Marc Antoine: Master Illusionist

Miguel Cervantes

9/25/17

            There’s something about Marc Antoine that makes me think he is a master illusionist. 

             In The Charm Buyers, we are taken on a unique journey that encompasses themes of family, community, history and migration, all in an area that is one of the most beautiful places on earth.  As the central protagonist and narrator of this journey, Marc Antoine is our conduit into this world, the Tahitian Hakka community of the 1970’s.  Marc’s parents divorce when he is young and much of his early life is shaped by his great-grandmother A-tai, placing him squarely under the influence of the older generation of Hakkas in his youth, and later under the auspices of more modern influences when he goes to live with his father. 

This divide in his upbringing is key, for Marc is quite perceptive, and in addition to his acute experience of familial pressure he also becomes painfully aware of what it feels like to live in a small community on a small island in a remote part of the world; a place where people require the lure of illusions in order to sustain themselves.  These illusions take many forms.  Gossip and rumor spread rapidly throughout the Hakka community, where almost every neighbor is a distant relative of some sort.  Industry and entrepreneurship are highly valued as well, and money becomes central to family relationships, a means of communication, something that is especially true in the case of Marc Antoine and his father. 

All throughout The Charm Buyers one gets the strong sense that Marc Antoine is searching for something genuine, whether it is his relationship with his cousin Marie-Laure or a means of coming to terms with his father, his new bride and their family pearl business.  Yet in order to make his way through this society Marc Antoine himself must become a master illusionist, something that starts at the very beginning with his great-grandmother A-tai, who represents a living link to Hakka history. 

She fills her great-grandson’s head with tales of ancient China, of their robber-baron kin and their fantastic exploits.  This is genuine Hakka history, but even A-tai cannot recall exactly why their people migrated away from China – there are pieces of history missing from the tale, and in the gaps Marc Antoine is left to dream of the rest. 

“‘We come from the North,’ A-Tai said, but it was so long ago.  No one talked about why we, the Hakka, had left this North or where it was located: in China?  Further North?  It was vague like everything else, real only in the voice of the storyteller.” (p. 21)

Right from the start then we become aware that invention comes naturally to the Hakka people; as immigrants without a complete knowledge of their own history it is something that they are forced to do, and Marc Antoine, as a Hakka, is born into this tradition.  The makings of an illusionist are already in his blood.  And it’s not just Marc Antoine.  As early as p. 13 we get a glimpse of the younger generation’s view of life in Tahiti in the voice of Harris, Marc Antoine’s cousin.  Just about everything around them, is seems, is steeped in illusion, in the lasting value of the exterior.  Feminine physical beauty, material status symbols and even the island of Tahiti itself are a part of this grand charade.

“Beauty is everything.  The reputation of the whole-fucking island was built on beauty.  The sacred illusion.  That’s why a family of beautiful women loves Marie-Laure.  She isn’t about illusion and illusion is hard work in the end…” (p. 13)

Marc Antoine doesn’t seek to contradict Harris.  He is painfully aware of this truth, observing its effect on his own life, particularly when it comes to open and genuine communication with people like his cousin Marie-Laure. 

“Why had Marie-Laure changed her mind about going to the party? Her dress, her long, smooth hair – didn’t she want to go?  It was like everything else I knew – the things that no one said out loud, so that the more questions I asked, the more hidden the answers remained.” (p. 21)

In order to succeed in a place where illusion is the preferred currency, Marc Antoine swiftly becomes a skilled illusionist himself, convincing Edouard Ma of his capabilities as a paka distributor without knowing a single thing about the business.  Of additional importance to note here is that Marc Antoine did not head into this meeting with any intent to deceive – the illusory tale of himself as an expert in logistics and distribution came about entirely in response to a simple need to communicate, to make his value known.

“‘You’re right,’ I said.  ‘I do know it all.  I know that if you wanted to hide a million francs, you’d grow it in the van-tui.’” (p. 23)

The first meeting between Marc Antoine and Edouard Ma proves to be quite important, setting the stage for Marc Antoine’s first real bid at financial independence from his father.  But the notion of false exteriors and their consequences does not sit merely in the realm of business.  It affects every aspect of Hakka life, particularly their social experiences.  Marc notices this quite readily during his illicit courtship of the older (and married) Aurore de Chatelet, sensing that she too is actively engaged in the maintenance of this fragile perceptive state.

“I couldn’t stop looking at her, the curve of her, eyes and mouth, and always, she turned to look back at me, saying nothing and yet improbably serene, as if she were happy and as if it were enough.” (p. 35)

And so Marc Antoine finds himself in the odd position of being part and parcel of the illusion surrounding him, yet also deeply aware of its fragility and emptiness.  There’s a sense of tragedy here, a grand sense of the inescapable, something that Marc Antoine ponders as he considers the beauty of the place he calls home.

“People talked about how beautiful it was, the sea and the sky and the flowers.  But there was always that underlying feeling that Tahiti was an island and you always ended up driving the same road around it.  Not much new, not much to think about.  So beautiful, they said, and then they left.” (p. 31) 

Observations like these make a strong case for Marc Antoine’s mastery of the illusion around him.  He is buffeted by the currents of life like everyone else, but in his keen awareness of the world around him lies a source of strength.  The island itself and the seeming limitations of life lived in such a small sphere act as a constraint on many around him, hemming their minds into such a narrow focus that only the most visible and ostentatious of things evoke their awe.  Yet for Marc Antoine such things are only part of the world they occupy, indicators of a much grander and deeper connection that both he and his community can aspire to.

“There was what you showed, how things appeared, and there was the way it really was.” (p. 57)

Layer by layer Marc Antoine strips away the flimsy façade of his world simply by living his life.  His mistakes, his joys, his quiet moments of introspection – all of these things help create a fuller vision of what will truly fulfill him, making him quite the master illusionist indeed, one of the few to seek outside the illusion rather than within it.