Marilynne Robinsons Housekeeping - Annotated Bibliography Example

Housekeeping This is one of the dissociated books in my recent readings. The story can be categorized by its haunting nature, empty and the rootless feelings it elicits and the balancing of feelings. Due to the presence of the mirrors, the woman character and the narrator, my figure has been disoriented. Simply, I like the feelings in the book. The author has set the story in the sleepy lumber city of Fingerbone. The story opens with a tragedy about Ruthie who is the narrator. The tragic death of Ruthie’s grandfather and her mother’s suicide is also revealed.

This develops a shadow of darkness in the story and the mystery seems to grow up. The plot fringe is tied to the rail of bridges which goes over the lake, the dark and damp woods which surround the town, and the ties to the lake (Robinson 98). The narrator is tall and gangly. She is out of place in the town. She is secretive as she has no friend. She observes keenly what goes around and she does not easily interact and engage. Lucille, her younger sister has a sense of direction and is grounded as compared to Ruthie.

Lucille makes decisions and delivers orders. They have been forced to live with their doddering aunts and grandmother. They also live with Sylivie, their actual aunt who is kind and recluse. Lucille realizes that she is leading a different life as compared to other people thus moves to stay with a teacher (Emerson). On the other hand, Sylvie and Ruthie stay on in the strange house. The two are noted by the town people as they travel from an excursion to the wilderness on a train. Sylivie allows the house to a fall into due to her strange way of guardianship.

Ruthie is pitied by the locals. The Sherriff makes a hearing to decide whether Sylivie is fit to be Ruthie’s caregiver (Robinson 102). The two leave the town thus are believed to be dead. They continue to linker around the criss-crossing trains. I am displaced as the story closes. The narrator has tried to be an ethereal. In addition, the dialogue in this story seems jagged and broken. For instance, there are some critical moments when the two girls are left under the care of their two aged aunts; the forth and back between these parties bemuses me.

According to Emerson, the author has creatively created a conversation which has fluidity. The two aunts piece their thoughts and later bounce their ideas off the other. Sylivie’s character is depicted in a strange manner. During actions, she elucidate eccentricities for instance the hoarding tendency and speaks to the two girls. She is just and allows them freedom which they did not expect. According to Teaching Thomas, the quality of the story is added by the location and the geography. Fingerbone is a tucked a glacial lake thus it is barely hanging.

The town is a train terminus as it is a lumber town. The trains make frequent moves in the town. Due to the high significance attached to the bridge which goes over the lake the trains have a big role in this story. This is evidenced by the grandfather’s death which was caused by train wreck that led to sinking of the train in the lake. The frequent snow and the flooding in this town and the crushing of houses show that the town is inhabitable. Just like Ruthie, I had the tendency to live in abandoned homes and cellars.

Sometime I could explore the underground. In the cellars, old nails, rusted cans and rotten woods were very common. As the reader, one with similar experience like that of Ruthie, you can know what she went through. Perhaps, this is how I connected the story as I was captured by the pages. Dispossessed, fluid and dreamlike, this is one book which adds credence to good story telling powers. As a reader, it took me out of my sense of time and place and put me in an uncomfortable place which was ever shifting and changing like the characters behavior.

Works CitedEmerson, Derek. Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson. March 7, 2010. Web April 15, 2012. Robinson, Marilynne. Housekeeping: A Novel. New York: Picador, 2004. Print. Teaching Thomas. Housekeeping by Marylinne Robisnson. November 10, 2011. Web April 15, 2012.