Thursday 22 January, 2004
Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
Although my mother keeps telling me now and again that I should read "real books", I very rarely do. I seem to be very limited with my choice of genres, and I generally only read sci-fi and crime novels, with rare occasion of some fantasy. "Normal" fiction, biographies or anything to do with real life rarely holds my interest. But I got this book Virgin Suicides as a Christmas present from my sister, and it looked relatively interesting, so I decided to give it a go. Besides, it would be rude not to, and it has less than 300 pages.
Virgin Suicides is a story about a family of seven where all five teenage daughters commit suicide. And that's not really a spoiler, since the events are explained in the beginning, and the book goes trough the year between first and the last of the suicides. It's written from a point of view of one of the girls' admirers and tries to understand the reasons behind the terrible events.
The book was a compelling read. Although you know what is going to happen, you want to understand the girls and you want to know the gruesome details. Finnish translation was very good, so I can only assume that the original English would be beautifully written too. In the end though I think I was a bit disappointed - everything happened, as you knew it would, and there is no explanation. We don't have enough information to make our own conclusions either, except the obvious - they lived such a restricted life that they couldn't see any other way out. But if that is true, what is the meaning of the story?
Because I always approach stories - whether it be an episode of a TV series, movie or a book - by asking "what's it about?" . A good story has a message in it, something it wants to convey to the audience. With this book, I'm not quite sure what it is. Or maybe I'm just trying to find a deeper meaning from the story because I got attached to the girls and I wanted their deaths to have a meaning. And in the end I feel empty because (for me) there was no justification, no one learned anything and no one became a better person because of it.
Sofia Coppola made a film about this book recently, and although I haven't heard good things about it from anyone that has seen it, I feel an urge to see it now. If for nothing else but I'd be very interested to see what her interpretation of the story is.
Posted by kolibri at 22 January 15:53, 2004Unfortunately, I haven't read the book, but I have seen the movie. I don't know who told you that Coppola's adaptation isn't good, but whoever said so is a lying sack of shit.
As for death, it rarely has justification, it rarely teaches anything worthwhile or unique (and if it does, it's even rarer that anybody bothers to learn from it), and it certainly doesn't make anyone a better person. People die, for various reasons. Those who survive live, until they die. I'm not trying to sound apathetic here; I just don't see a point in trying to make it into anything more than a natural circle of existence.
I'm a little surprised to see you wondering about the meaning of the story. What kind of a meaning would you like to have? What's wrong with the one you got? (I'm making the admittedly bold supposition that the book and the movie are similar enough to have the same principal elements.)
# 2 - Kolibri (on January 22, 2004 10:40 PM):
Hm. Maybe it's more like I was expecting a little more than "life is shit and then you die" - no matter how true that might be in real life. Maybe this is the reason I don't read "real books": that I expect them to have more to offer or something more special than what I have. This applies also to what I said about hoping that the girls' deaths' would have more meaning beyond just dying, I want there to be more, and although in the real world I don't get a say, in books this is possible.
If the story is just "they had a hard time and then they died", what does it mean? What does it teach to us? Passion or pity or love or admiration didn't seem to hold any aswers, and in the end there was no hope for anyone. I don't want to learn that. I want to believe that there is always hope, and I want to believe that something good can come out of tragedy too.
And before you say it, I know: "Tough shit" :)
# 3 - Anonymous (on January 23, 2004 11:27 AM):
The movie is excellent. It is not quite as good as Coppolas second feature Lost in Translation (in theatres now), but a very, very good first film from a very, very promising director. Quite frankly it doesn't seem impossible that Sofia will at some point bypass his father. Actually, it doesn't even seem unlikely.
# 4 - Mikki (on January 24, 2004 02:15 PM):
What does the story teach you? Well, if nothing else, it shows that if you treat your daughters like that, if you try to protect them from, well, everything, their lives will be shit -- and, very possibly, so will your own. (Although, if somebody's willing to treat people like that, they are already a waste of perfectly good flesh, no matter how good and decent and well-intentioned they may be -- but that's another thing.)
Anyway, if you have to have some sort of a lesson in a book, that's not a bad one. Isn't that enough? How is that meaningless?
Certainly, something good can come out of a tragedy. In most cases, something probably does -- but if, say, an earthquake that kills 50 000 people in Iran also happens to save someone's construction business from bankruptcy by creating a lot of work opportunities, and subsequently causes the owner to lead a prosperous and happy life, so what? Does that matter? Does showing that somehow make things better or nicer? Does not showing that mean it doesn't happen, or that you can't believe in it?
"Oh, okay, now I don't mind reading about it." Eh?
I don't think I follow your train of thought here.
# 5 - Kolibri (on January 24, 2004 03:49 PM):
I'm probably expressing myself badly again. When I talk about learning something, there are two levels - firstly, personal level (me) and secondly the other characters in the book.
Lesson for me - I don't think there was one, except that repeating is mother of all studies... I hopefully already knew all that, and even if the outcome hadn't been clear from the beginning, I knew it couldn't have ended well. I already knew you can't treat people like that. Maybe it would be news to some readers, who knows.
Lesson for the other characters in the book - there wasn't one. In the book, the parents comment on the events twenty years later, and seem confused and dismissive of their role in the events. They haven't learned anything. Other bystanders - the boys - are left confused and pining for the girls they never really knew, chasing a dream that never was.
Don't get me wrong, I liked the book. I thought it was good and thought provoking. What I left wanting, was some kind of closure.
So the book didn't tell what happened in the end. Of course I can always make something up - maybe the father regretted that he didn't intervene on his deathbed, maybe the mother never did. I could believe that - but it's not my story. The author left it open intentionally - so there is the obvious conclusion, like I originally said, like you've said.
No, that's not a bad lesson, it's not meaningless - to me. Other characters in the book, I'm not so sure. And that's the justification I missed.
# 6 - Chu (on January 26, 2004 10:44 AM):
After seeing the film, what I would have liked to know is if the girls ever thought of other means of escape than death - if there would have been any other way out of their situation.
Kolibri, did the book shed any light on this?
And yes, the film is definitely worth seeing. It's sad, fragile and cruel - and yet beautiful, serene and thought-provoking.
# 7 - Kolibri (on January 26, 2004 12:45 PM):
They did in a way - they did send messages to the boys. They left little pictures of Mary with cryptic messages for them to find. They had a phone call where no words were exchanged, both parties would just play a record where words of the song were used as means of communication.
The boys knew the girls wanted out and were willing to help - and just when they are coming to get them and are standing in the hall waiting for them to finish packing, engine running, they all kill themselves.
I want to believe that there would have been another way out, but it's of course very subjective. And in the end of the day, maybe they didn't want out, maybe they just wanted it to stop.
# 8 - Mikki (on January 26, 2004 01:45 PM):
Not everyone wants to live. I don't think that's necessarily a sad thing.
# 9 - Ronald Bachman MD (on February 25, 2004 04:46 PM):
I am a clinical geneticist and have been asked to lecture on the genetics/endocrinology of the disorder of the main character in "Middlesex" by Jeffrey Eugenides. I am wondering if anyone has Dr.Eugenides E Mail addres. I would like to send him a copy of my lecture. ron
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