thinking of Mary:
options--
. there is no pregnancy
. pregnant but miscarried (stress of war)
. pregnant but aborted (by her hand or Kate)
. baby carried to term (in Germany)
. under the Germany option--baby is adopted by Kathrin
. baby carried to term (in US)
. under US option, Mary’s father puts baby up for adoption
notes to the above:
Mary meets Virgil (nurse/soldier/France/1944) for one night before he dies. She is convinced it was love as she has never known and, over the next fifty years, claims never to be known again. She either becomes pregnant or she doesn’t. If she doesn’t, the story focuses on love, love loss, the management of grief and the edges of sanity. If she does become pregnant, she either goes AWOL and carries to term in Germany under Kathrin’s care with Kathrin adopting the baby as her own (for reasons not yet known) and all of the above with regard to love and loss takes on these new dimensions. In the US option, the army finds out Mary is pregnant and sends her home. Her father, who never wanted her to become a nurse (below the dignity of a woman, of his daughter) is horrified at the turn of events and arranges adoption. Mary sees her baby for less time than she had with Virgil and as soon as she is able, leaves home to never see her parents again. She relocates to the same town as Virgil’s parents and tries to make sense of her tragedy and so again the story becomes a study in the exploration of loss and sanity in the face of overwhelming despair. In this last option, there is the possibility that Mary and Virgil’s child finds her toward the end of of her life and the story ends with a coming full circle, a final healing and releasing.
2 comments:
I remember not precisely how much has been suggested within the story, but my imaginings have always been that final option, of the baby being adopted in the US, of her leaving...and perhaps that last part too. What these musings show/do is highlight how many influences there can be within a single story, how many twists and turns and roads, a yes here, a no there, Von's journal one thinks of, turned a differt corner - art and life, and we, as readers, have it easy, for we know, before a word is written, whichever way the story turns, it will touch.
Fiction is hard in that it must be truer than true. I think of my own life and I know it could never be fiction, the twists and turns beyond what one could expect another to reasonably believe. Then I think, what the hell, I'll just write what I want, the way I want, as beyond form as the star beyond its own light.
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