During discussion, we all pretty much agreed that Olive’s hysterical talk with Christopher in the kitchen is pretty much the climax of the novel. I’m sad to say that this is my least favorite chapter in the book. I’ve never really cared for him, and my distaste just deepened.
I feel like he is victimizing himself, blaming his mother for his inability to get past his baggage. I’m sorry to say, having been abused as a child is an excuse, not a reason. I feel like Christopher probably hates his life with his stupid wife, bratty kids and filthy house. With Anne though, they can both blame their parents for their poor choices.
He brought his mother all the way from Maine just to indulge his feelings. Then he let her go out in an unfamiliar place, where an old, confused lady could definitely come to no good.
He’s SELFISH. Sometimes I hate my mother, and sometimes I don’t care, but I don’t use her and I would never leave her helpless. Hell, she’s screwed me over plenty of times, yet I still let her be on my cell phone plan so that she isn’t without a phone.
Still, it served a sort of purpose. It woke Olive up to herself a bit in the end; she realized a lot of her loneliness was a consequence of her own actions. Her rudeness and abrasiveness had caught up with her.
On the last page she showed amazing insight. If any part of this novel sticks with me, the last page will be it. Youth squanders love and age misses it.
My boyfriend treats me with more kindness, love and caring than anyone else ever has. I think I’ll try to be a bit kinder to him and be more appreciative of the things he does. After all, I can be harsh and abrasive; I don’t want to end up alone.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
"Tell me about your mother."
ReplyDeleteSigmud Freud
I hate Freudian analysis (fun thing to do: go to the 2009 results for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest and search for Oedipus). It almost always leads to something like Cristopher's profession that someone else is always at fault.
I think that's what these last two (why is "Criminal" even there? Aargh!) stories are really about: responsibility. Olive (for some reason I wanted to call her "Dido" just then) realizes that Chistopher is a self-aggrandizing ingrate, then finds solace in aking responsibility for her own pecadillos through the extremely frank character Jack.
It's the one time I actually felt sympathetic toward Olive.
Don't worry, though, the feeling quickly passed.
I understand everything you are saying. Christopher is just using his mother as an excuse to blame someone for his messed up life. We all sometimes put the blame of our situation on ot someone else but in the end deep down we know it's only becasue of us.
ReplyDeleteChristopher is just a little boy inside being stupid. Like that guy in class said, (Girls are stupid)????? well from reading this book and experiences in life men (boys) are stupid, immature (as we all know) people that only let people get close to them so they will have someone to blame fo theri problems. I'm not saying this about all men because you seem to have gotten one of the good ones, but just for most men, they act just like Christopher.