4 The Back of the Turtle features two main settings: the town of Samaritan Bay and its environs (including the Smoke River Reserve), located somewhere on the West Coast of British Columbia, and the Domidion Corporation’s headquarters in downtown Toronto. While the novel portrays Toronto in realist fashion, Samaritan Bay represents a more liminal, otherworldly locale. It is in this supernatural coastal town where Nicholas Crisp lives as a reimagined mythological figure. Although many of the novel’s scenes take place at Domidion’s headquarters and other places in Toronto, the three pivotal scenes I will discuss here all occur in and around Samaritan Bay, revealing the importance of the place to the novel as a whole. Samaritan Bay’s existence on the threshold between the real world and the fantastic comes into focus in the novel’s opening scene, on the shores of the Pacific Ocean, following an ecologically devastating event called “The Ruin” that has turned the small town into an abandoned wasteland.

5 Three characters appear in the novel’s prologue: Crisp, his companion Soldier the dog (whom Crisp refers to as “Master Dog”), and the aforementioned Gabriel Quinn. The novel’s opening lines contribute to an interpretation of Samaritan Bay and The Back of the Turtle as a place and narrative informed by mythology: “First light. The shore in shadows, the fog banked on the horizon. Water, land, and the line of the tide. So it would begin” (1). King mimics the storytelling of both Christian and Indigenous creation stories, like the Genesis tale and the Skywoman story, two very different accounts that describe the world’s origins. Crisp does not utter, “Let there be light,” but with the arrival of dawn he and Soldier do sit on a rise overlooking the waters of the bay sharing an apple — the forbidden fruit. This prologue also underscores the importance of water (in the form of fog, seawater, and the tide) to the narrative. In his article “Pipelines, Mines, and Dams,” William Huggins argues that King repeatedly uses water in his published works to represent life, vitality, and nature: “This liquid resonance plays itself out again in Thomas King’s (Cherokee) body of work. Of his published oeuvre, five books include water in their titles, reinforcing the vitality of this unique substance to all life” (59). This sentiment informs an analysis of Crisp, who in this initial scene is immediately connected to both water (and through it nature) and the fantastic, as he sits on a hill conversing with a dog, watching the sun rise over his watery domain. Crisp’s importance here bookends the novel, as he is both the first and last character to speak, despite his secondary status to characters like Gabriel, Mara, and Dorian.

6 In this opening scene, Crisp and Soldier reflect various elements that are part of a pointed revisioning of Genesis. The duo share breakfast as they watch Gabriel descend onto the beach: “Crisp pulled an apple from his back pocket, split it with his knife, held out the fatter half for the dog. ‘’Tis the stuff of creation,’ he said, ‘and a remedy for the bowels’” (1). This is no traditional account of the Judeo-Christian creation story. Crisp, a figure with supernatural resonances, and Soldier, an immortal dog (a character that was presumed dead in King’s 1999 novel Truth and Bright Water), sit on the ecologically devastated Samaritan Bay coast sharing the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. However, Samaritan Bay is not the Garden of Eden, even if it is a supernatural space — it has already been spoiled and ruined by human machinations. Robin Ridington reinforces this assessment in his article “Got Any Grapes?”: “No prohibition here about eating forbidden fruit. The God who issued that decree hasn’t been seen for a long time” (165). On the shores of Samaritan Bay, the apple is not a danger to be avoided, but a healthful cure. Crisp is no traditional Adam, Soldier certainly no Eve, and the only serpent in the garden will not appear until the novel’s conclusion (the Anguis is named after a genus of snakelike, legless lizards). Moreover, Crisp himself may even represent a personified forbidden fruit — his name mimics several varieties of apple like the Honeycrisp and Cosmic Crisp (or, of course, apple crisp dessert), he loves the colour red, and he speaks in enigmatic though knowledgeable truths throughout the text. Through Crisp and other characters, King wraps his tale in multilayered mythologies and creation stories, cultivating a curious synthesis of varied traditions. As Ridington notes, “The human characters have mythic resonances in the same way that mythic characters have human attributes” (164). This opening scene informs the reader that the novel is not set in an entirely real world, but on some surreal borderland between reality and the supernatural informed by a variety of mythologies and traditional stories.

7 Initially King does not provide a physical description of Nicholas Crisp, but does so shortly thereafter when Gabriel meets Crisp in the town: “He imagined that Nicholas Crisp would be short and thin, with translucent skin and a soft chin, but the man who walked into the Tin Turtle was tall and lanky with a bald head, sharp blue eyes, and a red beard that floated about his face like a cloud on fire” (31). Throughout the novel, Crisp shuns clothing and frequently appears nude. On one such occasion other aspects of Crisp’s physical characteristics are described: “The man looked to have been put together from unrelated parts. Bald head, flaming beard, smooth muscular chest and stomach, trim waist, and thin, sinewy legs that were covered with hair that reminded Gabriel of a goat” (220). Crisp’s physical description borders on the fantastic. His features hint at the supernatural — his facial hair mimics the bearded countenance of Neptune, while his caprine legs allude to the satyrs and fauns of legend as well as the classical deity Pan or Faunus. Moreover, Crisp’s penchant for nudity visually mimics the statues and renderings of Neptune, as well as Greco-Roman sensibilities of modesty (or lack thereof). Crisp, then, an exhibitionist who lives at Samaritan Bay’s hot springs, and who sports a flaming red beard and goat-like legs, clearly embodies an updated iteration of the classical Neptune, including his affinity for water.

8 Shortly after their initial meeting, Crisp and Gabriel begin a discussion of names. This conversation buttresses an assessment of Crisp as a supernatural figure, blurring the boundaries and splicing the elements of a multitude of varied traditions, while also gesturing to various mythological corollaries for other characters. The duo discusses their names: “‘Nicholas is a fine name.’ ‘It covers the territory, it does. St. Nick. Old Nick. Christmas and hell. And all the bleeding nicks of life in between’” (35). Crisp directly compares himself to two prominent legendary figures sharing his name, Santa Claus and Satan, running the gamut from the most beloved to the most reviled. Although Crisp fails to serve as a devil character in the novel (but could be classified as trickster), he does mimic the traits of Santa Claus, as he constantly provides gifts in the form of food and sustenance (and free tickets to his hot springs) to the other characters. Furthermore, his Neptunesque beard also mirrors Santa Claus’s own facial hair, and Crisp’s love of red (the entire interior of his trailer is decorated in red) hints at Santa’s similar fondness for the colour. Even Crisp’s surname reminds the reader of another nickname for Santa Claus: Kris Kringle.

9 Gabriel next provides his own name to a delighted Crisp: “‘Gabriel!’ Crisp’s voice rushed through the trees like a truck in a tunnel. ‘Now there’s thunder and storm. The best-loved of the four angels.1 The one chosen to announce the birth of John the Baptist and to reveal the Qur’an to Muhammad. It’s Gabriel what tells Mary about the road ahead’” (35). Interestingly, here King reveals the Indigenous character Gabriel’s connection to the Judeo-Christian and Islamic traditions, while the White character Crisp, in addition to being well-versed in these traditions, is connected to classical antiquity and, later, the Anishinaabe creation story. In this way, The Back of the Turtle communicates to the reader that the characters’ names and their mythic resonances are worth noting. Moreover, the characters’ backgrounds and ethnicities do not align neatly with their fantastic references, presenting a far more complex and varied set of possible interpretations. Aside from Crisp and Gabriel, the novel’s other characters also possess discernable references to a multiplicity of supernatural and traditional figures. Mara, aside from being reminiscent of the Virgin Mary just mentioned by Crisp, is also the name of the demon of death and desire that tempted the Buddha on his path to Nirvana, in much the same way that she also tempts and teases Gabriel on his path to redemption. Dorian Asher, the novel’s antagonist, metatextually evokes the notorious narcissism of Oscar Wilde’s Dorian Gray through his disregard for the environment and habit of soothing himself with extravagant purchases. Finally, even Winter Lee, Dorian’s assistant and a relatively minor character, personifies the coldness of the season itself through her calculating and emotionless presence. These characters, like Crisp, reveal the elaborate web of contradictory and competing traditions and references synthesized in King’s text.

10 The Back of the Turtle is a novel replete with compelling moments and scenes. However, there is perhaps no scene as pivotal as Crisp’s birthday party on the night of the full moon. Crisp invites Samaritan Bay’s remaining denizens to his planned Bacchanalia — perhaps in this case a Neptunalia as well — at the natural hot springs where he makes his home. Aside from connecting Crisp even more directly with water, this scene also introduces other mythological and supernatural elements to the novel’s narrative, including the Anishinaabe story from which the novel derives its name. Crisp adds an otherworldly spectre to the event when presenting an invitation to Gabriel: “Crisp stepped off the deck and gave his pants a quick brush. ‘No, no, stay here. Enjoy your day. Come by the pools at the full moon, for the waters will be in riot with insomnia and lycanthropy’” (64). Crisp not only anthropomorphizes water in his invitation, he also gestures to werewolf folklore, hinting at the possibility of a supernatural transformation at his celebration. Crisp’s repeated connections to water throughout the novel, from the opening scene on the beach, to his birthday at the hot springs, to a later miracle he will work on the shore, reinforce his position as a Neptune figure with a power over the substance.

11 Like any mythic character, Nicholas Crisp is an ageless figure. When he invites Gabriel, Mara, and the other residents of the town to his festivities, he remains enigmatic regarding his actual age. Aside from Crisp’s own coyness, the novel itself hints that Crisp is not merely older than he appears, he is preternaturally ancient. On more than one occasion, Mara queries Crisp about his age: “‘And just how old are you Mr. Crisp?’ ‘Old.’ Crisp laughed and rubbed the side of his nose. ‘Old and worn to an edge, if it’s the truth ye wish’” (107). Later, Mara continues to playfully goad Crisp about his advanced years: “‘And you’re not as young as you used to be, Mr. Crisp.’ ‘Indeed, Mistress Mara,’ said Crisp, ‘Not by an eternity’” (495). Finally, King also references the character’s longevity as he soaks in the hot springs waiting for his guests to arrive: “For the first time in a very long while, Crisp felt alive. They were all here now. Mara, Soldier, and this Gabriel. So, it had begun. At last, it had begun” (85). Not only has Crisp been waiting a very long while — maybe even an eternity — for a specific event, but he portends the importance of the other characters arriving on the scene and carrying out whatever assigned roles they have in the narrative. Crisp, then, represents a metatextual awareness of his own place in the novel — he knows what will occur, and what each character’s role will be. Crisp exists, therefore, not only as a mythic figure, but as a self-reflexive, postmodern one. He is not only ageless, but seems aware that he is participating in a story, and that the narrative itself has reached a tipping point with the arrival of the other major characters.

12 The novel’s confluence of myth and reality continues as Gabriel and Mara arrive at the pools for Crisp’s celebration. The dreamlike nature of Crisp’s hot springs also reverberates into the literary realm — the locale comprises nine interconnected descending pools, alluding to Dante’s Inferno while also contributing to an estimation of Samaritan Bay as a kind of purgatory. However, as with the other references peppered throughout King’s text, the allusions do not neatly align but paint a more complex picture. Moreover, Crisp — like any good Roman deity — demonstrates an affinity for Latin, reiterating his connection to the water god of antiquity. As Gabriel and Mara arrive at Crisp’s hot springs, they cross a boundary from Samaritan Bay into an even more liminal and surreal space:

Because Crisp manages the hot springs, and utilizes Latin at other points in the novel, the reader can assume that he is the one who has carved “I endure eternal” into the timbers at the entrance of his dominion. This understanding is reinforced later in the scene, when Crisp reiterates this phrase in English, confirming his own existence as an immortal Neptune-like figure: “Crisp rubbed his belly and let loose a tremendous belch that buried itself in the night. ‘I endure eternal!’ And then he cast himself off the rock and slid smoothly into the water, without leaving so much as a bubble or a ripple to mark his passing” (246). Crisp’s evocation of a water deity emerges. Not only does he declare his immortality to the reader (for all the guests have departed when he bellows that line), but he also melts into the waters of the hot springs without a trace, highlighting his ethereal nature. Furthermore, Crisp’s understanding of himself as a literary figure can be further clarified here: as long as copies of The Back of the Turtle continue to exist, so will Nicholas Crisp, giving him a longevity far surpassing any mortal.

13 As Crisp waits for his guests to arrive earlier in the evening, his point of view establishes not only his abiding affection for water but also his potential ability to control the life-giving liquid itself. Crisp stands as a compelling figure possessing supernatural abilities, even if they are muted and restrained, rather than a direct embodiment of the classical deity:

If the reader discounts the mundane possibility that the lanterns festooned around the pools are connected to a Clapper™ and that Crisp is merely delusional about his ability to control the elements, only a supernatural explanation remains. On its surface, the mundane accounting may be plausible, but it would require that the reader ignore the novel’s many other supernatural allusions and events. The second possible interpretation, more likely considering the weight of the evidence, is that Crisp is indeed a mythic figure with the ability to control the water particles in the fog as well as other elements like the light in the lanterns. The novel’s use of allegory and mythology throughout its narrative, including during the all-important recounting of the Anishinaabe creation story at Crisp’s birthday party, imply that the second understanding is closer to the truth.

14 As noted earlier, the title of The Back of the Turtle is derived from the Anishinaabe story “The Woman Who Fell from the Sky.” The novel retells this Indigenous origin story at the hot springs during Crisp’s celebration, creating a direct connection between mythology and the supernatural, the watery hot springs of Crisp’s domain, and the various characters of the novel itself. Interestingly, despite both Gabriel’s and Mara’s Indigenous ethnic backgrounds, they both demur and encourage Crisp to recount the Anishinaabe story. Crisp delights in telling the Skywoman account, bombastically splashing and diving throughout the pools as he recounts it. The novel directly alludes to Genesis — first broached in the prologue — immediately before Crisp begins his performance. Floating in the surreal pools surrounded by mist and fog, Mara asserts: “I wonder . . . if this is what Eden was like” (224). Here, the novel presents an interesting contradiction. Despite their similarities as creation stories, the Judeo-Christian legend of Eden and the Anishinaabe Skywoman story nevertheless have little in common: they present competing views of nature and humanity’s place in the world. Given The Back of the Turtle’s use of intertwined myths, this informs an understanding of the novel as a whole. Although Skywoman stands paramount in the novel, Eve lurks in the background. After recounting “The Woman Who Fell from the Sky,” Crisp himself comments on the relationship between the two origin stories:

Despite his non-Indigenous background, Crisp aligns himself with Skywoman rather than Genesis. Robin Wall Kimmerer shares Crisp’s assessment of the two creation stories in her collection of essays, Braiding Sweetgrass. She compares the two divergent origin myths:

Despite their similarities as creation stories, the Adam and Eve myth and Skywoman story stand apart. Whereas Genesis provides one understanding of living within the natural world, “The Woman Who Fell from the Sky” offers an entirely different worldview. Despite these extensive differences, however, King juxtaposes the stories in The Back of the Turtle in both its narrative and its characters, when he mixes stories, myths, tales, and legends from a range of traditions and backgrounds. Despite our monumental differences and backgrounds, King’s text implies, we must nevertheless reconcile our histories to build a new future together. A future that does not forget our pasts, but does not hold us in thrall to them either. King himself bolstered this understanding of his novel in a 2014 interview at The Banff Centre, when he discussed the importance of reconciliation, rebuilding, resilience, and renewal:

Humanity’s dark past and its conflicted legacy cannot be ignored, but only by working together in a shared, diverse community can we ward off environmental destruction like “The Ruin” that devastated Samaritan Bay.

15 In his enthusiastic retelling of the Anishinaabe story, Nicholas Crisp reveals two important points. First, he contrasts the Eden legend and the Skywoman story in a way that critiques Genesis while foregrounding the Indigenous tradition. Second, Crisp refers to “The Woman Who Fell from the Sky” as our story. Crisp is not Indigenous. How can it be his story? This adds another potential dimension to both King’s implied audience and Crisp’s mythic status. In Crisp’s performance of Skywoman, he only proceeds after both Mara and Gabriel demur. Moreover, although Crisp is himself at least superficially non-Indigenous, his character is informed by the left-handed twin of the tale, making the story part his own as well. In this way, King brings readers, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous alike, into the Skywoman mythos — for Indigenous readers it represents their own oral traditions, and for non-Indigenous a lesson which they can also now associate with and benefit from. In order for this analogy to work, then, Crisp cannot be wholly Neptune or wholly non-Indigenous. Thankfully, King’s complex web of legendary references provides an alternate persona to Crisp. Not only does Crisp stand in for Neptune and share a connection to Adam, he also represents one of the twins mentioned in the Skywoman tale in this reading. Like his twin brother Dad (character Sonny’s father), Crisp was born of Skywoman. As the first-born, he is the older sibling, and therefore the left-handed one who complicates and perfects the works of his more rigid, right-handed brother, completing the world as an intricate and complex place. Crisp recounts what may be his own part in the story:

Ridington confirms this assessment of Crisp’s status: “Dad and Crisp, a previous generation of twins, had their own moment of creation. . . . The right-handed twin made things straight and the left-handed brother made them twisted. Dad seems to have disappeared long ago, but Crisp is very much alive, being the fixer-upper” (166-67). A query from Mara leads Crisp to divulge more of his own connection to the story and his immense age:

Crisp’s assertion can be read as hyperbolic, in the way Mara and Gabriel seem to take it, but perhaps Crisp is being matter-of-fact. He may be revealing his true history, but the story seems so outlandish that in his telling of truth, its reality is nevertheless obscured. The weight of the evidence favours taking Crisp at his word. He is not quite Adam, not quite Neptune, and not quite the left-handed twin. He is, however, an amalgamation of all three mythic figures (and others as well). Crisp’s relationships boast even more supernatural connections. His departed twin brother, Dad, is not only the right-handed twin, but perhaps also the Judeo-Christian deity. The God of the Old Testament could certainly be described as one of “assurances and admonishments,” and his many commandments for Sonny underscore this understanding (239). Sonny, meanwhile, is also a multilayered figure — as the offspring of Dad, he is a Christ-like figure who brings salvation to the beach with his tower while he also “wields Thor’s hammer” (Ridington 164). Moreover, Sonny also bears responsibility for constructing a sort of anti-Tower of Babel on the beach of Samaritan Bay out of the animal remains and detritus left in the wake of “The Ruin.” Unlike the original edifice, Sonny’s brings diverse people together for a common cause, rather than tearing them apart. When Sonny lights the beacon atop his tower, he brings the events of The Back of the Turtle to a crescendo. This understanding of Sonny, Dad, Crisp and other characters reveals how King’s text draws from and amends an expansive array of stories from disparate backgrounds and cultures to present a message of reconciliation and shared community in the face of disaster.

16 Throughout King’s novel, an ominous spectre of environmental destruction hangs over the narrative. Before the novel begins, the residents of Samaritan Bay had experienced a cataclysmic ecological event when the Domidion Corporation’s genetically engineered defoliant GreenSweep was improperly used at an oil pipeline site near the town. Referred to by Crisp as “The Ruin,” the herbicide not only razed a wide swath of vegetation along Kali Creek and the Smoke River, but obliterated animal life along its course and into Samaritan Bay when it reached the sea. King’s use of an oil pipeline as the locus of Indigenous trauma remains both poignant and relevant throughout North America, as present-day projects like Trans Mountain in Canada or Dakota Access in the United States continue to garner opposition from Indigenous rights activists and environmentalists alike. The potential for environmental devastation caused by such projects is emphasized in King’s text by the death left in GreenSweep’s wake, where the only reminder of the turtles that once migrated to the Samaritan Bay shore in droves are their sun-bleached skeletons.

17 King’s novel embodies the ever-present environmental threat in the form of the Anguis, a derelict vessel containing a horrifying quantity of the remaining GreenSweep and other deadly chemicals adrift on the world’s oceans. The Back of the Turtle concludes with a pivotal, climactic scene when the Anguis, like a ghost ship of legend, washes ashore at Samaritan Bay. Having sailed from Montreal months earlier, the Anguis was wrecked in a squall and disappeared. Somehow, the unpowered ship makes its way from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the coast of British Columbia, an amazing feat and one that ocean currents alone cannot explain.2 The Anguis itself acts as an ominous and ghostly supernatural figure, imbued with a power and sinister purpose that no normal ship can possess. Furthermore, as noted earlier, the reptilian origins of the ship’s name give the vessel a demonic aspect. The Anguis is the snake in the garden, but it is an environmental demon created by humans. Although the shadow of the Anguis haunts the reader throughout the novel through Dorian’s and Winter’s musing about the vessel’s fate, the ship does not enter the narrative in a physical form until King’s conclusion.

18 As the novel’s characters stand on the beach admiring Sonny’s tower and sharing a meal, the Anguis emerges out of nowhere from an unearthly fog bank. Crisp detects the ship before it appears:

The supernatural features of this passage are extensive. Crisp displays a variety of unearthly abilities as the Anguis arrives. First, he predicts the arrival of the derelict before it emerges from the fog, perhaps due to his Neptunesque connection to the sea. In order to save Sonny, Crisp proceeds with superhuman speed to rescue the boy from the surf before he is crushed by the ship. Soldier, too, the immortal dog, warns the crowd of the approaching terror. Finally, the Anguis itself, like some nightmare spawn, plows into the shore unannounced, holding the secret of its deadly cargo. King’s physical description of the battered vessel bolsters this interpretation: “The hull was cold and hollow, and great rivers of rust ran down its sides, as though the beast had been wounded and bled” (498). Dented, corroded, blackened, torn, rusting, wounded, and bleeding: the Anguis, like its name implies, is the embodiment of anguish, and with a will of its own it seems alive — or, at the very least, undead. By all rights, the derelict hulk should not even be afloat, let alone able to sail the ocean to arrive precisely at the exact time and place of the novel’s pivotal conclusion.

19 If the Anguis itself is a supernatural force, only another mythic character can drive the nautical demon back into the sea. In order to slay the monstrous Chimera, the characters of King’s novel need their own Bellerophon. Thankfully for the text’s characters, the people of Samaritan Bay have such a hero in the form of Nicholas Crisp. Here, more than anywhere else in The Back of the Turtle, does Crisp reveal himself as a supernatural figure and reimagined Neptune. Crisp demands help from Gabriel, Mara, Sonny, and others as he attempts to push the vessel back into the sea. Crisp orchestrates a community effort to ward off the environmental destruction contained in the derelict’s hold. He uses his superhuman strength, Gabriel leads the group in a traditional Anishinaabe song, and Sonny adds his mythic hammer to the effort. Then, something miraculous happens:

This exhilarating scene is central to understanding both Crisp’s character and King’s novel as a whole. Not only does it underscore the mythological features of the text, the town of Samaritan Bay, and Nicholas Crisp, it also demonstrates the notion that “King’s novel is a timely and necessary story of hope and resilience in the face of perpetual disaster” (Follett 61). Crisp, after utilizing superhuman speed and premonition to rescue the other characters from impending doom, organizes them to work together to save not only the town, but perhaps the world. As he orchestrates Gabriel and Mara in their singing, Sonny in his hammering, and the other characters in their pushing, he summons nature itself to free the Anguis from the sands of the beach. Before the arrival of the colossal waves that dislodge the vessel, Crisp recalls everyone from the surf to the safety of the slope. As the waves and tide batter the derelict, Crisp shouts encouragement, leading the waters in their charge against the death ship, and guiding the characters of Samaritan Bay on their journey to renewal.

20 The Back of the Turtle succeeds as a multilayered and complex allegory of hope and rebirth in a world threatened by perpetual environmental crises. In telling his tale, King draws from and mingles supernatural and mythic figures and tales from an array of contrasting traditions, crafting them into a complex yet complementary whole. Nowhere is this more evident than in Nicholas Crisp, who serves as a reimagined and re-embodied incarnation of not only the classical deity Neptune, but other mythological and traditional figures as well. As the novel reveals, Crisp not only retains features and abilities traditionally ascribed to the water god, but his personal history and familial background also link him to other supernatural figures like the Adam of Genesis and the left-handed twin of the Anishinaabe Skywoman creation story. Moreover, through his links to his brother Dad, both the right-handed twin and the Judeo-Christian deity, and his Christlike nephew Sonny, who nevertheless wields the instruments of Nordic legend, the multilayered nature of both Crisp and the novel itself become apparent.

21 Although we live in a varied and contradictory global system of beliefs and traditions, King demonstrates that humanity must strive to reconcile our differences and come together to prevent the planet’s environmental degradation. If the diverse people of the world can do so, like the heterogeneous community of Samaritan Bay in their shared efforts against “The Ruin” and the Anguis, then there is yet hope. However, although The Back of the Turtle ends on an optimistic note, all is not well. The Anguis continues to drift at sea, hinting at a continual and persisting ecological threat.