This story is primarily about class, and assumptions about class. Boyle creates fairly stereotypical rich people in the Strikers. The only sign of emotion on their part is around the dog. "She'd had the acceptance letter in her hand to show her, thinking how proud of her Mrs. Striker would be, how she'd take her in her arms, for a hug and congratulate her, but the first thing she'd said was What about Admiral?" (p.5)
Nisha is bought, just like Admiral is bought. She struggles with this, but not successfully. Although you understand why she is there, that she needs money, there is little depth to what she is experiencing in this story. The reader isn't sure what Nisha desires as an alternative which makes it hard to feel badly for her. It's unclear whether Boyle is doing this on purpose, or it is an accident of the storytelling.
She tells herself the job is temporary but when she contemplates starting to look for a "real" job "the face of her mother, sick from vomiting and with her scalp as smooth and slick as an eggplant, would rise up to shame her."(p.11). This feels like a misstep on the part of Boyle. Nisha has been indoctrinated by her mother that there are jobs that black people shouldn't take. Being a maid, for instance. "A woman of color does not clean house, that was what her mother always told her, and it had become a kind of mantra when she was growing up, a way of reinforcing core values, of promoting education and the life of the mind, but she couldn't help wondering how much higher a dog-sitter was on the socioeconomic scale than a maid." (p.2) One isn't convinced of the authenticity of Nisha being shamed by her sick mother, as her mother wouldn't endorse this job at all.
Boyle only provides one quick conversation about the animal cruelty, and not in a way that engaged my desire for revenge on the Strikers. It seems to me that the emphasis on the sandwiches, the drinking, the playing with Admiral are elongated and the crux, the tension between she and Erhard is underplayed even ignored. Wouldn't she struggle earlier with the pending event, whether he was interested in her, if that emotion would alter his actions? She understands her situation, "Of course, Nisha was no fool." She knew there was quid pro quo here, knew that Erhard has his agenda, but she was in n no hurry, she'd committed to nothing..." (p17)
Nisha expresses that she is humiliated by Mrs. Striker's return home and subsequent foiling of their plan. But it is unclear what is driving that. Is it that she, Nisha, couldn't pull off the rebellion? Is it her continued participation in the creation of a false dog? Is it that she's had her place reinforced once again? Boyle suggests the latter by closing with "And every slowly, as the days beat on, she began to understand what her role was, her true role." p(21) That role is truly make Admiral, Admiral. Perhaps by letting him run into traffic and die the first dog.
In a few short sentences, Boyle moves from this thought to the day of reckoning. Mrs. Striker calls their bluff and the story is over. Nisha makes a few attempts at rationalizing her life without success for herself or us. But I'm not sure I care enough for her. Does that make me Mrs. Striker?
I agree that class has much to do with the story, but I rather feel this story means to show the hopelessness of being stuck in time.
ReplyDeleteNisha is supposed to be ambitious, or at least she is not supposed to take certain jobs. She obtains a degree, she sets out make her own way in the world... and she ends up stuck in the same place, with the same clothes, with the same people, and with the same dog (almost) as when she was in high school.
It's frustrating but comfortable. She allows some excitement to enter her otherwise boring routine when she lets Erhard into her life. With Erhard, she complacently allows some rebellion to enter her mundane job. They try to fool the Strikers, they try to alter the rigid ways the Strikers have decreed, and they fail.
What's captivating about the ending is that it seems that, though crushed and hopeless, she is still rebelling by teaching Admiral II to eat his dung and chase cars. However, I think it shows the extent of her despair. Again, she is truly crushed and she resigns herself to fate. In this case, she cannot change anything. Much like she sought to escape her town, only to find that she was back in the same job of her high school days, or that she found she was grown up but in a job that required her to wear her high school clothes, she even resigns the fate of Admiral II and gives up on trying to teach him better ways. Rather, Admiral II, like the past had already shown, would have to meet his doom at the hands of some motorcycle.
I think this is a great review, or at least it's nice to see some of my qualms about the story articulated clearly. I agree the ending was unsatisfying and I really didn't understand what Nisha was trying to do. It sounds kind of like she just gave up.
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