The Member of the
Wedding by
Carson McCullers totally immerses us in the life of Frankie, a.k.a. F. Jasmine,
a tortured, bored and dangerously imaginative twelve year old girl on the
tipping point of adolescence. Frankie lives in a small southern town with her distant, widowed father
who is more an absence than a presence. Motherless, she is raised as best she
can by the family housekeeper, Berenice.
Frankie
is dissatisfied with everything in her life and longs for change, adventure and
a sense of belonging. Her despair and discomfort in her surroundings and mostly in her own skin is so brilliantly rendered by McCullers that it’s painful to
experience even as a reader.
Her
older brother, who is in the service, is getting married. Deluded, Frankie
truly believes he will take her on his honeymoon and then to live with him and
his wife. She wants this so desperately that it becomes her reason for living.
The novel takes place in the two days leading up to and after the wedding. Days
during which Frankie takes unimaginable risks.
Her lack of self-awareness and
unbelievable naiveté makes you squirm. You want to teach her, cry with her and
shake sense into her all at the same time. It’s no wonder this McCullers’ work
is considered a classic along with the rest of her impressive body of work.
No comments:
Post a Comment