The Mark

The Mark, the award-winning debut novel of Icelandic writer Frida Isberg, now translated into English by Larissa Kyzer, offers the reader a glimpse of one possible future, though whether its proposal is utopian or dystopian will differ from reader to reader just as it does from character to character. In it, psychologists have developed an empathy test which sets a minimum standard and is designed to highlight those who are more likely to hurt others and commit crimes. If you pass the test, you are ‘marked’, a description that can apply to an individual or an entire neighbourhood. If you fail the test, you will be supported with therapy, but a central question of the novel is whether such failure will automatically make you a second-class citizen. The novel’s success lies largely in Isberg’s approach, focussing her narrative on the lives of four individuals in alternating chapters as a referendum on whether to make the test compulsory approaches.

Oli is the most directly involved in the referendum as spokesperson for PSYCH, the Icelandic Psychological association, who are campaigning for a Yes vote. Oli’s belief in the benefits of a psychological approach is rooted in his own life:

“Oli was allocated a weekly appointment with a psychologist on Tuesdays between French and biology and it was during these sessions that he learned to identify the feeling of turmoil he sometimes felt.”

Alongside the stress of running the campaign, Oli has personal problems to face as his wife, Solveig, also a psychologist, is against the text becoming mandatory, though we quickly sense that this is not the only issue in his marriage. As the vote nears, he is facing death threats and comes home one night to find his tyres slashed. The vandal is another of Isberg’s main characters, Tristan, a young man who feels threatened by the test having watched his older brother fail and then become addicted to the drug given to him in order to improve his empathy. Tristan drops out of school and works at the harbour, intending to save enough money for a place of his own which he is determined to buy before the vote:

“…all the guys on YouTube started talking about how the only way to be safe, long-term, was to buy your own apartment because otherwise you’d just end up on the street when the powers that be made the mark a requirement…”

Vetur has the opposite problem – she lives in fear of an ex-boyfriend, Daniel, and wishes that the building she lived in was marked but, as long as one resident opposes this, it cannot go ahead. As a teacher, we see the implementation of the test (called a ‘sensitivity assessment’ to make it seem less threatening) in schools though her eyes. She worries not only about the institutional response to those who do not pass, but also how it will affect behaviour on an individual level:

“What if I accidentally discriminate against them or am suddenly afraid of them without meaning to be?”

The final character of the four is Eyja, recently divorced, whose company has decided to become marked – that is, for all its staff to sit and pass the test. She sees her ‘failure’, however, as an affirmation of who she is:

“…these are precisely her strengths, no matter what society says. They are what give her an edge over others.”

Through these four characters, Isberg explores her theoretical future in a very practical manner. All four remain sympathetic, but all four have important weaknesses which are revealed as the novel progresses: Oli’s ironic lack of self-awareness; Tristan’s irrational fears and anger; Ventur’s inability to overcome the past; and Eyja’s attempts to recreate her past to suit her own feelings of victimhood. Isberg also includes some small but significant indications of her future setting such as the AI ‘Zoé’ and the ability of characters to say ‘nine, nine, nine’ to get immediate police help. but at no point does the speculative nature of the novel overwhelm the narrative or the characters.

Translator Larissa Kyzer is brave enough to retain elements of Icelandic where, for example, the word itself is key to the point being made:

“…we’re a society, a samfélag. Sam-, as in co-, as in together. Félag, as in association, fellowship, club union.”

Other elements are included as verbal punctuation, such as “já, já”. The only thing missing is a translator’s afterword which would certainly have been interesting.

The Mark is one of the most intriguing of recent dystopias, perhaps because it’s future is so plausible, gentle even, and its characters so engaging. Rather than simply predict disaster, it offers us a future that is both progressive and restrictive. In the end it refuses to become polemical – read it and make up your own mind.