We Were the Mulvaneys

Product Information

Readers have reacted in sharply contrasting ways to the dilemma of the heart of the novel: If a loving, family-oriented woman must choose between her husband and one of her children, whom does she choose? Corinne Mulvaney is a deeply, unself-consciously religious woman who acts out of love and duty, but also with an unquestioned sense of God's intentions. She doesn't think of herself her own wishes but those of others; until the end of the novel, when she befriends an energetic, irrepressible woman named Sable, Corinne doesn't think of herself as an individual at all. She's Corinne Mulvaney, known to everyone as Michael Mulvaney's wife. Her behavior will seem baffling, even unconscionable, to those who don't share her faith. I don't believe that, in her place, I would have acted as she did, but I don't judge her harshly. Perhaps I even envy her faith. Between 1968 and 1978, Oates taught at the University of Windsor in Canada, just across the Detroit river. During this immensely productive decade, she published new books at the rate of two or three per year, all the while maintaining a full-time academic career. Though still in her thirties, Oates had become one of the most respected and honored writers in the United States. Asked repeatedly how she managed to produce so much excellent work in a wide variety of genres, she gave variations of the same basic answer, telling The New York Times in 1975 that “I have always lived a very conventional life of moderation, absolutely regular hours, nothing exotic, no need, even, to organize my time.” When a reporter labeled her a “workaholic,” she replied, “I am not conscious of working especially hard, or of ‘working’ at all. Writing and teaching have always been, for me, so richly rewarding that I don’t think of them as work in the usual sense of the word.” En cuanto a la traducción, en general me ha parecido correcta, pero… hay cositas, cositas aquí y allá como: There were those times when the telephone rang, and she could not locate a phone amid the clutter. She rushed, she stumbled – for what if it was Michael Sr., her beloved husband of whom she thought, worried obsessively as the mother of an infant if physically parted from the infant thinks and worries obsessively of the infant even when her mind appears to be fully engaged, if not obsessed, with other matters. Creo que la reflexión de la autora es si fue lo que pasó o más bien la reacción de los implicados lo que trajo tanto dolor. Hay también énfasis sobre el papel de la víctima y cómo es rechazada por la sociedad sin tener culpa alguna, de manera que el machismo se impone.

Es una experiencia muy inmersiva leer esta novela, por lo menos en mi caso lo ha sido, porque a raíz de la tragedia que se desencadena esa noche del 14 de febrero, Joyce Carol Oates consigue que reacciones como lector y que te preocupen esos personajes, sobre todo los hijos Mulvaney, que casi sin darse cuenta, empiezan a conocer de verdad a sus padres y ese entorno que hasta entonces les había parecido tan idílico. De la noche a la mañana el sueño americano es destrozado y tienen que empezar a gestionar el Porqué de este cambio en su vida familiar, un cambio que les viene dado tanto desde dentro de la familia (esas decisiones injustas tomadas por sus padres) como desde el entorno y la ciudad donde viven, donde las miradas y los comportamientos hacia ellos cambian también de la noche a la mañana. Lo que es tan difícil que un autor pueda conseguir y es el hecho de que el lector se preocupe por sus personajes, aquí esta autora lo consigue sin ninguna duda. Momentos de crueldad emocional, momentos en los que los hijos se encuentran indefensos y momentos en que la vulnerabilidad tanto de los padres como de los hijos frente a una sociedad interesada y partidista, convierten esta novela también en un discurso muy crítico con respecto a la sociedad en la que vivimos porque aqui la autora aborda temas universales como es el elitismo de ciertas clases sociales, la libertad del individuo y la búsqueda de su propia identidad, y sobre todo la naturaleza. Pocas veces he leido a la Oates explayarse tanto y tan largamente con pasajes que exaltan su amor por la naturaleza y sobre todo por los animales: hay muchas páginas dedicadas a ellos, a los animales de la familia, a los gatos, quizás en un intento por compararlos a las personas. Hay un momento en que algún personaje revela que ver envejecer a nuestros animales es casi una visión acelerada de nuestro propio envejecimiento futuro. Gloriosa, Joyce Carol Oates. When news of her grandmother's death reaches her, Marianne resolves to go to the funeral and to renew her connection to her family. A shy boy from the co-op named Hewie Miner offers to drive her across the state to the town where Corinne was raised. After traveling several hours, though, Marianne finds that she does not have it in herself to enter the chapel: she watches from outside and sees her mother and Judd, but neither of her other brothers or her father. On the way home, she has Hewie drive through Mt. Ephraim, past the Mulvaney Roofing building, through the streets she knew as a child, and past High Point Farm, realizing how removed she is now from it all. This book is about a family- The Mulvaneys. They are a good family; a well-known family in their country home in upstate NY. These family members have names but to be honest with you each one is referred to by about 4 different names and there is such a long introduction to all of them individually that I couldn’t be bothered to actually pay attention to it. There’s a mom, a dad, a few brothers and a sweet darling sister whose innocence is taken from her in one of the worst ways one could ever imagine. Writing makes Oates melancholy, especially towards the end of a book, when the momentum propels her through 10-hour days. She needs to surround herself with people to relax. So it was that, in spite of disliking most television and finding popular culture "debased", Oates took to Oprah's Book Club in a way some of her younger, more modish literary peers did not. In Oprah's world, readers don't read; they stay up all night sobbing their way through a book and then write to its author in the morning. "I found that very wonderful and very surprising," says Oates, blinking her great marble eyes. "Since I'm a literary person, I look upon books as texts that have been imagined and written. But the general reading public looks upon books as documents of reality, and so the people on Oprah would say, for instance, 'I have a mother just like that.' Or, 'My father was just like that.' Or, 'This happened to me.' They don't seem to perceive - nor do they wish to perceive - that this is a novel. I think if they had, for instance, a class on Shakespeare's Hamlet, they would say, 'Gertrude is just like my mother; Hamlet's like my brother; Ophelia, that's my story.' And they would get a lot of emotion out of that." She falters. There is nothing wrong with reading as therapy, but there is something perhaps painful to an author in seeing readers gobble up their books as an excuse to "basically talk about themselves". Oates's eyelashes lower. "Of course, one doesn't want to dampen that enthusiasm." If you are also looking for a book with easily identifiable heroes and villans to relate to, cheer for and boo and hiss at, then again, this is not a book for you. The characters Oates' draws are human, with all their flaws and weaknesses. Every single one of them is unpredictable, at time unfathomable, at times loveable, and at time detestable. Just like life itself.The story is about a family living on a farm on the outskirts of a small New York town, mid-1970’s. The writing immediately insinuates you into the Mulvaney family, their history, the place they now live, friends and neighbors, what their lives are like, family dynamics, quirks. You feel like you know them, and they seem cool, likable. Until the day their seventeen year old daughter is raped at a school dance. From that point on, we witness the family’s complete implosion, with each character dealing with “it” in their own way, going completely off the rails into a downward spiral that lasts for years. It’s gratifying to see that there is some closure and redemption by the end, but you’ll have to read for yourself to see exactly what that is and how they all got there, and that’s a heartbreaking ride. Not all the prose is so insightful. This passage, for instance, cries out for tightening and clarity:

I believe in uttering the truth, even if it hurts us. Particularly if it hurts us.” (Part 1, “Storybook House”) ImageryDuring these mad dashes to the wall phone in the kitchen she hadn’t time to fall but with fantastical grace and dexterity wrenched herself upright in midfall and continued running (dogs whimpering, yapping hysterically in her wake, cats scattering wide-eyed and plume-tailed) before the telephone ceased its querulous ringing – though frequently she was greeted with nothing more than a derisive dial tone, in any case.