A prickly protagonist with a tender heart
As heroines go, Olive Kitteridge is about as far away from a Disney princess as Maine is from Florida. Before her retirement, the gruff 60-something was 鈥渢he seventh-grade math teacher that kids were scared of.鈥� And the years haven鈥檛 exactly mellowed her. 鈥淥live had a way about her that was absolutely without apology,鈥� a former co-worker thinks. (Imagine that Miss Viola Swamp, the witchy substitute teacher from the children鈥檚 classic 鈥淢iss Nelson is Missing,鈥� moved to rural Maine and got married.)
And yet, as she stumps her way through Elizabeth Strout鈥檚 translucent new 鈥渘ovel in stories,鈥� Olive Kitteridge, she鈥檚 absolutely beautiful.
Maisy Mills, Maine, a small coastal community, is the kind of town where to make good, children have to move away. 鈥淭own is the church, and the grange hall, and the grocery store, and these days the grocery store could use a coat of paint.鈥� Strout (author of 鈥淎my and Isabelle鈥�) creates a melancholy world where parents pine for their grown children, spouses grieve in marriages grown cold with misunderstanding, and yet where hope, humor, and a kind of quiet endurance remain.
Olive and her gentle husband, Henry, appear in almost every story, though sometimes just glimpsed from a distance. For example, in 鈥淭he Piano Player,鈥� they just pass through someone else鈥檚 heartbreak, on their way to dinner.
Both the humor and the melancholy are evident in the opening story, 鈥淧harmacy,鈥� where Olive鈥檚 husband, Henry, remembers his days running a local store before being forced to sell out to a national chain. About 20 years earlier, Henry had invited his young assistant, Denise, and her husband to dinner, in defiance of Olive鈥檚 wishes. (鈥淣ot keen on it,鈥� she pronounces when he first mentions the possibility.) Dinner takes place over several pages of simmering hostility and placating niceness, brilliantly underplayed by Strout. Olive makes the couple welcome by slapping plates of baked beans in front of them for an entree, while Henry nervously makes chitchat. For dessert, 鈥渢hey were each handed a blue bowl with a scoop of vanilla ice cream sliding in its center. 鈥榁anilla鈥檚 my favorite,鈥� Denise said.
鈥� 鈥業s it,鈥� said Olive.鈥�
But Strout makes a reader feel protective, even tender, toward Olive 鈥� despite her prickliness. Olive鈥檚 father committed suicide; she battled years of depression while her son was growing up; and she鈥檚 still worried about that son, Christopher, now a middle-aged podiatrist. 鈥淪he鈥檇 been through some things, but never mind. She straightened her back. Other people had been through things, too.鈥�
Her fraught relationship with Christopher is one of the book鈥檚 biggest heartbreaks. (A reader would want to hug Olive, if she weren鈥檛 likely to swat one away like a low-flying bat.) Take Christopher鈥檚 wedding day. Olive sewed her green and pink floral dress herself, and she loved it. 鈥淗er heart really opened when she came across the gauzy muslin in So-Fro鈥檚; sunlight let into the anxious gloom of the upcoming wedding....鈥�
But during the reception, Olive overhears her new daughter-in-law gossiping about her and making fun of the dress. Humiliated, Olive wishes she could tell her, 鈥淟isten, Dr. Sue, deep down there is a thing inside me, and sometimes it wells up like the head of a squid and shoots blackness through me. I haven鈥檛 wanted to be this way, but so help me, I have loved my son.鈥� As that feels impossible to her, she consoles herself by ruining one of Sue鈥檚 sweaters with black magic marker and stealing a shoe.
Each of the 13 tales serves as an individual microcosm of small-town life, with its gossip, small kindnesses, and everyday tragedies. Not all the minor characters stand out the way Henry and Olive do, and there are a pile of them to keep straight by the end. I also couldn鈥檛 quite place how one story, 鈥淪hip in a Bottle,鈥� meshed with the rest. But those are small flaws far outweighed by the book鈥檚 compassion and intelligence.
That compassion finds an unlikely source in Olive. Despite her conflicted feelings about her fellow man 鈥� 鈥淪he didn鈥檛 like to be alone. Even more, she didn鈥檛 like being with people鈥� 鈥� she ultimately comes down on the side of human decency. In 鈥淚ncoming Tide,鈥� she helps a former student who鈥檚 contemplating suicide and, in another story, comforts a grieving widow who discovers a particularly nasty betrayal on the day of her husband鈥檚 funeral. And after Henry is incapacitated by a stroke, she visits him every day, bringing their dog to the nursing home parking lot so it can lick Henry鈥檚 hands.
When Olive鈥檚 story is over, she doesn鈥檛 end with bitterness, but equal parts gratitude and regret. 鈥淚t baffled her, the world. She didn鈥檛 want to leave it yet.鈥� Readers will know just how she feels.
Yvonne Zipp regularly reviews fiction for the Monitor.
