Do you ever find yourself hating MG's hypocricy? I get people who can't stand (or are ambivalent about) their parents and family and write about it. But MG goes out of her way to clarify that her stories are close to autobiography and that he friends agree, and then in the same breath to claim that she never did or wrote anything to disparage her. For example, David Sedaris has always written the most appalling things about his family, but hasn't tried to sugarcoat himself, even when dealing with his disturbed sister Tiffany and her suicide. Nor did Albee when writing and speaking about his mother.
The lack of charity to the report that her mother has said "I was a bad mother" is telling. Maybe she would have said the opposite a minute later, and/or maybe her mother said that so it would get back to her, but MG seems to like to nurse her grievances, with her mother as with Canada, in a way that never allows redemption or a generous impulse to the notion that even if her mother had an agenda (getting in touch) or was fickle, the act of verbalizing something so socially stigmatized (being a bad mother) meant worlds were happening below the surface.
Also her reaction to receiving the photo of her mom reading the newspaper she wrote for. Pretty cold and lacking the nuance she invests in balancing the language in her sentences. At least, that's how it strikes me. (It's a blessing she never had kids, don't you think? She would have made their lives hell.)
Golly! Allan, that's a lot to think about. I'll do that - still at work, on a break, can't reply fully now, just to say that she had her complexities, as we all do, and that she was someone who was often asked to express them in interviews which might not be the place to really wrestle with the past and so on. I never met her, and about her mother I have no idea, apart from the bits and pieces in the public record -- no doubt Benny was an angel she wrestled with. She was closing in on 80 when she gave that interview, too, and not in the best of health. Me, I'd apply about as much salt to it as the Russians did to their windows. Anyway, a half made bed of half-thought thoughts, great to know you're reading and responding, really appreciate it, always. Gotta bounce! b
Do you ever find yourself hating MG's hypocricy? I get people who can't stand (or are ambivalent about) their parents and family and write about it. But MG goes out of her way to clarify that her stories are close to autobiography and that he friends agree, and then in the same breath to claim that she never did or wrote anything to disparage her. For example, David Sedaris has always written the most appalling things about his family, but hasn't tried to sugarcoat himself, even when dealing with his disturbed sister Tiffany and her suicide. Nor did Albee when writing and speaking about his mother.
The lack of charity to the report that her mother has said "I was a bad mother" is telling. Maybe she would have said the opposite a minute later, and/or maybe her mother said that so it would get back to her, but MG seems to like to nurse her grievances, with her mother as with Canada, in a way that never allows redemption or a generous impulse to the notion that even if her mother had an agenda (getting in touch) or was fickle, the act of verbalizing something so socially stigmatized (being a bad mother) meant worlds were happening below the surface.
Also her reaction to receiving the photo of her mom reading the newspaper she wrote for. Pretty cold and lacking the nuance she invests in balancing the language in her sentences. At least, that's how it strikes me. (It's a blessing she never had kids, don't you think? She would have made their lives hell.)
Golly! Allan, that's a lot to think about. I'll do that - still at work, on a break, can't reply fully now, just to say that she had her complexities, as we all do, and that she was someone who was often asked to express them in interviews which might not be the place to really wrestle with the past and so on. I never met her, and about her mother I have no idea, apart from the bits and pieces in the public record -- no doubt Benny was an angel she wrestled with. She was closing in on 80 when she gave that interview, too, and not in the best of health. Me, I'd apply about as much salt to it as the Russians did to their windows. Anyway, a half made bed of half-thought thoughts, great to know you're reading and responding, really appreciate it, always. Gotta bounce! b