(I only have this story in Swedish, so I can't quote from it in an English-speaking blog. I hate making translations of translations. My apologies.)
I was deeply shocked by this story. I know I shouldn't be; sexual abuse happens all the time. Yet there's something even more disturbing about a fat girl who pays boys to have sex with her, and the boys blackmailing her. It's not exactly rape, or prostitution, but it comes close to both of those things, and Maria was only 13. And of course, like so often in these stories, the girl is found out and disgraced. To add insult to injury, her parents sue her for stealing. She ends up in an institution, all alone, while the boys are never held accountable. They all lie for each other, and no one can prove anything.And maybe no one wants to believe it of their own boys; Maria is, after all, an immigrant and a stranger to the town. There's something callous and scary about it all, a dark side of human nature. And they say the old days were innocent and simpler times. (Although I love Munro for never depicting them that way in her stories.)
It also disturbs me that Brenda, upon hearing the story, seems to focus only on one thing: Maria's attractiveness or lack thereof. She ponders that Maria could be pretty now. That would fix everything, wouldn't it? The scars of the sex and being abused by the boys, of her parents abanadoning her, the rough years in the institution. And one must ask why 13-year-old Maria would want to pay boys for sex in the first place. Maybe she was a victim of sexual abuse or incest, which led to overly sexualized behavior. Maybe that accounts for the weight as well - an eating disorder brought on by trauma. (Although I must add that fat isn't always the result of some mental problem.) What is her life like when she comes out of an institution, shunned by her family? It's likely she turned to prostitution, unless they were able to give her some good therapy. And I doubt they were.
The story is full of disturbing details. Even before Maria's parents abandoned and sued her, they had already put her in a role far too heavy for a 13-year-old. She was in charge of the store, in charge of finances. She went to school and worked late into the night. So her life, even before the sex, must not have been very good. Maybe she never got to be a child. It could be a cultural thing, or an old-timey thing, but it still reeks of abuse to me. And if they did this to Maria, what did they do to Lisa who stayed with them? Did she take on the same role?
I feel that as a woman, Brenda should be siding with Maria, openly condemning the boys' behavior. Perhaps thinking of Maria's looks is a distraction. Perhaps she's too horrified to think about what it must be like to be Maria. Or is it just because this is the olden days, and women used to be more allowing when it came to men's sexuality?
Also, Brenda's lover Neil is one of the men who abused Maria, even if he doesn't admit it at first. Surely Brenda can tell that this is the very reason he tells the story. It's not just his younger brother - which would probably be bad enough, too close for comfort - but Neil himself who did it. He seems to be ashamed of it now at least; he shares it as a regret. But he did do it.
As Neil recounts the story, the couple - adulterers, like in so many Munro stories - have their first fight. The fight might mean that Brenda judges Neil more than she lets on, and Neil has to respond by acting like a sexist jerk. It's perhaps significant that he says Brenda has a fat ass (like fat Maria?).
There are so many layers to this story. I see myself saying "might" and "perhaps" a lot, and I can't really say anything for certain. It's an utterly fascinating, disturbing story. I choose to believe Munro is a feminist and is using this story to say that men do horrible things to women and get away with them, that society will judge a whore but not the man who uses her services. But I can't be sure of even this. Munro might just be saying nobody's perfect; like Neil, everyone has a skeleton in the closet and you can't have an easy adultery. I doubt she'd be that simplistic about it, but who knows?
Who is Munro anyway? Who is any of us? Almost all of her stories make me ask these questions. This is why I love her.
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Away from Her
This weekend, I watched "Away from Her", a movie based on Alice Munro's "The Bear Came over the Mountain". It's one of my favorite stories, a story of true love - Grant takes his wife Fiona, who has Alzheimers, to a home. Fiona falls in love with another man there, and Grant still visits her, giving her space and waiting. It's a sad but beautiful story.
The movie was... It's always hard to watch something where you already imagined the characters in one way. I felt the actor choices were good, and the acting was superb throughout. I had imagined Grant a bit younger, Marian more worn-out but flashier, Kristy blonder. But all of these actors brought the characters to life; Gordon Pinsent's Grant was charming and loving but sad, Olympia Dukakis' Marian experienced and weary, yet hopeful. I particularly liked Kristen Thomson's Kristy, who was caring but down-to-earth. She was depicted, faithfully to the story, as someone who truly empathizes with Grant. They hadn't beautified Kristy, and she was allowed to be plain but kind, someone who grew throughout the story. Julie Christie as Fiona was particularly well suited, and she shows the nuances of Fiona's illness in a way that I found deeply touching. She's a bit lost, not herself, and then we see glimpses of who she was, and she nails the "sweet and ironic" nature of Fiona.
I felt the beginning of the movie was not a success. There were too many things happening, and I was a bit confused, even if I know the story. The short story is not confusing, and it doesn't operate on a frame-within-frame structure. It tells us the story, with some flashbacks, fairly chronologically. There's no point in showing Grant driving to Marian's house - and Fiona skiing and getting lost - and Grant driving again - and Grant and Fiona - and Grant saying hello to Marian, and so forth. It felt too gimmicky and pointless. The story isn't meant to be gimmicky. When the movie got going however, this was abandoned and there was a calm and clarity in the narration. The mood was calm, gloomy yet somewhat hopeful, beautiful. I was able to enjoy the film.
There were no omissions that I can see, just many additions. I'm not sure if they were necessary. Did we need to see so many scenes of Fiona forgetting things? The beginning in the book is fairly fast; there is no dwelling on how Fiona deteriorates, just some examples. I felt the movie tried too hard to give us backstory. The best lines were directly from the book, even if I liked "When did we last wash that sweater?" "Right after the war", and some other cute moments. There were many excerpts from books about Alzheimer's, some of which worked quite well - the lights going out scene - but perhaps there were too many. What I really liked was the scene where Grant reads to Fiona from "Letters from Iceland". That was a beautiful and poignant scene. I also liked that Fiona and Grant had sex in her room before he left. That was a tender moment between them, the last one in a long while.
I hated the scene where Grant tells Kristy that she doesn't think much of his suffering, and Kristy gets offended and tells him he must have cheated on his wife. There's a judgement there that doesn't fit in with Munro. Munro writes about adultery all the time. She writes about men cheating women, women cheating men; she writes from the viewpoint of cheater and cheatee. People get divorces, have affairs, leave each other and marry someone else without warning. I always felt the tone was "this is life, this is how we are". I never felt she judged her characters for doing that. By having Kristy judge Grant, I felt Sarah Polley was showing her own views. It's not something that arises from the story, at least for me. I had a feeling Polley wanted to judge Grant for what he had done, to punish him. Also, in the book, Grant never told Kristy that Fiona might be punishing him.
I'm also not happy with the choice of having Fiona tell Grant about all the girls he had - in the book, Grant thinks of it himself, and it's never brought up in their dialogue. Here, again, I felt Polley was judging Grant and trying to show the pain that Fiona felt being cheated on - and perhaps juxtaposing with the pain Grant would feel. I felt it was a bit too blunt, like being hit with an anvil. Munro doesn't do this kind of thing. What I would have liked to see was the dream sequence in the story, where Grant sees himself lecturing to a hall full of black-clad, angry women. It would have been a way of showing his guilt without having Fiona spell it out.
The scene I felt was most ill-fitting was Grant's "I'm more than aware of your fucking policies." I feel like we didn't need that. It was obvious - a broken heart, a cold bureaucrat. This is movie fare. It takes away from the intensity of the emotion if you spell everything out.
An addition I did like was having Grant talk to a teenager, who sympathizes with him and admires his love for Fiona. This scene isn't in the book, and is not strictly necessary, but I felt it was tender and beautiful. It was nice to see Grant appreciating a young person and vice versa; there was no pegging of old vs. young people, as there wasn't in the original story.
The movie resolves the story by having Fiona remember and love Grant again, and having Grant sleep with Marian. These things never happen in the book; they are alluded to but not spelled out. I felt Polley could have left the ending as it was. Grant hugging Fiona with the music swelling up was a bit too melodramatic, although it did lift the viewer's spirits after all the sad scenes of loss. But in the end, do we need our spirits lifted? The ending of the story, if you think further on in years, is obvious: Fiona will lose herself to Alzheimer's, and Grant will have to live without her. But maybe ending on a hopeful note is a good thing, movie-wise. I'm slightly torn about this, because it left me feeling better than a sad ending would have.
All in all, I felt the movie was successful in showing Fiona and Grant and delivering their beautiful but sad story. The spirit of the story, if not always the letter, was followed beautifully. Overall, the film would have benefited from some subtlety, and from being shorter, but it was still elevated from the ordinary film to a more lasting experience. I don't know if it's Munro's original quotes, or the actors, or the "Letters from Iceland", but there was something beautiful about this film that wasn't fabricated for the romantic movie audience. It was just.. life beauty. For that, I need to commend Sarah Polley. She was able to adapt this story, which must be a momentous effort, given the rich world and nuance in Munro's fiction.
The movie was... It's always hard to watch something where you already imagined the characters in one way. I felt the actor choices were good, and the acting was superb throughout. I had imagined Grant a bit younger, Marian more worn-out but flashier, Kristy blonder. But all of these actors brought the characters to life; Gordon Pinsent's Grant was charming and loving but sad, Olympia Dukakis' Marian experienced and weary, yet hopeful. I particularly liked Kristen Thomson's Kristy, who was caring but down-to-earth. She was depicted, faithfully to the story, as someone who truly empathizes with Grant. They hadn't beautified Kristy, and she was allowed to be plain but kind, someone who grew throughout the story. Julie Christie as Fiona was particularly well suited, and she shows the nuances of Fiona's illness in a way that I found deeply touching. She's a bit lost, not herself, and then we see glimpses of who she was, and she nails the "sweet and ironic" nature of Fiona.
I felt the beginning of the movie was not a success. There were too many things happening, and I was a bit confused, even if I know the story. The short story is not confusing, and it doesn't operate on a frame-within-frame structure. It tells us the story, with some flashbacks, fairly chronologically. There's no point in showing Grant driving to Marian's house - and Fiona skiing and getting lost - and Grant driving again - and Grant and Fiona - and Grant saying hello to Marian, and so forth. It felt too gimmicky and pointless. The story isn't meant to be gimmicky. When the movie got going however, this was abandoned and there was a calm and clarity in the narration. The mood was calm, gloomy yet somewhat hopeful, beautiful. I was able to enjoy the film.
There were no omissions that I can see, just many additions. I'm not sure if they were necessary. Did we need to see so many scenes of Fiona forgetting things? The beginning in the book is fairly fast; there is no dwelling on how Fiona deteriorates, just some examples. I felt the movie tried too hard to give us backstory. The best lines were directly from the book, even if I liked "When did we last wash that sweater?" "Right after the war", and some other cute moments. There were many excerpts from books about Alzheimer's, some of which worked quite well - the lights going out scene - but perhaps there were too many. What I really liked was the scene where Grant reads to Fiona from "Letters from Iceland". That was a beautiful and poignant scene. I also liked that Fiona and Grant had sex in her room before he left. That was a tender moment between them, the last one in a long while.
I hated the scene where Grant tells Kristy that she doesn't think much of his suffering, and Kristy gets offended and tells him he must have cheated on his wife. There's a judgement there that doesn't fit in with Munro. Munro writes about adultery all the time. She writes about men cheating women, women cheating men; she writes from the viewpoint of cheater and cheatee. People get divorces, have affairs, leave each other and marry someone else without warning. I always felt the tone was "this is life, this is how we are". I never felt she judged her characters for doing that. By having Kristy judge Grant, I felt Sarah Polley was showing her own views. It's not something that arises from the story, at least for me. I had a feeling Polley wanted to judge Grant for what he had done, to punish him. Also, in the book, Grant never told Kristy that Fiona might be punishing him.
I'm also not happy with the choice of having Fiona tell Grant about all the girls he had - in the book, Grant thinks of it himself, and it's never brought up in their dialogue. Here, again, I felt Polley was judging Grant and trying to show the pain that Fiona felt being cheated on - and perhaps juxtaposing with the pain Grant would feel. I felt it was a bit too blunt, like being hit with an anvil. Munro doesn't do this kind of thing. What I would have liked to see was the dream sequence in the story, where Grant sees himself lecturing to a hall full of black-clad, angry women. It would have been a way of showing his guilt without having Fiona spell it out.
The scene I felt was most ill-fitting was Grant's "I'm more than aware of your fucking policies." I feel like we didn't need that. It was obvious - a broken heart, a cold bureaucrat. This is movie fare. It takes away from the intensity of the emotion if you spell everything out.
An addition I did like was having Grant talk to a teenager, who sympathizes with him and admires his love for Fiona. This scene isn't in the book, and is not strictly necessary, but I felt it was tender and beautiful. It was nice to see Grant appreciating a young person and vice versa; there was no pegging of old vs. young people, as there wasn't in the original story.
The movie resolves the story by having Fiona remember and love Grant again, and having Grant sleep with Marian. These things never happen in the book; they are alluded to but not spelled out. I felt Polley could have left the ending as it was. Grant hugging Fiona with the music swelling up was a bit too melodramatic, although it did lift the viewer's spirits after all the sad scenes of loss. But in the end, do we need our spirits lifted? The ending of the story, if you think further on in years, is obvious: Fiona will lose herself to Alzheimer's, and Grant will have to live without her. But maybe ending on a hopeful note is a good thing, movie-wise. I'm slightly torn about this, because it left me feeling better than a sad ending would have.
All in all, I felt the movie was successful in showing Fiona and Grant and delivering their beautiful but sad story. The spirit of the story, if not always the letter, was followed beautifully. Overall, the film would have benefited from some subtlety, and from being shorter, but it was still elevated from the ordinary film to a more lasting experience. I don't know if it's Munro's original quotes, or the actors, or the "Letters from Iceland", but there was something beautiful about this film that wasn't fabricated for the romantic movie audience. It was just.. life beauty. For that, I need to commend Sarah Polley. She was able to adapt this story, which must be a momentous effort, given the rich world and nuance in Munro's fiction.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Little Moments
One thing I love about Munro is how she sucks me into the little moments in life. She makes me feel like I'm in them. Maybe it's because I recognize the feelings she's describing, or maybe she's painting it before me so skilfully that I can live it through her books? I don't know, but it works.
For instance, from Tell Me Yes or No:
We both trembled. We barely managed it, being overcome - both of us, both of us - with gratitude, and amazement. The flood of luck, of happiness undeserved, unqualified, nearly unbelieved-in. Tears stood in our eyes. Undeniably. Yes.
Why does this work so well? Is it the word "yes", which is like a final surrender to the feeling? Is it "tears stood in our eyes", like the moment is standing still, the tears not coming out but freezing there, everything freezing in one moment? Is it the repetition of "both of us" that seems so joyful and trembling? Her use of language in that moment quivers with joy and expectation.
But with "little moments", I also mean a different sort of thing: a little moment in a person's life when she realizes something, on her own. A little moment of falling or awakening that is not shared with anyone. These moments are harder to describe and seem less momentous, and thus most writers don't bother with them. But look at this from the same story:
Next day, or the day after, when I was reading as usual on the couch, I felt myself drop a lovely distance, thinking of you, and that was the beginning, I suppose, the realization of what more there could still be. So I said to you, "I was in love."
It's a little moment, barely something you an put into words. The narrator is critical of the moment and its significance, even as she relates it. But it's the reason she said "I love you" even if she's not sure she does - because the moment did mean something.
Another little moment is described in Open Secrets. Maureen sees something - she is not sure what, and can't explain it to anyone. She feels it's another life, another dimension, "a life just as long and complicated and strange and dull as this one". The scenes are ordinary - a man carrying a parcel, herself eating cherries. Another scene is a hand being pressed against a hot stove, which could be a repressed moment from her own childhood, or who knows, a memory of a past life. Munro leaves this open for the reader; the explanation doesn't really matter. What matters is the moment's significance for Maureen.
In kitchens hundreds and thousands of miles away, she'll watch the soft skin form on the back of a wooden spoon and her memory will twitch, but it will not quite reveal to her this moment when she seems to be looking into an open secret, something not startling until you think of trying to tell it.
I'm no good at analyzing this stuff. I just want to live through it over and over again.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Friend of My Youth vs. The Love of a Good Woman - quick observation
It's odd if you compare the nurse Audrey Atkinson in "Friend of My Youth" to Enid in "The Love of a Good Woman". Both are nurses who come into people's homes, both take care of young ladies who are dying and difficult to deal with.
But Enid is described as someone who truly cares, too - not a saint like some people call her, but a genuinely empathetic person. Audrey, on the other hand, is selfish and greedy, an opportunist who steals her patient's husband and has no empathy for anyone.
Or is it just the way the narrator's mother sees Audrey? After all, we get inside Enid's head, but we only have the narrator's mother's account in Audrey's case.
Coming to think of it, it's a little strange that "Friend of My Youth" is narrated by someone who wasn't even there, and is only discussing what the events looked like to her mother. It's like a third-hand narrator. Nobody can tell what really happened between Flora and Robert, or Ellie and Robert, or Audrey and Robert; we only know how Flora carried herself to the outside world, and how brash Audrey and Robert seemed.
Is there any point in hating Audrey when it's obviously Robert who betrays Flora twice - first by sleeping with her sister, then with the nurse? All he had to say was no. Unless he's a bit simple and they were abusing him. It's so hard to tell.
Random Notes: The Name Alice
I've only seen two instances of the name Alice in Munro's stories. Alice Peel in "The Moon in the Orange Street Skating Rink" and Alice Kelling in "How I Met My Husband".
They are both referred to by their full names throughout the stories. Never Alice, always Alice Peel, Alice Kelling. I don't know if this has anything to do with her own name being Alice. Maybe it doesn't. It just seems like an interesting detail.
(Of course, Loretta Bird and Adam Delahunt are also referred to with their full names throughout in these stories. It might be a stylistic thing.)
Friday, September 7, 2012
Free Radicals: a Question
Why does this story about a guy who killed his parents and sister upset me more than "Dimensions", a story about a father killing his children?
"Dimensions" was a lot more shocking in one way, but I just find this murderer-guy disgusting. Maybe it's because I have the audio book and the reader - Kimberly Farr - does a really realistic hateful bad guy voice, but I just can't revisit this story.
It's a shame, because I wouldn't mind reading more about Nita's grief over Rich.
"Dimensions" was a lot more shocking in one way, but I just find this murderer-guy disgusting. Maybe it's because I have the audio book and the reader - Kimberly Farr - does a really realistic hateful bad guy voice, but I just can't revisit this story.
It's a shame, because I wouldn't mind reading more about Nita's grief over Rich.
Labor Day Dinner
I find this story a little un-Munroish, or at least unlike her later style. It's so very wordy and full of dialogue, so many things are spelled out for the reader. The first sentence is so full of names too, it confused me - George and Roberta and Eva and Angela. (I started reading Munro with "The Love of a Good Woman", so I got her best work first. I'm spoiled that way.)
But later on, when the characters emerged, I loved the story. I love how awful George is and how everyone walks on tiptoes around him, and how he despises Roberta and the way she mopes. He thinks that she started out self-ironic and calmly telling him her flaws, and now she's needy and sad. It reminds me of David in "Lichen" and his description of Rosemary: "A sweet dark name, though finally a shrill trite woman."
A lot of things about George and Roberta are disturbing. It's disturbing that Valerie likes him better than he liked Roberta's ex. It's disturbing that people want to please him, and make him laugh. Is he really that charismatic? It's disturbing that Roberta has slid into depression with him - although it might not be fully his fault.
It seems like Angela is the only one who sees George for what he truly is, a selfish jerk who makes Roberta depressed. He has no tact - he tells Roberta, "Your arms are flabby" when she wants to wear a sleeveless dress - and he can't stand to see weakness.
We get no real description of Angela and Eva's father, but he must be a much kinder man, or the girls would be more timid and scared of George. The girls only spend their summer with Roberta and George, but Roberta is still horrified George won't be able to take them and will hurt them:
Also, stop reading your daughter's journal, Roberta.
But later on, when the characters emerged, I loved the story. I love how awful George is and how everyone walks on tiptoes around him, and how he despises Roberta and the way she mopes. He thinks that she started out self-ironic and calmly telling him her flaws, and now she's needy and sad. It reminds me of David in "Lichen" and his description of Rosemary: "A sweet dark name, though finally a shrill trite woman."
A lot of things about George and Roberta are disturbing. It's disturbing that Valerie likes him better than he liked Roberta's ex. It's disturbing that people want to please him, and make him laugh. Is he really that charismatic? It's disturbing that Roberta has slid into depression with him - although it might not be fully his fault.
It seems like Angela is the only one who sees George for what he truly is, a selfish jerk who makes Roberta depressed. He has no tact - he tells Roberta, "Your arms are flabby" when she wants to wear a sleeveless dress - and he can't stand to see weakness.
I have seen her change, Angela has written in her journal, from a person I deeply respected into a person on the verge of being a nervous wreck. If this is love I want no part of it. He wants to enslave her and us all and she walks a tightrope trying to keep him from getting mad. She doesn't enjoy anything and if you gave her the choice she would like best to lie down in a dark room with a cloth over her eyes and not see anybody or do anything. This is an intelligent woman who used to believe in freedom.George also reminds me of Clark in "Runaway": Carla has to fear his anger, even if he doesn't physically abuse her. He abuses her with his silences and despising of her. She almost runs away and then turns back, unable to live without him. (Like Roberta who's too depressed to do something about her situation?) But Clark and Carla had no children.
We get no real description of Angela and Eva's father, but he must be a much kinder man, or the girls would be more timid and scared of George. The girls only spend their summer with Roberta and George, but Roberta is still horrified George won't be able to take them and will hurt them:
Instead, Eva says: "You know, I understand George. I don't mind about him the way Angela does. I know how to be jokey. I understand him."Half the time in Munro's stories, I want to tell the female protagonist: run for the hills, this man is a jerk, he will ruin your life. It's a bit disconcerting to think how many couples might be like this. They look happy on the outside, but there's all this settling, all this walking on thin ice, to please an angry spouse. It's easy to say I'd never settle like that, but if I'd lived the life they had, maybe I would.
Roberta and Valerie look at each other, and Roberta smiles, shakes her head, and shivers. She has been afraid, sometimes, that George would hurt her children, not physically but by some turnabout, some revelation of dislike, that htey could never forget. It seems to her she has instructed them, by example, that he is to be accommodated, his silences respected, his joking responded to. What if he should turn, within this safety, and deal them a memorable blow? If it happened, it would be she who would have betrayed them into it. And she can feel a danger. [...]
But Roberta thinks now that the real danger is not to Angela, who would find a way to welcome insult, would be ready to reap some advantage. (Roberta has read parts of the journal.) It is Eva, with her claims of understanding, her hopes of all-around conciliation, who could be smashed and stranded.
Also, stop reading your daughter's journal, Roberta.
A Wilderness Station
Published in "Open Secrets". A brief excerpt here.
This is actually not one of my favorite stories, which is probably why I feel able to start the blog with it. I don't have as many intense feelings as I have for some of my favorites.
I'm not fond of stories about dreary houses in the wilderness, maybe because I like to imagine myself in the stories, and I'm a very comfort-loving person. In addition, the characters in the early parts of the story seem hard and resigned to a life with nothing but work. No girls who love to write, no poets with a secret longing for beauty, like in many of Munro's stories. I don't mind the ghoulish subject matter - half her stories are about murder, attempted murder, suicide, and abuse. (And I'm not complaining; she writes about taboos and the human condition, as I see it, and part of that is violence and hate.) But it needs some warmth of love or friendship or at least the hope for something better to temper it. Annie has nothing. She's driven half mad by fear, and the only thing she can think of is to lie about a crime and go to jail. Her husband and his brother seem harsh, and this is realistic, given that all both they and Annie are poor and had no parents growing up. So it might be a statement about the lives such people led, and the conditions of women in particular, in those days. But it's still a dreary read.
Also, it's probably the only Munro story that is composed entirely of letters. That's worth noting. I love how she does the different voices, and it's notable how the letters are written between men who decide about a woman's fate, only one letter being written by Annie herself. It's as if her life is in the hands of men - her husband, his brother, the minister and the police. But coming to think of it, the letters are probably one reason why this isn't among my favorite stories - with the formality of letters and the uneducated nature of some of the voices, you lose the rich narrative stuff and metaphors Munro uses in her other stories.
Still, they provide some dry humor:
What I love about this story is the long, rambly letter in the end, written by the old lady. She's so proud of having owned a Stanley Steamer (I had to check Wikipedia, they really did exist). The clever thing about this part of the story is how it brings up Old Annie as if in a side note, while she's been the protagonist all along. Here is also where the comfort-loving part of me finds refuge, in the lady's memories of a rich, sheltered childhood. Old Annie is just a colorful character, no longer a menace or a victim of abuse.
But is it a happy ending? Is Old Annie meeting her brother-in-law at last a revenge of sorts? Or is she simply saying she forgives him? The narrator has no idea what has gone on between them, and thus doesn't observe them too closely. She's too focused on her Stanley Steamer. It feels good to know though, that after the wilderness station, Annie found a warm rich home to live and work in. It's a happy ending of sorts. Or is it? She has to spend her life in an inferior position, being someone's servant. But she's also in a good home that treats her well, and she gains some power within it. She has no children of her own, but she has children in her life. She never finds love, or does she? We actually know very little about her.
Why is it so often hard to tell if Munro's endings are happy or sad?
This is actually not one of my favorite stories, which is probably why I feel able to start the blog with it. I don't have as many intense feelings as I have for some of my favorites.
I'm not fond of stories about dreary houses in the wilderness, maybe because I like to imagine myself in the stories, and I'm a very comfort-loving person. In addition, the characters in the early parts of the story seem hard and resigned to a life with nothing but work. No girls who love to write, no poets with a secret longing for beauty, like in many of Munro's stories. I don't mind the ghoulish subject matter - half her stories are about murder, attempted murder, suicide, and abuse. (And I'm not complaining; she writes about taboos and the human condition, as I see it, and part of that is violence and hate.) But it needs some warmth of love or friendship or at least the hope for something better to temper it. Annie has nothing. She's driven half mad by fear, and the only thing she can think of is to lie about a crime and go to jail. Her husband and his brother seem harsh, and this is realistic, given that all both they and Annie are poor and had no parents growing up. So it might be a statement about the lives such people led, and the conditions of women in particular, in those days. But it's still a dreary read.
Also, it's probably the only Munro story that is composed entirely of letters. That's worth noting. I love how she does the different voices, and it's notable how the letters are written between men who decide about a woman's fate, only one letter being written by Annie herself. It's as if her life is in the hands of men - her husband, his brother, the minister and the police. But coming to think of it, the letters are probably one reason why this isn't among my favorite stories - with the formality of letters and the uneducated nature of some of the voices, you lose the rich narrative stuff and metaphors Munro uses in her other stories.
Still, they provide some dry humor:
"Your letter to Mr McBain sent back to you, he died here at the inn February 25. There is some books here, nobody wants them."
What I love about this story is the long, rambly letter in the end, written by the old lady. She's so proud of having owned a Stanley Steamer (I had to check Wikipedia, they really did exist). The clever thing about this part of the story is how it brings up Old Annie as if in a side note, while she's been the protagonist all along. Here is also where the comfort-loving part of me finds refuge, in the lady's memories of a rich, sheltered childhood. Old Annie is just a colorful character, no longer a menace or a victim of abuse.
"By the time I bought the Steamer, I was the only one of my sisters living at home, and the sewing-woman was the only one of these old servants who remained. The sewing-woman was called Old Annie and never objected to that name. She used it herself and would write notes to the cook that said, 'Tea was not hot, did you warm the pot? Old Annie.' The whole third floor was Old Annie's domain and one of my sisters - Dolly - said that whenever she dreamed of home, that is, of Tarquair, she dreamed of Old Annie up at the top of the third-floor stairs brandishing her measuring stick and wearing a black dress with long fuzzy black arms like a spider.The lady is, of course, not writing to the imaginary researcher about Old Annie, but about Treece Herron, a politician who happens to be related to Annie's brother-in-law. The mentioning of Annie seems perfectly natural in this context, in the midst of a very rambly account of the old lady's only encounter with Herron (which I can't see being helpful for the research). The rambling is very believable, and it provides the warmth that the story otherwise lacks.
She had one eye that slid off to the side and gave her the air of taking in more information than the ordinary person."
But is it a happy ending? Is Old Annie meeting her brother-in-law at last a revenge of sorts? Or is she simply saying she forgives him? The narrator has no idea what has gone on between them, and thus doesn't observe them too closely. She's too focused on her Stanley Steamer. It feels good to know though, that after the wilderness station, Annie found a warm rich home to live and work in. It's a happy ending of sorts. Or is it? She has to spend her life in an inferior position, being someone's servant. But she's also in a good home that treats her well, and she gains some power within it. She has no children of her own, but she has children in her life. She never finds love, or does she? We actually know very little about her.
Why is it so often hard to tell if Munro's endings are happy or sad?
In this blog, I intend to write thoughts and feelings upon reading Alice Munro.
I don't want to make any rules for this blog, because I just want to enjoy writing it. It's not really a review blog so much as a "personal feelings and reactions" thing. It could be anything from brief notes and quotes to long personal rambles. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts, if you want to share in the comments.
I've studied English literature, but I'm not really very academic, and I'm a very emotional reader. So the point is not to try and wow anyone with my intellectual interpretations. Munro's stories tend to get under my skin and the characters stay in my mind, and more often than not, I can relate to something in the stories. This is what I hope to share with this blog.
Why Munro? Short answer: Because her stories have everything.
My favorite stories at the moment, in no particular order:
The Love of a Good Woman
Eskimo
Open Secrets
Soon
Accident
Powers
Trespasses
White Dump
Rich as Stink
Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage
The Bear Came over the Mountain
Dance of the Happy Shades
The Time of Death
Some Women
Child's Play
Basically all of the stories about Rose.
I don't want to make any rules for this blog, because I just want to enjoy writing it. It's not really a review blog so much as a "personal feelings and reactions" thing. It could be anything from brief notes and quotes to long personal rambles. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts, if you want to share in the comments.
I've studied English literature, but I'm not really very academic, and I'm a very emotional reader. So the point is not to try and wow anyone with my intellectual interpretations. Munro's stories tend to get under my skin and the characters stay in my mind, and more often than not, I can relate to something in the stories. This is what I hope to share with this blog.
Why Munro? Short answer: Because her stories have everything.
My favorite stories at the moment, in no particular order:
The Love of a Good Woman
Eskimo
Open Secrets
Soon
Accident
Powers
Trespasses
White Dump
Rich as Stink
Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage
The Bear Came over the Mountain
Dance of the Happy Shades
The Time of Death
Some Women
Child's Play
Basically all of the stories about Rose.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)