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CANADIAN LANDSCAPES/ PAYSAGES CANADIENS
characters interpret reality and the way they seek, accept or reject knowledge.
The three stories question the impact of knowledge or its rejection on the
individual: whether it alienates or connects with others, whether it has a price,
and if so, what it is, and whether that price is worth paying. At the heart of
each narrative lies the quest of a woman who — at least initially — is daunted
because she senses that knowledge may reveal horrors in her life, challenge or
jeopardize the image she has maintained of herself, of her loved one, of their
life together. Through the examples of the three narratives presented, the paper
has explored a Munrovian rendering of the story of the Fall, where knowledge
allows Eve to detach herself from an abusive Adam and, by leaving the illusion
of romantic, passionate love, rather than believing his story of themselves, she
can start spinning a new one of herself for herself. In the final narrative, this
possibility is posited as a happy ending.
WORKS CITED
Carrington, Ildiko De Papp. Controlling the Uncontrollable: The Fiction of Alice Munro.
Northern Illinois UP, 1989.
Carscallen, James. The Other Country: Patterns in the Writing of Alice Munro. E-book ed.,
ECW Press, 1993.
Munro, Alice. “An Interview with Alice Munro.” With Geoff Hancock. Canadian Fiction
Magazine, vol. 43, 1982, pp. 74-114.
———. “Boys and Girls.” Dance of the Happy Shades and Other Stories. (1968). E-book ed.,
Vintage Books, 1998.
———. Friend of My Youth. McClelland & Stewart, 1990.
———. Lives of Girls and Women. McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1971.
———. “Vandals.” Open Secrets. McClelland & Stewart, 1994, pp. 261-94.
———. “Runaway.” Runaway. E-book ed., McClelland & Stewart, 2004.
———. “Dimensions.” Too Much Happiness. E-book ed., McClelland & Stewart, 2009.
———. Who Do You Think You Are. Macmillan of Canada, 1978.
Trussler, Michael. “Pockets of Nothingness: ‘Metaphysical Solitude’ in Alice Munro’s ‘Pas¬
sion.” Narrative, vol. 20, no. 2, May 2012, pp. 183-197, https://www.jstor.org/sta¬
ble/41475362
Andrea Szab6 F. is associate professor at the Department of English Literatures
and Cultures of the University of Pannónia. She is also the acting head of the
Teacher Training Center at the Faculty of Philology and Social Sciences. Her
research areas include North American literary history, gender studies, women
writers and Gothic as a genre.
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