A Bandaid for a Broken Leg
In Fun Home, I noticed a theme of the characters having roundabout ways to deal with their problems. A lot of them seemed to stem from the lack of room to do so in a healthy way–healthy as in attacking the situation head-on–so they sort of just let out their pent-up feelings through other, more harmful means.
Alison’s father, Bruce, is without a doubt the most apparent example of this. Bruce was a closeted gay man, and he was forced to hide that part of himself. He had a wife and children in a small town, and if his more authentic identity were to get out, it would’ve spread like wildfire–not only his sexuality, but also the fact that he was a pedophile. Because of this, their relationship grew quite cold and distant, with Alison saying there was a lack of a “margin for error” and that “showing affection for [her father] was an even dicier venture” (Bechdel 18-19). Bruce used his passion for architecture and interior design to fill that void in himself. But, he was still cold and “indifferent to the human cost of his projects” as Alision put it, in reference to Bruce punishing and forcing labor out of his kids (Bechdel 11). He used his home as a way to express himself when he himself couldn’t. He later stepped into oncoming traffic, but whether it was intentional or not is up to interpretation.
The way Bruce went about his sexuality caused Alison’s mother to similarly deal with her problems unhealthily. She also had to worry about Bruce’s identity getting out, and despite knowing her husband was gay, and furthermore, committed adultery with underage boys, she stayed in the marriage. I honestly don’t remember whether her reasons were explained, but I’d imagine it would be for the children and to upkeep the family’s image. The issue came when Alison came out to her parents. Her mother disapproved in fear that she would have a similar life to that of Bruce’s. But, rather than properly discussing her concern, she dumps everything out on Alison, and in the panels, Alison was always depicted in a fetal position. Helen obviously had a lot of pent up feelings in regards to her marriage, but throwing it all at Alison was quite harmful and unproductive.
This sort of chain reaction isn’t really perpetuated by Alison–I’d argue writing a book to process your feelings is a good way to go about it–but its effects are still present in her. Most directly, the explanations Helen gave Alison about her father were quite jarring and the things she told her fueled so much of the Fun Home’s premise. Alison described it as an “abrupt and wholesale revision of my history” (Bechdel 79). Her parents both had quite intense problems to deal with, but the way in which they dealt with them only resulted in hurting someone else: Bruce’s behavior towards his family tarnished their relationship, and Helen using Alison as an involuntary therapist gave Alison a mess of new context to wrap her head around. Most notably, their coping mechanisms didn’t solve the very thing they were trying to fix.
I love how your title brings together all the points of your post. I think it's really interesting how every character that we see in Fun Home does the same thing, using small things to cover big problems. We see that it doesn't actually work to suppress these feelings, and they continuously make the same mistakes and feel empty from it. I do like that we get to see Bechdel breaking this chain of trauma and repression, with this book being literal proof of her growth in comparison to her parent's. Great post!
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting topic! I think the title is so good and it's a very good representation of all of the unspoken tensions within the bechdel household. Everyone is going through their own things, no one is talking about any of it, and all of the "solutions" for those issues don't do much more than delay solving the problems. I like that you bring up the way both of Alison's parents deal with their issues contrasted with the way that Alsion herself chooses to deal with them. I think this is a really interesting thread (breaking generational trauma cycles and what not) that we didn't really talk about in class!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I agree that Helen would have stayed in her marriage with Bruce to make sure their kids grew up with two parents and also to hide Bruce's sexuality from the small town/Bruce + Helen's families. However, this decision seems to come back and manifest negatively when Helen finally tells Alison in a way that could stress her out and, as you said, "harmful and unproductive." Not only this, but Alison describes her family being like this generally in an early part of the book, and this dysfunctionality is definitely not something Alison or her siblings should have been brought up around, but Alison writing a book is for sure a good way to let it all out!
ReplyDeleteI agree that Helen and her role in concealing the truth about Bruce is a fascinating and pretty ambiguous part of this story--we do get the very plausible idea that she too is sinking her emotional turmoil into her art, the theater in her case, and Bechdel does depict her mother as mostly speaking to her in written lines from _The Importance of Being Earnest_ throughout the very eventful summer of 1974, when there was SO MUCH to talk about in the Bechdel household (that no one was talking about!). We see members of this family "using" art for emotional avoidance in a wide range of ways.
ReplyDeleteIf you do want more insight into Helen and where she's at throughout this story, I commend to you the follow-up to this first memoir, _Are You My Mother?_ It's mostly set AFTER the publication of _Fun Home_, and it features long, in-depth conversations between Alison and her mother about Bruce, his secrets, her experiences throughout this ordeal, and her very mixed feelings about her daughter exposing all the family secrets in this very public way with her book.
I definitely agree that in Fun Home, there is all too often an avoidant approach to solving the intense emotional problems that are recurrent in the book. I think we share this frustration with Bechdel who, at that time, was simply trying to come out to her parents and healthily accept her identity, and was faced with uncomfortable truths about her father, and being asked why she felt the need to label herself as queer. It's unfortunate that Bechdel has to go through it, but very raw that we get to feel these emotions with her. Love your post!
ReplyDeleteYour title caught my eye!
ReplyDeleteVery interesting blog post. I found your discussion of the psychology of the book to be very intriguing, and its definitely not an easy topic to discuss (especially in relation to this book), so I appreciate this post. Your analysis of the mother brings attention to possibly one of the strangest things in this book, the mother's knowledge of her own husband's gay identity and his relationships with underage boys. She probably saw herself as more of a protector to him or a friend or companion rather than an actual soulmate. Their marriage could have just been a cover up for Bruce.
I really appreciate that you touched on this topic, as I didn't see anyone else write about this. It's clear through Alison's stories that she grew up with two distant parents, one of which probably felt like she "had" to stay in her marriage to better her children's lives. But the graphic novel really shows how difficult it was for Alison and her sibling to grow up in such an emotionally distant family. You can see that this learned coping mechanism of suppression became quite prominent in Alison herself, and writing Fun Home likely helped her change that. Amazing job!!!
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