Scan barcode
A review by monitaroymohan
Dear Life by Alice Munro
Did not finish book.
1.0
Wow, I have heard so much about Alice Munro - she's a Nobel Prize winner and I have wanted to read her work for a while. We had 'Dear Life' at home and I jumped at the opportunity to read it because I love short stories.
And... that didn't go so well. The book is a collection of short stories about people in and around Munro's hometown - I am guessing most of the protagonists are women, as that is how the first two stories went. I am also guessing that most of the stories are about the pitfalls and travails of love and romance. I'm guessing all this because I didn't get passed the first two stories; I just couldn't.
I'm hardly the person to critique a Nobel Prize winner, but as a reader of varied fiction, I was astounded by the writing here. Munro uses the strangest sentence structures, which constantly read like tongue twisters for the eye. I found myself reading and re-reading phrases attempting to decipher their true meaning. Additionally, I'm not sure about her other work, but in this book many sentences and thoughts were left unfinished. There's only so many blanks a reader can fill in; after a while we might as well make up our own stories.
The biggest problem with the two stories that I read were the plots and characters. Fear of having to sit through much more stupidity stopped me from continuing the book. I'd say spoilers ahead, but who cares.
In the first story, our protagonist is a listless woman who heads to a party and immediately gets drunk. She is hit on by a 'nice guy', and in typical Hollywood fashion, starts swooning at the thought of him. Next we know, she's flirting with some teenager (look, I read the Greg guy as a teenager, because the writing confused me so much that I couldn't make out if he was an adult or not) and then they're up to no good on the train. She has a scare just after, and I thought this was going down the same route as 'Little Children', but, nope. The 'nice guy' shows up out of nowhere. I don't know what we're supposed to make of this. I am always amused by these stories where this somehow perfect woman - who is oblivious to her charms, of course - is the object of every man's desire. Seriously, who are these people? They appear to be caricatures of an idealistic B-movie.
The second story was even worse! Nubile young woman starts teaching at a hospital run by a super-horrible doctor. I thought this would be a 'Pride and Prejudice'-esque battle of wits, but nope. Our protagonist has absolutely no personality bar reacting to everything the rude and nasty doctor throws at her. He constantly cuts her down, but worse, he is awful to his own daughter. He intentionally misses his daughter's play (and makes the protagonist skip it to spend time with him). When the girl comes home to re-enact it for them, he tells her to lay off the cookies and sends her home, alone, in the middle of the night. All this happens in front of our protagonist, who does nothing except head to the bedroom with him. Like, what?
All her colleagues seem interested in how their relationship is going, but given how it ends, I'm wondering if they were written as a sniggering chorus, awaiting the strings to be cut off yet another puppet.
Before we know it, the two of them are planning a wedding and off they go. He doesn't inform her that they won't be having any ceremony, instead it's going to be them signing some papers (Red Alert!). Just as she's all ready in her best dress (not a wedding dress), he bails on their plans, tells her he can't do it and puts her on the next train to Toronto. Are you kidding me? Even when this was published in 2013, readers must have had enough stories about lovers being duped. There was just no substance to the story. The epilogue suggests the young woman settled for someone much older than her, and his children (not hers) seemed to constantly be in trouble.
What annoys me about women writing stories about women whose lives are governed/dictated/destroyed by the men around them is that they are not original or enticing. If we wanted to know more about that, we just need to switch to the news. Do something different; give us stories where women are protagonists in their own lives, not just plot points in your imagination.
I know I'm in the minority with regard to my opinion about this book, but, hey, it's time we started asking artists to do more than just the bare minimum. I'm sure Munro's other work is truly spectacular. But this one - not worth the read.
And... that didn't go so well. The book is a collection of short stories about people in and around Munro's hometown - I am guessing most of the protagonists are women, as that is how the first two stories went. I am also guessing that most of the stories are about the pitfalls and travails of love and romance. I'm guessing all this because I didn't get passed the first two stories; I just couldn't.
I'm hardly the person to critique a Nobel Prize winner, but as a reader of varied fiction, I was astounded by the writing here. Munro uses the strangest sentence structures, which constantly read like tongue twisters for the eye. I found myself reading and re-reading phrases attempting to decipher their true meaning. Additionally, I'm not sure about her other work, but in this book many sentences and thoughts were left unfinished. There's only so many blanks a reader can fill in; after a while we might as well make up our own stories.
The biggest problem with the two stories that I read were the plots and characters. Fear of having to sit through much more stupidity stopped me from continuing the book. I'd say spoilers ahead, but who cares.
In the first story, our protagonist is a listless woman who heads to a party and immediately gets drunk. She is hit on by a 'nice guy', and in typical Hollywood fashion, starts swooning at the thought of him. Next we know, she's flirting with some teenager (look, I read the Greg guy as a teenager, because the writing confused me so much that I couldn't make out if he was an adult or not) and then they're up to no good on the train. She has a scare just after, and I thought this was going down the same route as 'Little Children', but, nope. The 'nice guy' shows up out of nowhere. I don't know what we're supposed to make of this. I am always amused by these stories where this somehow perfect woman - who is oblivious to her charms, of course - is the object of every man's desire. Seriously, who are these people? They appear to be caricatures of an idealistic B-movie.
The second story was even worse! Nubile young woman starts teaching at a hospital run by a super-horrible doctor. I thought this would be a 'Pride and Prejudice'-esque battle of wits, but nope. Our protagonist has absolutely no personality bar reacting to everything the rude and nasty doctor throws at her. He constantly cuts her down, but worse, he is awful to his own daughter. He intentionally misses his daughter's play (and makes the protagonist skip it to spend time with him). When the girl comes home to re-enact it for them, he tells her to lay off the cookies and sends her home, alone, in the middle of the night. All this happens in front of our protagonist, who does nothing except head to the bedroom with him. Like, what?
All her colleagues seem interested in how their relationship is going, but given how it ends, I'm wondering if they were written as a sniggering chorus, awaiting the strings to be cut off yet another puppet.
Before we know it, the two of them are planning a wedding and off they go. He doesn't inform her that they won't be having any ceremony, instead it's going to be them signing some papers (Red Alert!). Just as she's all ready in her best dress (not a wedding dress), he bails on their plans, tells her he can't do it and puts her on the next train to Toronto. Are you kidding me? Even when this was published in 2013, readers must have had enough stories about lovers being duped. There was just no substance to the story. The epilogue suggests the young woman settled for someone much older than her, and his children (not hers) seemed to constantly be in trouble.
What annoys me about women writing stories about women whose lives are governed/dictated/destroyed by the men around them is that they are not original or enticing. If we wanted to know more about that, we just need to switch to the news. Do something different; give us stories where women are protagonists in their own lives, not just plot points in your imagination.
I know I'm in the minority with regard to my opinion about this book, but, hey, it's time we started asking artists to do more than just the bare minimum. I'm sure Munro's other work is truly spectacular. But this one - not worth the read.