring presence that can afflict a writer midnovel and a person midlife:

  So I have to be the one to explain the facts of life to you (sigh). Sit up straight, uncross your knees, and pay attention: at the age of fifty-whatever, it is now time to get rid of that little nun who’s been sitting on your shoulder and talking into your ear for the last four decades. Thank her for keeping you out of trouble in your wild-oats years (though I bet she didn’t), and let her fly away (your back isn’t what it was, and she really is too heavy).

  Sometimes it was a name and contact. (José Rigau in Puerto Rico “knows everything about that portion of the expedition.” Ditto for Tom Colvin on the Philippine and Mexican portions. Also Michael Smith in Oklahoma, Susana Ramírez in Madrid …) Soon, I was shuttling around the world in cyberspace, coming “home” to the story with information I needed.

  When I finally put the finished manuscript in the mail, I was stricken by the writer’s version of empty-nest syndrome. I sent Catherine a forlorn e-mail. She was having none of that. No way I was done, she flashed back. I was one of the carriers now. Again, Catherine’s right. I’ll be telling this story for the rest of my life.

  A Reading and Discussion Guide

  1. The two stories in this novel—Alma Huebner’s contemporary story and Isabel Sendales y Gómez’s nineteenth-century story—are narrated from strikingly different points of view. Alma’s is told in third person (she did this, she thought that). Isabel’s is told in first person (I did this, I thought that). Why do you think the author chose these particular points of view for her two characters?

  2. Alma is inspired by Isabel’s story. Isabel’s courage and strength of character help Alma cope with her own fears and with the frightening situations she ultimately encounters. What in Alma’s character might have impressed and inspired Isabel?

  3. Both women are attracted to and influenced by men with visions of helping mankind. What are the other clear parallels between these women’s lives and struggles?

  4. Which character do you most identify with an
d why? Would you make the same decisions as that character?

  5. After Don Francisco finishes dictating a letter addressed to his wife, Doña Isabel begins to cry, moved by his gentle words (page 204). “Some day,” he says to Isabel, “someone will write you such a letter, Doña Isabel. And you will think of me, perhaps.” Why do you suppose he says that to her, and how would you describe their relationship?

  6. Helen is the only person to whom Alma confides about being unable to finish the novel. Why do you think Alma is able to entrust Helen with her doubts and fears? Is there something special about Helen that allows Alma to divulge her secrets?

  7. What motivates people to try to “save the world”? What has/would motivate you to take up a humanitarian cause?

  8. Is there a right way to carry out our humanitarian urges? In this novel, many characters try, in their own ways, to better the lives of the people around them. How did Tara, Mickey, and Hannah, the “terrorist” boys at the clinic, and Helen try to bring about change? Did these characters accomplish their goals in the end? Did Don Francisco, who forged humanitarianism with ego and ambition, achieve his true objective?

  9. Saving the World suggests that there is a distinction between storytelling in our culture (the publishing business) and storytelling in our personal lives: as Alma worries about the significance of literature today—about modern publishing’s emphasis on fame and selfpromotion—she also uses Isabel’s story as a kind of mantra or guide as she navigates tricky, scary waters in her own life. How do you think the business of publishing affects the role of storytelling in our culture? What role can stories play in helping us change our own lives?