In Madeleine Thien’s stories “Alchemy” and “House,” the two protagonists, Miriam, and Lorraine navigate and contend with the challenges that accompany dysfunctional and abusive family lives. Miriam in “Alchemy” is isolated and alienated from her own family and feels more at home at her friend Paula’s house whose family life, we later discover, is vastly more toxic, than Miriam’s. In “House,” Lorraine, through her vivid memories, recalls the trials and tribulations she and her sister Kathleen faced in dealing with their mother’s alcoholism and their father’s absence. The two heart-wrenching tales of anguish, abuse, and absence found in “Alchemy” and “House” impress a nuanced and highly introspective views of family life in the mind of the reader.
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Her mother is an alcoholic, and her father spends the majority of his time logging in Vancouver Island. Although, when Lorraine’s father is home, she has fond memories of her family. When all family members are present, and pulling their own weight, Lorraine’s family functions somewhat normally. At a couple points in the story Lorraine’s mother admits her deep-seated need for the stabilization and balance her husband offers to the family when he is at home. One message to take from this story in regard to family life, might be one of the necessity of cohesiveness and togetherness. Without one integral piece, namely the father, the family falls apart, and its disintegration is only exacerbated by the mother’s alcoholism. Lorraine recalls her mother telling her father: “Without you, I fall apart” (103). The outcry of her mother, and later of Lorraine, over the phone, is further evidence of the father’s importance to the family. Perhaps the message to be gleaned from this is that without a cohesive family whose members are all in the same place a family will, in most cases, implode, and that Lorraine’s mother’s alcoholism acts as an accelerant in an inevitable process of family dissolution precipitated by the …show more content…
Her dysfunctional, irresponsible, alcoholic mother is incapable of taking care of her children by herself, and it is only her husband who can stabilize her. This is referenced many times throughout the story, like when Lorraine remember her mother telling her father: “Without you, I fall apart” (103). Later in the story her mother tells her father over the phone: “I can’t hold it together without you” (106). Despite this, Lorraine’s father is working at a logging camp in Port Hardy, on Vancouver Island, and is removed from the dysfunction and havoc occurring within his family. Lorraine tries to communicate the extent of her mother’s drinking over the phone, but her father is dismissive of her concerns. He responds to Lorraine’s saying her mother is “drunk all the time” by laughing and saying “all the time? You should have seen her when she was young” (). This is complete denial and minimization of the problems of the mother by the father. His failure to acknowledge the severity of the problem is partly responsible for the disintegration of his family we see in the
Her mother is an alcoholic, and her father spends the majority of his time logging in Vancouver Island. Although, when Lorraine’s father is home, she has fond memories of her family. When all family members are present, and pulling their own weight, Lorraine’s family functions somewhat normally. At a couple points in the story Lorraine’s mother admits her deep-seated need for the stabilization and balance her husband offers to the family when he is at home. One message to take from this story in regard to family life, might be one of the necessity of cohesiveness and togetherness. Without one integral piece, namely the father, the family falls apart, and its disintegration is only exacerbated by the mother’s alcoholism. Lorraine recalls her mother telling her father: “Without you, I fall apart” (103). The outcry of her mother, and later of Lorraine, over the phone, is further evidence of the father’s importance to the family. Perhaps the message to be gleaned from this is that without a cohesive family whose members are all in the same place a family will, in most cases, implode, and that Lorraine’s mother’s alcoholism acts as an accelerant in an inevitable process of family dissolution precipitated by the …show more content…
Her dysfunctional, irresponsible, alcoholic mother is incapable of taking care of her children by herself, and it is only her husband who can stabilize her. This is referenced many times throughout the story, like when Lorraine remember her mother telling her father: “Without you, I fall apart” (103). Later in the story her mother tells her father over the phone: “I can’t hold it together without you” (106). Despite this, Lorraine’s father is working at a logging camp in Port Hardy, on Vancouver Island, and is removed from the dysfunction and havoc occurring within his family. Lorraine tries to communicate the extent of her mother’s drinking over the phone, but her father is dismissive of her concerns. He responds to Lorraine’s saying her mother is “drunk all the time” by laughing and saying “all the time? You should have seen her when she was young” (). This is complete denial and minimization of the problems of the mother by the father. His failure to acknowledge the severity of the problem is partly responsible for the disintegration of his family we see in the