Essay Questions

How does are the themes of religion and science discussed in the novel?

A Canticle for Leibowitz has a cyclical thematic triad of religion being superseded by scientific development then followed by a decline into barbarism. These three themes are all interrelated; often with faith and scientific development played out as a counterweight for humanity’s natural predisposition for violence that often results in it returning into a primitive state of existence. The novel puts forth a provocative question: can science and religion sufficiently quell man’s violent urges? The novel posits that it cannot and the whole novel plays this out in several cycles. The Catholic Church serves as a bastion of humanity by serving as a database for moral teachings and scientific principles but it eventually stagnates and fights to suppress what it once championed: human development. Science cannot effectively hinder man’s appetite for war either as it eventually—or inevitably perhaps—finds its way into the development of some horrible weapon of mass destruction that ends up dooming humanity. What the novel suggests is that the two—science and religion—operating on their own cannot contain and curtail man’s intrinsic drive for violence. The best case scenario is if somehow, some way science and religion could work together; theoretically if science could utilize religion as a sort of indispensable moral tether cord that kept scientific discoveries from being weaponized for war then humanity would not eventually obliterate itself.

What do light and fire symbolize in the novel?

Light and fire are recurring themes/symbols throughout the novel’s timeline. These two concepts often occur simultaneously. Thematically, the two are also used in both a positive and negative frame. Light as being symbolic of knowledge that brings people out of the darkness of ignorance and superstition but there is also the symbol of fire along with the light; fire being the destructive potential intertwined within knowledge brought by light. The dual symbolism of fire and light are also echoed in other literary allusions within the novel. There is the character of Prometheus, The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and Lucifer—all literary allegories that deal with fire and light in some literal or figurative way as bringing both knowledge and destruction to its recipients.

What is the significance of the novel’s title?

A canticle is defined as a song of praise lifted directly from the Bible. The canticle, being a musical term, is also the allegory that the novel uses to describe the flow of events in the story, which covers an expansive timeline ranging from the Early Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the 21st Century, and a distant, imagined, post-apocalyptic future. In a canticle the themes change but there is an underlying rhythm that remains constant and this pattern of changes with certain elements remaining constant is also a theme in the novel. A canticle is also religious matter, often used as a catechetical tool but in the case of the novel instead of religion being the primary topic it is science and issues of modern ethics and morality that it discusses—case in point; the author actually writes a canticle within the novel where he makes reference to Lucifer as a metaphor for nuclear war and the choir responds by calling out for God’s mercy. This fictional canticle warns of the dangers of nuclear war and calls for restraint rather than patriotic summons to war, a theme that echoes the general sentiment of the time during the Cold War.