It’s your relationship with the ground that shifts
Earlier this year, I read The Ministry of Time, the 2024 debut novel by Kaliane Bradley.
The book is a fun sci-fi story of a government employee in the newly founded Ministry of Time, taking care of one of the first time-travellers, known as “expats”.
I often write down little snippets from fiction that capture my imagination. Towards the end of the book, it reaches this conclusion:
“When something changes you constitutionally, you say: ‘the earth moved’. But the earth stays the same. It’s your relationship with the ground that shifts.
The time-travel project was the first time in history that any person had been brought out of their time and into their far future. In this sense, the predicament of the expats was unique. But the rhythms of loss and asylum, exodus and loneliness, roll like floods across human history.”
The book explores the theme of taking people out of their time and space, and what happens. It’s about time travel, but it’s also about the underlying theme of resetting.
Another extract from the very end of the book expands the theme that people should become more than they thought they were…
“Don’t enter believing yourself a node in a grand undertaking, that your past and your trauma will define your future, that individuals don’t matter. The most radical thing I ever did was love him, and I wasn’t even the first person in this story to do that. But you can get it right if you try. You will have hope, and you have been forgiven.
Forgiveness, which takes you back to the person you were and lets you reset them. Hope, which exists in a future in which you are new. Forgiveness and hope are miracles. They let you change your life. They are time-travel.”
So a reflection from a book whose story is not intended to be taken entirely seriously. What doesn’t change…
Love, hope and forgiveness are the constants in this story, recognising that we all share the same rhythms of loss and displacement. It’s the ability we have to reset, and how our relationship with the ground can shift.
This is my blog where I’ve been writing for 20 years. You can follow all of my posts by subscribing to this RSS feed. You can also find me on Bluesky and LinkedIn.