The Gravedigger's Daughter (2007) - Plot & Excerpts
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted here illegally.)So what's the dark fear that lies in the inner heart of all erudite nerds? Namely this -- that no matter how educated, intelligent or well-read you are, there are always going to be a certain amount of very well-known authors you have never read at all, not even one single page of, and that at any moment this fact might be discovered by your fellow erudite nerds. Just take me, for example, who can count among completely unread authors such stalwarts as (deep breath, Jason, deep breath) Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, William Faulkner, Norman Mailer, Augusten Burroughs, Dave Eggers, and dozens more embarrassing admissions. So needless to say that I was excited to recently come across the latest novel by Joyce Carol Oates at my local library, 2007's The Gravedigger's Daughter, because Oates is yet another of these classic "everyone has read at least one book by her" authors who I haven't read myself; and that's apparently a shame, according to my fellow book-loving geeks, given that Oates (a lit professor at Princeton) has been a multiple nominee over the years of the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, National Book Critics Circle Award, PEN/Faulkner Award and Orange Prize, not to mention the actual winner of an NBA (in 1970), a Stoker Award and a dozen other accolades. And this is to say nothing of The Gravedigger's Daughter in particular, which made the New York Times' "10 Most Notable Books of the Year" list last year; and of course all of this is small potatoes compared to the greatest achievement of Oates' entire career so far, making it into the Revered And Blessed Oprah's Book Club Hallowed Be Her Name Amen.So I checked it out and sat down a couple of weeks ago to read it; and then about a week later, found myself finally giving up on it for good around page 250 or so (or roughly halfway through), after two days of literally dreading the idea of even physically picking the book up again. So what happened? Well, to answer that, maybe it would be better for me to ask you a series of questions, questions I've been starting to wonder more and more about the longer CCLaP has been open. Ready?--Why is it that almost all novels revered by the academic community principally feature characters who are constantly in a state of being slightly miserable? And not miserable as in "interesting" miserable, but miserable as in "that whiny professor in the corner of the room who ruins every godd-mn party they're invited to" miserable?--Why is it that almost all award-winning novels go way out of their way, deliberately out of their way, to show off what pretty language that author knows, completely removing the reader from the natural pace and rhythm of the story itself? Why can no academically revered novel simply let the reader get lost in the actual story, which is the entire point of a novel even existing?*--Why is it that academes are so fascinated by mediocre EveryPeople living in bland surroundings, who do nothing with their unremarkable lives and yet somehow still manage to make a whole series of terrible life decisions? Why do so many people in the academic community think that this makes for fascinating literature, and why do they think we should sympathize or even care about such oblivious, socially retarded chumps?It's the great mystery of the arts, I'm beginning to understand, as CCLaP has me reading academically-revered award-winning novels on a regular basis for the first time in my life; that the exact novels most lauded by this community are the very ones least fitting the definition of an entertaining novel, the ones that instead most call attention to themselves as "precious works of art" more fit for years of overeducated analysis instead of simple pleasure. And in this I guess the so-called "mainstream literature" community is just like any community of genre fans as well, in that they are constantly in need of justifying their existence too, constantly in need of explaining why anyone should devote such time and energy doing delicate little analyses of barely readable books. It's disappointing to be sure, to realize that these revered prize lists are in actuality not a reliable way at all to simply find good books by good authors; it's a lesson about the arts I'm reminded of again by The Gravedigger's Daughter, a lesson I think I'll be paying more attention to in the future.Out of 10: 4.8*And since we're on the subject....Sheesh, Oates, will you please stop using exclamation marks! Over and over! In awkward places in your paragraphs! To make your point! Crazy you are driving me! Good literature this is not! Oh, and speaking of which, why like Yoda all your Jewish characters talk? Slightly offensive in a hazily defined way it is! UGH, this book drove me crazy.
This novel is narrated by the main character, Rebecca, in the third person, primarily using free indirect discourse. Oates’ style is to make liberal use of sentence fragments, and these seem consistent with the FID approach. The initial section of the first of three parts of the book reveals Rebecca as a young woman of about 23, working in a sweatshop factory to support herself and her three-year-old son. Her husband, Niles Trignor, is often away from home at unknown locations for days and weeks at a time and is narcissistic and abusive, Rebecca accepting the passive role as her lot and making no attempt to challenge him or extricate herself from the situation. References are made to her hatred of her deceased father, who seems to have died violently.The second major section of the novel jumps back to Rebecca’s childhood. Her parents were immigrants from Germany in 1936, settling in rural upstate New York. Her two older brothers traveled across the Atlantic with her parents, but she was actually born on the ship in NY Harbor, just as they arrived in the US. Her father, a university-educated high school math teacher in Germany (and the narrative suggests that the family is Jewish, although the parents deny and hate Judaism), is given the job of cemetery caretaker and gravedigger. Rebecca’s home life is very emotionally impoverished and physically abusive.Oates’ use of dialogue is skillful; each character speaks distinctively, consistent with his or her personality, contributing to Oates’ development of psychology and plot.Among other things, this novel is an exploration of the role and experience of the outsider, the “other.” And of the extent to which environment determines one’s character and fate. Rebecca’s family is accused of being Jewish, “Krauts,” Nazis, and their place as poor, uneducated, of marginal occupation make them perfect targets for the citizens of their small community. This part of the novel draws to a close as the mystery of what happened to Rebecca’s parents is revealed. After a few chapters outlining her life during the following few years, Niles Tignor enters the story. He and Rebecca eventually marry, largely because she will only submit to him sexually if they are married. Their relationship, which becomes physically abusive to her (she accepts that as “what she deserves”), is based on his intense sexual desire for her and her need to be needed and desired, there being little mutual sharing in any other way - she knows little about him and is not welcome to ask. One wonders how her background has driven this dynamic. Finally, after another severe beating from her “husband” (having learned that her marriage might not be valid), Rebecca flees with her son, thus ending Part I of three parts of the novel.Oates has skillfully crafted an atmosphere that is oppressive and claustrophobic, the reader being powerfully drawn into Rebecca’s consciousness. The metaphors in this writing are sharp and effective, often passing subliminally in the reader’s own awareness.In Part II, having changed her name and that of her son, Rebecca (now “Hazel”) works in a variety of menial jobs in a series of small towns in Upstate New York, always on the move, always providing little information about her background to those who ask. And increasingly the narrative moves into using free indirect discourse to explore the consciousness of “Zack,” her son. During the following few years, Hazel establishes a new identity, gradually becoming less vigilant about being found by Tignor. She is romantically pursued by Chet Gallagher, a well-to-do jazz pianist who is emotionally estranged from his wealthy family and very needy in his own right. Zack, in the meantime, is proving to be a musical prodigy, excelling at the piano. But Hazel continues to be wary, refusing to commit herself to a new relationship and hiding all aspects of her background. Eventually, though, she and Zack move in with Gallagher. Later, Hazel learns that Tignor is dead. Part III, containing an Epilogue, is by far the shortest part of the novel. The denouement is as fitting as it is unexpected and thought-provoking.This is a masterfully written novel, technically skillful and emotionally insightful, opening up new worlds and experiences to the reader and thus enlarging the reader’s own humanity, a privilege to have read and pondered.
What do You think about The Gravedigger's Daughter (2007)?
I guess I liked this book, but reading it once is plenty for me. It was very well-written, but I just could not handle how ungodly depressing it was. Honestly, the main character can't seem to go ten pages without getting the shit kicked out of her (literally and figuratively) by all the Mean Bad Men in her life. First there's her father, who goes apeshit when his daughter dares to enter a spelling bee (I still don't get that); then there's her husband, who chooses beating the shit out of her as an acceptable courtship ritual; and then there's the guy she meets after leaving the husband, who never really did anything to her but creeped me out none the less. This book is basically a manual on Why Life Sucks For Everyone, and the worst part is, it doesn't even have an ending. You know those books that just stop? That's what The Gravedigger's Daughter does, and it is irritating. Fun Fact: I read the majority of this book on a 9-hour plane ride, and by doing so discovered a fun challenge: trying to read a book about how evil and crazy men are while 27 Dresses plays on the video screen directly above your line of vision. Looking up from my book about spousal abuse and depression, I would watch Katherine Heigal prancing around onscreen with James Marsden and all I could think was, "You stupid bitch, get away from him while you still can! He will get jealous and paranoid and the next thing you know, he's kicking you in the face for asking where he was all night."
—Madeline
I do not believe I have read this author before and after this book, I'm not likely to seek out her other books even though I know she has won awards.I found myself skimming paragraphs and pages to move on with the plot rather than being bored by the non-stop exploration of "I don't know what". To me, there was no rhyme or reason for things that happened in this book. The main character grew up in an abusive home and went on to an abusive husband...but what did that have to do with the woman she was mistaken for as a young woman, whose name she later adopted? Why did she have a son that turned out to be a piano prodigy? What were all the little italicized thoughts or memories about that popped up throughout the book? She was always using and manipulating people to get what she needed and wanted...but ended up a lonely person who was obsessed with a woman who may or may not have been her cousin? The ending was boring and served no purpose and never gave us any indication of what happened with the other characters that were simply "dropped" at the end of the book. Not impressed!!
—Kelli Johnson
I've read her short stories but this is my first novel. She can surely write. I love her style and while the story is quite graphic in its violence and abuse, it was not gratuitous, but necessary, handled well. It was a story of survival, escape. One family escapes the holocaust only to confront isolation and prejudice in America, eventually leading a father to insanity and self-destruction. The journey of the surviving daughter reveals another from of persecution--the persecution of women/ a woman. Still, she manages to survive by using the male's vulnerability to sexual manipulation to her advantage. She also survives by giving up her identity in order to hide from her first abusive relationship. That she escaped persecution of Jews only to be forced to give up her identity to escape persecution from an abusive man is rather ironic. In fact, this irony comes back at the end of the novel. The irony of two types of persecutions. Two ways of escape.The other family in the background (until the end) are Rebecca's cousins, who do not escape Germany. Rebecca's cousin, close in age to Rebecca, loses her family to the holocaust; however she survives. Unlike Rebecca, she embraces her identity, even writes a book about her tragedy, exaggerating in order to exploit. The irony of this story of escape and survival is complex and fascinating. I love how Oates turns it around, shows the communication in the end as a way of revealing the similarities and differences of character, the similarities and differences of different types of persecution. An interesting and complex way of ending the story.I enjoyed it.
—Debbie
