If I was trying to convince readers to try Alice Munro, choosing this sampling of three stories might not be the best way to approach the matter.
Each is stuffed with sadness, with resignation and despair to season the blend.
But it’s as though there is also a dash of cinnamon — which is so often difficult to spot in the way in which it influences other flavours in a dish; these stories — hard as they are — do contain a hint of resistance, refusal, even rebellion.
The Time of Death
One of the sharpest images in this story, for me, is actually one of the softest: the bed in Allie McGee’s house. “The bed they slept in had a feather tick and smooth ironed sheets; the blankets were pale and fluffy and smelled faintly of mothballs.”
This is where Irene and George go to stay after their little brother, Benny, has died. It’s a subtle means in which to consider the socioeconomic complications of life in the Maitland Valley. “Mr. McGee did not work in the mill like the other men, but in a store.”
Day of the Butterfly
Class issues are also at work in this story. That’s something of a play on words because not only is there a question of families’ rankings in the community, but also of the relative positioning of girls in the sixth grade class at school. The question of what is of value is important, whether it’s a ring from the Cracker Jack box, or a friendship, or a life.
“We began to talk of her as if she were something we owned, and her party became a cause; with womanly heaviness we discussed it at recess, and decided that twenty-five cents was too low.”
Boys and Girls
One of the reasons that I responded so strongly to this story is because of the narrator’s belief in the power of storytelling. It seems to be an inherent act of recognition, but at night, after the lights are out, she and her brother sing themselves to sleep and, then, because she stays awake longer, she tells herself stories.
In the beginning, this is how it is:
“These stories were about myself, when I had grown a little older; they took place in a world that was recognizably mine, yet one that presented opportunities for courage, boldness and self-sacrifice, as mine never did.”
But things happen. And the stories change.
Then, this is how it is:
“I still stayed awake after Laird was asleep and told myself stories, but even in these stories something different was happening, mysterious alterations took place. A story might start off in the old way, with a spectacular danger, a fire or wild animals, and for a while I might rescue people; then things would change around, and instead, somebody would be rescuing me.”
The events that change her so. Those which result in the stories’ mysterious alteration. That’s the stuff of this story.
And, what about you? Are you reading along? Surprised by what you’re thinking? Thinking about joining in? (The schedule is below. Lots of room for other reading.) There’s a lot more we could say about any single one of these stories.
Walker Brothers Cowboy; The Shining Houses; Images JAN19
Thanks for the ride; The Office; An Ounce of Cure JAN26
The Time of Death; Day of the Butterfly; Boys and Girls (above)
Postcard; Red Dress – 1946; Sunday Afternoon FEB23
A Trip to the Coast; The Peace of Utrecht; Dance of the Happy Shades MAR2
Sandra: You brought out a layer of “The Time of Death” that I had overlooked, the way that Patricia had grieved “like a grown-up”. She did, didn’t she!
I think it’s interesting, how many of these tales are told about (and from the perspective of) little girls (even Patricia, though she acts like a grown-up is only, what, 16?), but how distinct their viewpoints and personalities and family situations are, one from the next.
Also, along those lines, the number of stories that consider relationships between siblings. I agree that Myra’s attentiveness to her younger brother Jimmy was particularly touching, and a lot of the sibling relationships are drawn in even more detail, become more complex as the stories lengthen, and as the characters age.
We have an older daughter and younger brother in “Walker Brothers Cowboy” and “Images”, Patricia and Benny up above, and the narrator and Laird in “Boys and Girls” (and two sisters in “The Peace of Utrecht”). I’m looking forward to finding other sibling connections, which are interesting to this only-child reader.
My favourite story, however, (possibly so far), was “Boys and Girls”. Are these the Jordan kids from the earlier two stories? Either way, I love the way that the narrator finds a glimmer of power in her position; even though she has been summarily dismissed in one sense, in another she has laid claim to a kind of strength that might be all-the-stronger for having been identified as a weakness and overlooked as a threat to the status quo.
John: But did you catch the hints of cinnamon? 😉
Chris: Lives of Girls and Women is next. It’s not scary at all!
Yes, these three stories seemed particularly laden with the pathos that Munro writes so well. However, I found some of those dashes of cinnamon you referred to in your opening and they brought rays of light to accompany the sadness.
In The Time of Death I was first caught by the sewing of the “cowgirl outfit” and then later by the cut-out game using the catalogues. These two things played major roles in my own childhood and identifying with them provided a kind of comfort. They also gave authenticity to the story for this reader. The characters of both Leona and Patricia,separately and together, were fascinating. Leona was seen by her neighbours as “unwashed, unliked and desolate” and yet, because her son died her neighbours were totally focussed on her welfare. Leona penalizes Patricia who “did things the way a grown-up does” and who loved the unloveable Benny. Leona indulges her sorrow while Patricia bears up like a grown up until faced with the scissor man and his connection with Benny and then the tides of sadness escape her child’s body. Patricia’s withheld pain emphasizes the difference in degree of maternal feeling in Leona,the mother and Patricia,the child for whom Benny was “the only stupid thing she did not hate.”
The Day of the Butterfly dashes of cinnamon for me were in the compassion that Myra displayed for her brother Jimmy and in the narrator, Helen’s,impulse to give Myra the butterfly brooch. In Boys and Girls what made the greatest impression on me was the learning process which the narrator went through. She spoke early on about having “rules to keep us safe” and then she learned from the salesman that she was “only a girl” and then that housework was “endless, dreary, and particularly depressing”. She begins to understand that “a girl was not, as I had supposed, simply what I was; it was what I had to become.” Finally when she lets Flora through the gate and her father finds out he refuses to recognize the subtleties of her action and dismisses it because she is “only a girl”. The dash of cinnamon comes when she does not protest but realizes instead that she just might be a girl in the sense that she would want to be.
Yes, the cinnamon is definitely there. And the sadness and despair? Well, that’s life: it’s what Munro writes so well. Thank you for the continuing inspiration to reread these stories.
“sadness, with resignation and despair”
Yep, that about sums up all 3 Munro books I’ve read– none of which was this book, by the way.
I still haven’t read any Munro. I’m a little scared.