What we know, from the beginning, is that Linnet Muir is alone.
“My father died, then my grandmother; my mother was left, but we did not get on.”
She concedes her role in this situation. She was probably disagreeable.
“I was probably disagreeable with anyone who felt entitled to give me instructions and advice.”
But even here, she reminds readers that this “anyone” felt a sense of entitlement.
What follows could be seen as reasons why Linnet does not feel this sense of entitlement is valid. Why the remaining advice-givers were not entitled to dispense instructions or advice.
But ultimately the most important takeaway here is Linnet’s sense of being alone and her concern with that state being properly understood.
It’s like other people might feel like they’re alone. But Linnet has uncovered other layers of being alone. And it’s not only about independence, it’s also about vulnerability.
“I was now eighteen, and completely on my own. By ‘on my own’ I don’t mean a show of independence with Papa-Mama footing the bills. I mean that I was solely responsible for my economic survival and that no living person felt any duty toward me.”
Simultaneously, readers must remember that “In Youth Is Pleasure” is Linnet’s story, told in Linnet’s voice. And that it as much about what she chooses not to present.
“There were good-hearted Americans who knew a bit of my story – as much as I wanted anyone to know – and who hoped I would swim and not drown, but from the moment I embarked on my journey I went on the dark side of the moon.”
Which is why we wonder, what does Linnet want us to know?
What might those good-hearted people have hoped for her if she had shared the parts she didn’t want anyone to know. (Again with the “anyone”.)
She still views herself as being on the dark side of the moon, but would others have hoped for her to drown if they’d known more about her?
And we cannot forget that the story is told from the future, so she has had the opportunity to reflect. She has had the chance to consider how she “should have felt”, to contrast that with what she now remembers feeling.
“I should have felt pity, but at eighteen all that came to me was thankfulness that I had been correct about one thing throughout my youth, which I now considered ended: time had been on my side, faithfully, and unless you died you were always bound to escape.”
But what does escape mean? We have five more stories to read, to search for an answer.
Home Truths Stories: Thank You for the Lovely Tea / Jorinda and Jorindel / Saturday / Up North / Orphans’ Progress / The Prodigal Parent / In the Tunnel / The Ice Wagon Going Down the Street / Bonaventure / Virus X / In Youth is Pleasure / Between Zero and One / Varieties of Exile / Voices Lost in Snow / The Doctor / With a Capital T
Note: This is part of a series of posts on Mavis Gallant’s stories, as I read through her short fiction. This is the final story in Home Truths. Please feel free to check the schedule and join in, for the series, or for a single story; I would love the company. Next collection: Overhead in a Balloon.
Another lovely sounding story Linnet sounds like a character I would enjoy reading about.
Linnet would appreciate your kindness. She’s all on her own, doncha know.
Well I’ve failed miserably to keep up with the reading on this collection. I will try to get back to it and join you again. It is SO EASY for me to abandon or forget about books on my Kindle app. The paper books on my shelf present a form that reminds me of their existence. This story sounds most intriguing – Linnet sounds closed off towards others and I want to know why.
That happens to me too. I very rarely read on a device anymore. It just doesn’t work as well for my retention, my focus or my commitment. laughs Which is not to say that I’m not paying attention in this very moment on a screen.
I was thinking of messaging you about this final sequence in the book though: six stories about Linnet…it’s like a mini linked-story collection!
I loved Linett as soon as I learned she was reading a novel by Sylvia Townsend Warner. It took the genius of Gallant to make this connection to a writer of stories of anothe4 world. One common thread in some of these stories is how Americans were described. When she lived in NYC people asked her if Canada had radio. I sense her great aloneness but felt she preferred it that way. We also see the impact of her mother’s mental abuse.
I know! Wasn’t that a lovely bit. There is a little more reading in the second story too. I remember being asked when I was a kid, on an occasional visit to see family members who used to live across the border, if I knew about certain TV shows and comics, because it was assumed that all Canadians lived backwardly.