The Last Days of Night

Profit and power are dominant forces within the novel. With the advent of electricity, a kind of wealth, “heretofore unknown on the face of the earth was burbling up from beneath these very streets” (4). Manhattan’s place in this system is central. The few streets of Wall Street, Madison Avenue and the like contain nearly all of the electricity in America at this time, fueling the sense of prestige that New York feeds on.

When Paul muses on what kind of man can make such “miracles” as electric light, Westinghouse responds with: “A rich one” (9). Money and resources’ relationship to the act of invention is impossibly intertwined.

The outlier in this argument is Tesla, the only character who is not motivated by money. Paul can recite the exact contents of his bank account by memory, contrasted with Tesla who came to New York with nothing but his ideas. When Paul offers him fifty thousand dollars on behalf of Westinghouse, Tesla forgets the check on the restaurant table, shocking Paul to his very capitalistic roots. The difference between the Serbian socialist mindset and the one of American greed is extreme. Paul doesn’t understand Tesla’s ambivalence, or anyone who “did not like money. What motivated their dreams? What comprised their desires? Could happiness be ‘purchased,’ as they say? Well, of course not. But it was not as if it were free either” (69). The fact that Tesla dies poor, in part due to Paul’s greed, is a tragedy of the American capitalistic system.

The networks of power that Westinghouse, Edison, Tesla, Bell, and the rest form are deeply rooted in the relationships between the inventors themselves. Tesla worked for Edison, then for Westinghouse, then for himself. Fessenden worked for Edison, then Westinghouse, then Coffin. Henry Ford worked for Edison, and Edison worked eventually with Bell. Although their development as engineers intertwines, still they often see each other as adversaries and competitors: “The lines were drawn. Everyone would have to choose a side. Everyone would join a network. Networks of light. Networks of people. Networks of power. Networks of money” (78-79).

These currents of network are described in different imagery throughout the novel. Money is portrayed like water. When Morgan is still working with Edison, Paul sees the money of potential investors as trickles: “What little of it trickled across Manhattan would not make it all the way to Pittsburgh. And what larger pools might be available were closed off by the dam that was J.P. Morgan” (257).

Out of everyone, Alexander Graham Bell exists the most peacefully within these networks. In helping Paul beat Edison, he considers it a service to Edison. This is followed through in full in the end, as Bell takes Edison under his wing and into his lab to rediscover himself as an inventor. Bell’s estate is described as a network of natural connection, reflecting this integrative mindset:

Through the thick woods, paths had been carved to connect most of these structures to one another. Some buildings were even linked by covered passageways for pedestrian travel in the snowy winter. The style of the estate stood in some contrast to its size, for its dark-wood rustic design gave the impression that the whole thing had blossomed from the great forest around it (276).