From: Maia <maia>
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 13:43:59 -0400

Nancy Werlin wrote:


I found it interesting that Nancy found Melody to be an easy target. One of the things that I thought Voigt did so well was to describe how the enmeshment between the two of them affected Jeff, and how he was unable to respond to his mother with the venom she deserved. One of the things that is so difficult about people (characters!) like Melody is that since the person is so affectionate and 'loving' on the surface, one finds oneself on slippery psychological ground when trying to confront them. I thought Voigt did an excellent job at showing this conflict in Jeff's feelings.

I also thought that Voigt successfully conveyed how inappropriate Melody's behavior was towards Jeff. I'm thinking in particular of the episodes where she asks him for money and expects him to pay for their meals. An adolescent might very well be caught off guard by this request, in part because it might feel as though they were being treated as an adult.

Another interesting aspect is the almost sexual devotion that Jeff gives Melody, and what Melody does to elicit that reaction. For an adolescent who's been in a similar situation (or, back to my earlier points, an adult) to be able to see those hazy, confused emotions through a character's eyes might permit them to get a better grasp on their own experiences. Melody's relationship with Jeff is clearly abusive, and yet in a way that we as a society haven't really recognized. There's a significant shame factor that tends to keep this pretty repressed - no doubt in part because the blame is so easily turned on the child.
(After all, we often hear the Oedipal or Electra complexes invoked with little recognition that it's generally the parent who has broken appropriate boundaries.) And this, I think, is doubly true for men/boys, which makes this book all the more relevant.

I can understand why Nancy felt that there wasn't enough understanding allotted to Melody. But this wasn't Melody's story, it was Jeff's. And I guess I'd say that ( to use a Star Wars metaphor!) Melody has 'crossed over to the dark side.' She is a pretty evil person. We might not like it, but there are enough people like Melody out there - selfish and narcissistic to the point of evil - that I would say it's a good thing to address it in such a way that readers might recognize those kinds of people when they come across them in their own lives. Not for condemnation (note that Jeff does not condemn his mother), but rather for self-protection.

I can't help it, the psychologist in me loves this book.

Maia Cheli-Colando maia at littlefolktales.org
Received on Tue 18 May 1999 12:43:59 PM CDT