| Summary: | Gemini is the most geographical or spatial of Tournier’s novels. Natural occurrences like weather and tides, and spaces shaped by humans, like gardens and landfills, are key “characters” in the novel. Tides illustrate the double meaning of temps (time and weather), and the intertidal creatures that suffer through low tide are a metaphor for all marginals, especially the disabled and homosexual characters of Gemini . Gardens prove the intimate bond between humans and humus, from the lush gardens of Tunisia to the geothermal gardens of Iceland, to the tiny perfection of the Japanese miniature garden. Finally, towering landfills, alive with rats and gulls, present an infernal mirror of our consumer society, a malignant inversion of homo economicus into homo detritus .
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