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.