I didn't always enjoy the way Irene treated him, as I've noted, but I REALLY didn't enjoy the way he treated her. His tone always seemed mockingly respectful (like when he referred to her to his son as "the ladies in the house") and tinged with sarcasm or passive-aggression. I never got the feeling that he actually loved and honored his wife. Do you think the author intended for us to like him?
Was she trying to draw any specific comparisons between the husbands in the story?
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Yes, I couldn't find any husband characters to admire or even like in this narrative. Brian did tick me off, especially after that conversation he had with Irene in the car. John Bellew, though, should take the prize for "worst-husband-ever" title!
ReplyDeleteYeah, he would get my vote, for sure.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't fathom how Clare endured him. I understand the desire to "pass," just to be able to go through life in that era without the horror of racism (on top of the horror of sexism). But, honestly, how did she endure him? She not only had to bear his terrible racism, but she had to behave like a racist herself, telling him how she wouldn't have a black person in the house, etc., to seem extra convincing. It's like those self-hating gay people who adopt homophobic behaviors to show others that they aren't gay.
Maybe this is why, as I mentioned elsewhere, I felt kind of indifferent toward Clare. I just don't understand what kind of character one must have to live the life she did.
Agreed on all counts. I can't imagine how Clare could bear it. Being called "nig" all the time as a pet name? Ugh.
ReplyDeleteI wondered if Brian was just bitter about having his dreams of South America dashed. He agreed to stay in New York for Irene's sake, but he clearly resented it later. It was really aggravating, though, how he spoke to her.
Agreed on all counts as well. Brian I didn't like or dislike -- he was weak more than anything else. Whatever came out of him I took as the barely veiled hostility of a henpecked husband. And the hullabaloo over sending their sons to school -- that was his stand that Irene had manipulated him into a corner, but their boys would have a real life and not the manufactured one Irene thought safest. There wasn't really a strength to him to understand what kind of man he would have been if he lived as he wished. The appeal for adventure in Brazil, that I could admire, but other than that he just didn't have much presence. He was the kind of guy who could get pushed around by two stronger women.
ReplyDeleteJohn Ballew -- worst husband ever -- nicely said, Shanxi. A one-dimensional monster. I also find it hard to understand why Clare would tolerate him, but maybe she felt she had the upper hand, the joke's on him, and so on, with her secret. She did seem to gravitate toward risk and pain. Maybe he reminded her of her father, or controlling a jerk like that made her feel powerful when as a child she couldn't control anything or anyone.