"Absolutamente necesario": The Express Train in Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano, Chapter Twelve

Locomotion is the life-force, and it is death; it is fate itself.

—Clark Blaise, Time Lord¹

1. Expressing Speed

In Under the Volcano, Geoffrey Firmin, a former British consul, despairs over a failed marriage in the bars of Quauhnahuac, Mexico. On this day his former wife, Yvonne, returns to save him, hoping to lure him away from Mexico to an Elysian cabin. Stagnant failures of the past coalesce with apocalyptic visions when the narrative engine of a lifetime comes to a halt and all the boxcars of a lifetime collide with the present.² The Consul is physically killed by an Indian's runaway horse that is frightened by the storm, so the express train is only the figurative cause of his death. On the Day of the Dead, November 2, 1938, from seven A.M. to seven P.M., a lifetime is contained in a day that speeds towards death in a stream-of-consciousness narrative with the accelerating structure of an express train. Typographically, we are on a swift course winding through the Mexican terrain. From the figurative broken track ending Chapter 1 to its continuation in Chapter 2, Under the Volcano makes it clear we have boarded a speeding narrative that conveys death:

Over the town, in the dark tempestuous night, backwards revolved the luminous wheel. ____________________________________________________________ A corpse will be transported by express!³

As a noun, "express" can refer to hyper-chronology, an excess of minutes, a zeal for adventure, a speeding train, or an alcoholic's disease; as a verb, "express" is to communicate, love, and forgive.⁴ The linear track from the first chapter in 1939 carries the express train into 1938 of the second chapter, traveling backwards into the black tunnel—or black hole—of the past for a final, fleeting act of forgiveness.

Upon her arrival in Mexico, Yvonne asks the taxi driver, "But why, Fernando, why should a corpse be transported by express, do you suppose?" Then she reconsiders, "—on the other hand, damn it, Fernando, why shouldn't it? Why shouldn't a corpse be transported by express?" (UV, 44). Fernando reasons: "Absolutamente necesario" (UV, 44). Why is death in a hurry? Why should time speed for a corpse that has vacated time rather than setting a slower pace that would prolong its passage and sustain its longevity? Speeding trains also convey death in Charles Dickens' serial novel, Dombey & Son (1848) and in Alfred Hitchcock's film, The Lady Vanishes (1938)⁵ . Dickens' novel prophesies that industrialized, express time will cause vertigo that leads to death and in Hitchcock's film, the train's velocity is indicative of the vulnerable psychological state of a rushed passenger—such as a spy or a woman separated from her fiancé—who currently lacks the ability to rest securely at home and must keep moving.

The path of life is charted as though on train tracks, relentlessly moving to its final depot despite our itinerary. The train is not only speeding but it is also heading to a destination unstoppably. If a mountain stands in its way, it passes through a dark tunnel. But in Under the Volcano, the express is subterranean—never appearing on stage. With only a few references, the trace of the railroad tracks is faint, even imperceptible; after all, in Quauhnahuac, "there was little to suggest any train ever arrived at this station, let alone left it" (UV, 8). Lowry does not show us the train or its course, but he announces its passage. To consider this image is to interpret the force of speed and read its movement.

Etymologically, "locomotive" comes from locus ("place") and motivus ("causing motion"). As a noun, a locomotive is a self-propelled vehicle for pushing or pulling cars along tracks; a driving or pulling force; an impetus. As an adjective, "locomotive" pertains to the power of progressive motion, or the ability to move independently from place to place, apparently without a conductor or author; yet a locomotive's movement is determined by the railroad track's successive, linear structure. Paradoxically...