“The Return” - A Short Story by Alistair MacLeod - 1971- included in The Collected Stories of Alistair MacLeod
Join in iwith Buried in Print for A read along through The Short Stories of Alistair MacLeod.
Schedule for the Alistair MacLeod Read along
My post on his story, “The Boat”
For almost four years i read along with Buried in Print through The Short Stories of Mavis Gallant. I was able to read and post on about half of her two hundred or so stories. It was a great Reading Life experience which also gave me a sense of accomplishment. Plus it was a lot of fun to folllow along with Buried in Print. Now we begin a new read along on a writer new to me, Alistair MacLeod. This Will be my fourth post on his work.
Alastair MacLeod
July 26, 1936 - North Battleford, Canada
April 20, 2014 - Windsor, Canada
As the story opens Alex, age ten when it happens, is on his way back to Cape Breton with his parents. Cape Breton was then a rough place to live, with most men working as fishermen, a dangerous occupation. Residents looked down on outsiders who come as tourists to see the beautiful coast. His father left the family home there a long time ago to become an attorney in Montreal.His in laws paid for his schooling. The mother regards Cape Breton people with contempt,seeing them as drunken and uneducated. We can see her angst in this:
“When we are seated on the new train I see that my mother is very angry. “Ten years,” she snaps at my father, “ten years I’ve raised this child in the city of Montreal and he has never seen an adult drink liquor out of a bottle, nor heard that kind of language. We have not been here five minutes and that is the first thing he sees and hears.” She is on the verge of tears.”
Of course now her husband is dreading the face to face encounters when he arrives.
For an affluent woman from Montreal Cape Breton seems like a very squalid place.
We are quick to see the bad blood between father and oldest son:
““You have been a long time coming home,” he says to my father. “If you had come through that door as often as I’ve thought of you, I’d’ve replaced the hinges a good many times.” “I know, I’ve tried, I’ve wanted to, but it’s different in Montreal, you know.”
The father picks up his attack:
““Yes, I guess so. I just never figured it would be like this. It seems so far away and we get old so quickly and a man always feels a certain way about his oldest son. I guess in some ways it is a good thing that we do not all go to school. I could never see myself being owned by my woman’s family.” “Please don’t start that already,” says my father a little angrily. “I am not owned by anybody and you know it. I am a lawyer and I am in partnership with another lawyer who just happens to be my father-in-law. That’s all.” “Yes, that’s all,” says my grandfather and gives me another sip from his glass. “Well, to change the subject, is this the only one you have after being married eleven years?”
The Young man is taken out by his cousins. He is exposed to things way rougher than Life in Montréal. To me this seemed almost like his Grandfather’s revenge on his son. The older man works as a miner,hard dangerous work at 76.
To me this is the grandfather’s revenge
““And did you have a good day today, Alex?” asks my grandfather as we stop before his locker. And then unexpectedly and before I can reply he places his two big hands on either side of my head and turns it back and forth very powerfully upon my shoulders. I can feel the pressure of his calloused fingers squeezing hard against my cheeks and pressing my ears into my head and I can feel the fine, fine, coal dust which I know is covering my face and I can taste it from his thumbs which are close against my lips. It is not gritty as I had expected but is more like smoke than sand and almost like my mother’s powder. And now he presses my face into his waist and holds me there for a long, long time with my nose bent over against the blackened buckle of his belt. Unable to see or hear or feel or taste or smell anything that is not black; holding me there engulfed and drowning in blackness until I am unable to breathe. And my father is saying from a great distance: “What are you doing? Let him go! He’ll suffocate.” And then the big hands come away from my ears and my father’s voice is louder and he sounds like my mother. Now I am so black that I am almost afraid to move and the two men are standing over me looking into one another’s eyes. “Oh, well,” says my grandfather turning reluctantly toward his locker and beginning to open his shirt.”
To me this seems shameful and cruel, hurting the grandson for revenge.
MacLeod brought out well the emotions of the different parties. The grandson is clearly confused.
Mel u
