July 29, Final Post

I’d have to say the one story that I liked most, perhaps because it was my lead respondent story and I looked deeper into it than some of the others, was “A New England Nun”. I guess the appeal was the ambiguity of its true meaning. On the surface we have this proper woman who pledges her marriage to a man who travels away for 15 years. She becomes accustom to a life of routine and monotony, even finds joy in it. Her human interactions are almost non-existent and when her past lover returns she is annoyed by his very presents. In fact the realization that her married life is now coming to fruition upsets her. The text tells us that, “In that length of time much had happened. Louisa's mother and brother had died, and she was all alone in the world. But greatest happening of all-a subtle happening which both were too simple to understand-Louisa's feet had turned into a path, smooth maybe under a calm, serene sky, but so straight and unswerving that it could only meet a check at her grave, and so narrow that there was no room for any one at her side.” All of her relationships have been severed and she has become numb to human interaction. Her pets metaphor her life well, both cut off from others and content in doing so. This life of basically house chores is safe and comforting. She finds that Joe has fallen in love with a younger woman and breaks their marriage arrangements. This brings her ease saying, “the next morning, on waking, she felt like a queen who, after fearing lest her domain be wrested away from her, sees it firmly insured in her possession.” Such a strange way for a human being to act, but it can be understood. In the theme of change this story fits well, our protagonist goes through a rather dramatic and peculiar life style change. I like how much dissecting this story takes with room for lots of interpretation. Odd characters (i.e. the pets) are added for substantial evidence making. I would recommend this story to a fellow literature student to write about.