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CANADIAN LANDSCAPES/ PAYSAGES CANADIENS allies with little room for reconsideration. Although Dorrie suspects that Lloyd has a tendency to view people through a lens of disdain, especially if he feels slighted by them, she knows that contradicting him is futile. So she never does. When Doree/Fleur starts to develop a friendly relationship with someone else, Lloyd’s reaction is predictable: “It got worse, gradually. No direct forbidding, but more criticism” (Munro, “Dimensions”). The female protagonists of these short stories accept living according to their partners’ rules even if they grapple with the toll of maintaining their loyalty to their partners. Also, because they perceive their bond as unique and deeply personal, which should not be subject to scrutiny from others, they are more reluctant to betray their partner’s trust than care for their own emotional well-being. They are willing to make sacrifices in the name of deeply felt human connections and intimacy. Thus the three stories exhibit a number of shared characteristics, such as types of characters and relationships, elements of plot, and a thematic focus on characters shaping narratives they resist revising. Moreover, they also show a strong thematic coherence. However, the differences in their endings signify a change in Munro’s perspective. While in her earlier narratives the Eve-like female protagonists are hopelessly caught up in the complexities of loyalty, intimacy, and individual identity, Munro envisions a different possible resolution for her intentionally blind female protagonist in her most recent narratives. In the first narrative, the secret remains a secret, and is at most preserved as a scar in the taxidermist’s Garden of Eden’: both Liza and Bea unconsciously opt for intentional blindness because it offers greater emotional comfort. In the second story, Carla suspects Clark’s secret but refuses to ascertain what happened to Flora, fearing that she would not know who she is without Clark. In contrast, in the third narrative, Doree/Fleur comes to the realization that although the alternative reality presented by her husband is tempting, it demands a higher cost than she is prepared to pay. On the one hand, if she succumbs to his narrative about different dimensions, her life as defined through her relationship to Lloyd remains tenable. All she needs to do is believe. On the other hand, this erases the reality not only of his brutal action but also that of her and her children’s experience. This is what she intimates when she catches the scent of the freshly ironed shirt of the young man in the accident spread out like Jesus on the cross. The young man, who almost died, who she resuscitated, who is now lying on the roadside, is someone’s son; this someone ironed his shirt fresh before he left for his ride, this someone takes care of him and cares for him. The materiality of his life, the fact that he can return home matters to them. Thus she resists Lloyd’s dimensions offering consolation in belief.? ? The three initials carved into the wood at the scene of the rape on Ladner’s estate. 3 Just as earlier she resisted the Christian leaflet lady in Mrs Sand’s office. +50 +
