My Atwood Project, Part 15: Stone Mattress

This collection of “wicked tales” was published in 2015. Atwood takes pains to define “tale” as less true than “story”: “We may safely assume that all tales are fiction, whereas a ‘story’ might well be a true story about what we usually agree to call ‘real life.’” 

The first three are interconnected. "Alphinland" is about Constance, who has recently lost her husband but continues to converse with him; she especially wants to know if he had that affair, like she suspected he did. The title comes from her successful fantasy series, which supported them; C. W. Starr, her nom de plume, seems to be an amalgam of J. K. Rowling and Atwood herself. Atwood's characters often write “subliterary” fiction (her word; see the romance novels in Lady Oracle, for example) to support themselves. Does she actually consider any of her work to be pulp?

“Revenant” switches to the point of view of Constance’s ex, Gavin, and his young wife, Reynolds. He regrets not marrying Constance, and tells Reynolds so. But no time to hash it out, as Reynolds has arranged for him to meet with Naveena, who is writing about his work, or so Reynolds says. In point of fact, she’s writing about Constance, and Gavin is just someone who knew her before she was famous. 

The third story, “Dark Lady,” takes place after Gavin’s death. Jorrie and her twin Tin, fka Marjorie and Martin, learn of Gavin’s funeral, and Jorrie, who was with Gavin after Constance, wants to go and gloat. She hopes Constance will be there…and of course she is. 

“Lusus Naturae” was written for a collection of “strange tales” edited by Michael Chabon, and continues in the undead-ish vein of Happy Zombie Sunrise Home.

“The Freeze-Dried Groom” and “The Dead Hand Loves You” are delightful little horror gems. In the first, a man who uses storage units for drug deals, and whose inner monologue imagines him as a murder victim, discovers a chilling cache, and gets to play out his fantasy. The second reminds me of the first three intertwined stories: a young writer who can’t pay the rent jokingly contracts with his housemates to share the proceeds of his next book. It’s a surprise hit that ties them all uncomfortably together, and he contemplates murdering the people siphoning off his riches. 

“I Dream of Zenia with the Bright Red Teeth” is a return to the characters from The Robber Bride, but with a more sympathetic reading of the man-stealing antagonist Zenia.

The title story is a chilling tale of murder and revenge. When Bob raped 14-year-old Verna, he ruined her life, and set her on a path to seducing older men, then sending them off a little sooner than necessary. She’s plotting to do the same to a man on her cruise -- but he turns out to be Bob. Her revenge is perfectly plotted, using an aptly named piece of fossil called a “stone mattress.” 

Finally, “Torching the Dusties” is about a movement that would scale up Verna’s approach by ridding the country of folks in retirement homes. 

My Atwood Projet, Part 14: The Happy Zombie Sunrise Home

The Happy Zombie Sunrise Home (2013), Atwood’s first publication after the conclusion of the MaddAddam series in 2013, is a quick fun read, a novella that I could only find on Wattpad, in the form of a blog. Is it by Naomi Alderman, author of The Power, and dedicated to Atwood, as the Wattpad blog states? Or was it coauthored by the two of them, as the book cover image suggests? Alderman is mentioned in the memoir as a mentee of Atwood’s, whom she chose because Alderman was not “in awe” of her.  

Happy Zombie alternates between two points of view, that of Okie, a young girl whose mother-turned-zombie has just eaten her father; and Clio, Okie’s grandmother, to whom Okie must now bring her zombie mother for safekeeping. Clio is a familiar Atwood trope: an older woman with a secret and a dim view of the young, like Iris in The Blind Assassin. One might assume that the younger Alderman wrote Okie’s sections, and Atwood wrote Clio’s. 

The plot takes a couple of twists and turns as Okie heads out on her quest to deliver her subdued mother, with the help of delivery driver and love interest Hughes. Clio waits for her granddaughter at home, reflecting on her husband’s experimental anti-Alzheimer’s energy drink, “Glowing Skull,” that launched the  Zombiepocalype.  

If you haven’t read Alderman’s novel The Power (2017), you should. She dedicates it to Atwood and her partner Graeme Gibson. The novel has been compared to The Handmaid’s Tale, and I see Atwood’s mentoring influence, especially in the frame story. The male author of the book, a historian, presents it as “the most plausible narrative” of the time when women gained physical power over men, in the form of electricity generated in organs called “skeins” near their collarbones. This physical power allowed women to control and even rape men, flipping the power dynamic and leading to the situation of female dominance in the frame story. The male author who has researched and written this history appeals to his female mentor for help publishing it; she proposes that he publish under a female name, since no one is likely to believe such an incredible claim coming from a mere man.

This conceit reminds me of the way both The Handmaid’s Tale and The Testaments are presented within the frame narrative of an academic conference, which reassures us that Gilead did not last, but also casts some doubt on the narratives.

My Atwood Project, Part 13: Moral Disorder

This is the third of three short books that Atwood published in the six years between Oryx and Crake (2003) and the second book of the MaddAddam series, The Year of the Flood (2009). I was looking forward to rereading Moral Disorder (2006) because my favorite Atwood story, “My Last Duchess,” is in it. What an eye-opener to find that every single story (or chapter?) is autobiographical to a certain extent. 

As Atwood says in the memoir: "It’s a mix of Nell and Tig stories—these two characters would appear later in Old Babes in the Wood, and they bear more than a coincidental relationship to Graeme and me—and stories of childhood…. The last two stories, however, are valedictions. A valediction is an act of bidding farewell. The first valediction, ‘The Labrador Fiasco,’ is for my father, who had died ten years before. The second—’The Boys at the Lab’—is for my mother..."

In fact, this seems like a practice memoir, or a first draft of one. The full title is Moral Disorder and Other Stories, and each section has a title on its first page, but in the the table of contents they are simply labeled with chapter numbers, as if it were a single narrative rather than a collection. The title comes from a novel that Graeme started but never finished.

Chapter 1, “The Bad News,” is a Nell and Tig story, which begins in the present and then transposes them to Roman times to show how the more things change, the more they stay the same.

The next four stories are about Atwood’s childhood and youth, all with analogs in the memoir. 

• In Chapter 2, “The Art of Cooking and Serving,” first-person narration, Atwood as a child prepares for the birth of her sister Ruth. It’s an anxiety-inducing time, as their mother is older than is usual -- forty-two, we learn in the memoir.  
• Chapter 3, “The Headless Horseman,” also first person, is about a Halloween costume passed from Atwood to younger sister Ruth.
• Chapter 4, “My Last Duchess,” also first person, is about Atwood’s final year in high school and early boyfriend. I love it because I can relate both to young Margaret, a strong student with a boyfriend, and also to the English teacher, as I became one later. I also love the title poem, which I have taught, and Tess of the d’Urbervilles, which they also study. 
• Chapter 5, “The Other Place,” first person, recounts in a vague and general way Atwood’s restless first years out of college. 

In Chapter 6, “Monopoly,” we return to the Nell and Tig stories. This is about when Atwood was officially introduced to Tig and Oona’s (Graeme and Shirley's) children as Graeme’s new -- girlfriend? The narrator decides during the story that Oona/Shirley considers her a governess, a glorified babysitter. All this harks back to Life Before Man, the fictionalized story of Graeme’s disaster of an open marriage with Shirley, before committing to Atwood.

 

In Chapter 7, “Moral Disorder,” we continue with Nell and Tig, and all the animals on the farm: how they are acquired, and often, how they die. Considering all this come and go in the animal world leads Nell/Atwood to the realization that Tig/Gibson does not want to marry, or for Nell to have children

Chapter 8, “White Horse,” is also in the Nell and Tig framework, but it’s mostly about Atwood's sister Ruth, called Lizzie in the story, and her mental health struggles. When Atwood let Ruth know that she’d have a chapter in her memoir, Ruth replied, “I don’t actually need one, it's all in Moral Disorder.” 

In Chapter 9, “The Entities,” Oona/Shirley insists that Nell/Atwood buy her a house. Then she dies in it. Again, it’s all real, and in the memoir.

Chapter 10, “The Labrador Fiasco,” returns to the first person, and tells of Atwood’s father’s decline. It contains a story within a story: Atwood’s mother is reading to him an account of a real expedition to Labrador in the Canadian wilderness. The expedition is a fiasco, due to inadequate knowledge and poor preparation. Atwood’s father gleefully imagines how he would have done better. I view this as a reflection on his life as a man who was a successful wilderness trekker.

 

Finally, Chapter 11, “The Boys at the Lab,” continues in the first person and tells of Atwood’s mother’s decline. I found the connection to these “boys,” the students who assisted Atwood’s father, intriguing. I get the impression, from the many cold and abandoning mothers in Atwood’s work, that her mother was not as warm with her children as she was with other adults, that perhaps she regretted leaving behind an independent and unconventional life to become a mother.