Doreen

This post has been a long time coming. It goes back to when we read the first few chapters of The Bell Jar (remember that?) by Sylvia Plath.

I want to make a postulate: everyone, at one point or another in their lives, encounters a Doreen. Remember her? You can't not. She's the person who's already experienced at least most of it all, and has the stories to prove it, if she'll tell you. You cannot help but at least admire her, even if you don't really like her. There are plenty of reasons for both admiration and dislike.

Something about her is wacky as hell, but it...works. She has fuzzy white hair. Or something like that. Despite that, or perhaps because of it, she is charming. She knows how to get people where she wants them, and she is well aware of that. She is intelligent--she can't not be--but it's not necessarily the practical kind of intelligence, it's the kind of intelligence that goads you into seeing the world in a darker light, with a lot more contrast and sharp edges. Doreen is the quintessential "bad influence," the "devil on your shoulder," but the contrast is very appealing.

The only trouble here is that at some point, you have to make a choice between becoming Doreen, being destroyed by Doreen, or coming to the realization that, while she might be a close friend, she isn't someone you should--or necessarily can--emulate. Obviously, Esther makes the latter choice, but it's not so clear for all of us.

I think one of the real strengths of The Bell Jar is the way that Plath handles the elements of the story that are not obvious focal points of the plot. Esther's relationship with Buddy Willard carries through the whole book, but her relationship with Doreen seems to be more relatable. That probably has a simple enough explanation: it is less tied to the plot, and is therefore less personal to Esther's life. Still, that particular relationship seems to resonate throughout others of the books we've covered in the Coming-of-Age Novel class.

One example of a Doreen is Hugo from David Mitchell's Black Swan Green. He is obviously a slimeball, but a very handsome, smooth-talking, and charismatic slimeball. He fulfills the role by being inexplicably attractive despite unconventional behavior, and offers Jason (the protagonist) a cigarette. Jason ultimately realizes that he will never be able to "be Hugo," but it's a difficult thing to admit. In Housekeeping, by Marilynne Robinson, there is something of a Doreen in the character of Sylvie. Though she seems like a much more nurturing influence than either Hugo or Doreen herself, she is similarly unusual and attractive to the main character Ruthie. In the end, Ruthie comes of age by deciding that her personality is more suited to Sylvie's than to "the common persuasion," but she gives up society to follow Sylvie into transience. It seems like a good thing to Ruthie--and to readers who can relate to her--but members of her tiny town obviously see Sylvie's influence as just as corrupting as readers of Black Swan Green see the influence of Hugo. It all depends on perspective, and there's no denying that Sylvie, Hugo, and Doreen all serve as figures whose behavior serves as a pull for their respective protagonists.

My theory is this: we are all protagonists in our own coming-of-age stories. We can all identify authority figures in our lives, both in and outside of the structures of school and the government. Each of us has at least one Doreen.

Perfidy

Reading Marilynne Robinson's novel Housekeeping, I was definitely sepent a lot of time thinking about the  relationship that Ruthie, the narrator, has with her younger sister Lucille. I have a younger sister with whom I am very close, and so I started out being able to relate to the way they seemed to do everything together. I had to admit to myself as a reader that I wished Ruthie had let a little more of her individual personality show through, but I could completely understand the way it was always "Lucille and me," because frankly, that's how I think of my sister and myself a lot of the time. As the book progressed and I watched the sisters grow apart, it became more and more difficult to read the interactions between the two of them. Lucille seemed so cold and unwilling to relate or even be kind to her sister.

I was reminded of the Kate DiCamello book The Tale of Despereaux, which is a beautifully written book about a mouse (and doesn't really have anything to do with Housekeeping at all) that draws attention to interesting words. In Despereaux, the hero is handed to the mouse-executioner by his family because he is so strange, idealistic, and seemingly unconnected to the real world. The word "perfidy" figures strongly, and because I learned the word from that book, I have always associated it especially with the betrayal of a family member. Housekeeping ends rather more happily than does that particular scene in Despereaux, and it even seems for the best for both sisters that Lucille goes her own way before Ruthie follows Sylvie into the mists of transience, but I can't help but be indignant. They're sisters.

I think now--having finished Housekeeping--that Ruthie's decision to follow Sylvie (who seems in character to be very similar to herself) rather than following Lucille (out of habit?) was a crucial part of her coming-of-age. She had to make up her mind to do what was best for her, rather than continuing to do what she had always done. Maybe my strong reaction to the break between the sisters is because I am closer to my sister than Ruthie is to Lucille, and maybe it's because I haven't yet come to a point at which I have to go my own way.

I leave you with a statement and a question. Ruthie starts off Chapter 7 with the something like "For that summer, Lucille was still loyal to us." Would you say that her decision to leave was a betrayal? My first answer was yes, but I'm not so sure.