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Definition of Setting
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or it can be an imagined... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the city of New York, or... read full definition
Setting is where and when a story or scene takes place. The where can be a real place like the... read full definition
Setting
Explanation and Analysis:
Scythe takes place hundreds of years in the future, in what the novel calls the post-mortal age. The exact timeframe is not clarified in the book, but some elements are clear. Humans achieved artificial intelligence and, soon after, medical immortality, in 2042.
One of the excerpts from Curie's gleaning journal calls this "a year every schoolchild knows." The plot of the novel likely takes place about 300 years after this, as another of Curie's journal entries notes that that is the age of the oldest living humans at the time. However, the exact timeline is probably unclear to almost all the characters in the novel. People in the post-mortal world no longer count years, instead naming years after animals. It suffices to say that the story takes place in a distant future that hardly remembers the present day.
The events of the story take place over the course of about one year. Faraday first visits Citra in November, and she and Rowan train with him for several months. Faraday's "murder" takes place in March, just after Vernal Conclave. Rowan and Citra train with Goddard and Curie throughout the summer (hence Goddard's many pool parties) until the Harvest Conclave when they reunite briefly. Citra's exile to the Chileargentine region, as well as Rowan's participation in the massacre at the Tonist conclave, take place over the winter. The novel's climax takes place on January 2 of the following year (the year of the Capybara) at Winter Conclave, when Citra and Rowan fight and eventually escape with Faraday.
The physical setting of the story, for the most part, is MidMerica. The novel contains few specifics about this geographical region, though from its name readers can assume it refers approximately to what is now the central United States. There are a few specific MidMerican places mentioned in the novel. The Conclaves take place in Fulcrum City, which was seemingly built on the site of St. Louis, Missouri. (On their first visit, the apprentices see the ruin of the Gateway Arch, destroyed by "terrorism," a word Citra doesn't know.) Citra also visits Curie's home at Fallingwater, the famous house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in western Pennsylvania. The specific location of Rowan and Citra's home city is never named, nor are the other locations in the novel, like the residences of Goddard or Xenocrates. Other regions in the world are mentioned, like PanAsia and the Chileargentine region. But since the Thunderhead eliminated all world governments, these are not political designations, only geographical ones.
Related Themes:
