The Review of Contemporary Fiction
Our Asian Journey by Dallas WiebeIrving Malin
Dallas Wiebe. Our Asian Journey. Mir Editions Canada (Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Onterio, N2L 3C3, Canada),1997. 439 pp. Paper: $30.00.
Dallas Wiebe’s strange philosophical fiction has been published by small presses since the 1960s. This novel is his most significant work. It is an occult text which deals, in part, with an odd, real journey of Mennonites to the Asian continent to locate the site of the Second Coming, the Apocalypse as described in the Revelation of John. It is obsessed with the “end of things.”
The text is a commentary on Revelations (itself a commentary) and, by implications, a commentary by Wiebe on the ultimate meaning of the commentaries. There are three levels, three readings: the structure of Our Asian Journey is a juxtaposition of Joseph’s diary entries written during the pilgrimage to the Asian city; a commentary by Wiebe on the meaning of this calling; two meditations by Joseph on the significance of the Asian journey (as he waits for his death in, of all places, Aberdeen, Idaho).
The novel is wide in scope, in time and space; its very structure suggests that revelation, interpretation of signs (heavenly and earthly) is often unclear, not centered. Revelation depends on the “correct” response to language. The text makes much of obscure phrases, names, tongues. The text is an ascent and a descent, mirroring the emotions of the pilgrims who discover that their destination is hermetically (un)marked. In a kind of postmodernist turn, the author Wiebe, a relation of the actual historical characters, wonders whether he can find meaning in the diverse texts—diaries, scholarly studies—which are written in various languages. How can he discover meaning in history (if it exists)? How can he “translate” the experiences of a strange cult in a strange land? It is easy to dismiss this text as a perverse, diffuse one. But it suggests that “revelation” is always difficult, that epistemology is convoluted, amusing, sad. The very fact that we are baffled may suggest that “the cloud of unknowing” haunts our longing for ultimate truth and salvation. [Irving Malin]