Analyse af Jay McInerneys 'Story of My Life'

“Story of My Life” is an English youth novel written in 1988 by Jay Mcinerney. A short summary will tell us that the story is about Alison. We follow her life. We read her thoughts. We also meet her dirty circle of acquaintances. The story is told from Alison’s own point of view. It’s kind of a dairy. The novel throws light on a lot of normal youth themes. For example friendship – Alison is really being tested, when she faces a lot of lies, unfaithfulness, untrue and cheating. Can she stand it? It’s difficult to keep forgiving, when her boyfriend Dean admits that he has been with another girl. Or when her roommate Jeannie tells her father, who pays half of the rent, that Alison used all the money to off topic. In these situations is it difficult to keep forgiving and it’s also tough for Alison. She also gets very mad, but in both cases it ends up with forgiveness. Because of all the challenges through her life, makes often Alison think about her life, her future and not least her past. We often hear about how Alison had a rough childhood. She feels like an orphan. “I’m kind of amazed that Dad’s in Virginia because he hardly ever goes sown there anymore, Mom lives there and they can hardly stand the sight of each other. You can’t blame theme, really, either of them. Dad moved us out to the farm from Long Island after they separated, I was ten then” (p. 132, l. 21). Her mother left when she was just a little girl – starting to drink, and her father is somewhere over the hills, and she doesn’t hear from him very often. Sometimes he pays, and sends her a check, but that is too rare. She talks to her mother sometimes too, but it’s always the same old screed she hears about. Her mother always talks about all these boyfriends who have broken up and been a son of a bitch. She’s also often drunks, which makes the problems even bigger. Her dad isn’t much better in that point. He also often tells about how a new girl broke up and took a young Brad Pitt looking guy. “That night my old man finally calls. I’m like, I must be dreaming. Pissed at you, I go, when he asked how I am. I’m sorry, honey, he says, about the tuition. I screwed up. You’re goddamn right you did, I say. Oh, baby, he goes, I’m a mess. You’re telling me, I go. He says, she left me. Don’t come crying to me about what’s-her-name, I say.” (p. 14, l. 26). As young she was abused by her father and she was nearly raped by her father’s right hand too; a man called Cliff. “Cliff is probably my least favorite persons in the whole world. He’s Dad’s right-hand man, he drives the car and beats people up or something. He tried to rape me when I was a kid. I was out in the stables and he cornered me, the only thing that saved me was I had curry comb, I’d been brushing Eric the Red, and finally whacked his face with it. I wish I’d hit him where it really hurt but I was so freaked out, his hand pinning me to the walls, and I ran like hell after I hit him. When I told Dad, he acted like he didn’t believe be. And finally he said Cliff didn’t mean any harm and told me to shut up about it. That’s when I realized Cliff had something on him, that Dad couldn’t afford to fire him. That’s also when I realized that my father was I complete asshole.” (p.133, l. 10)So there had been some incest in Alison’s childhood. Already there, she might be mentally hurt, and that can get big consequences for the future. You sometimes hear about girls, who were exposed to incest as children, who don’t want to do sex later on, because they have this fear for men and sex generally. However Alison doesn’t look worn out in that point. She often tells about how she loves sex. All kinds of sex and she has done it a lot of times. When she finds out she has this venereal disease, she finds it annoying that she has to stay away from boys, in that way, for 2 weeks. Unfortunately it runs together with the meeting with Dean. She is totally in lust, and finds it maddeningly not to could do it with him.As said there have been done a lot of lies, cheating, disappointments and so to Alison. She has always been doing a lot of “one nights” and all too little real love. Meanwhile she actually tells about one real love she had once. She says that her only real love through the time is her ex-boyfriend called Alex. Not even her boyfriend through most of the story, Dean, would she call for real love.I think as child and young she may has take care of herself a lot. No help from her mother or her father. I think she was kind of alone. She maybe not needed friends, but real love. Like love from parents to their child, and not that kind of love you do in 25 min. in a public toilet. She has done all too much of number two. Because of all these letdowns through her times, she doesn’t want to get married. She really doesn’t believe in marriage. And that’s why she takes all that so called “family” with a pinch of salt. But I think when she gets older and maybe meets the real love; she can see herself in a marriage with children, a dog, a station car, and a villa in a pretty villa neighborhood. A real family and real love. As said it is a youth novel, so we also hear about more generally youth themes. They party a lot, drink a lot of alcohol, smoke a lot of cigarettes and they do a lot of drugs in her setting. Of course it have an effect on Alison, but meanwhile a lot of her friends in her circle of acquaintances are drug abusers, Alison only do the drugs now and then. You might wanna call her a “Weekend Junkie”. Through the novel, the main character is the girl Alison Pool. Alison is 20 years old most of the story and in the end she be 21. However she feels older than she is. Alison lives in a flat with her friend Jeannie in New York. She has always shortage of money. When she now and then gets the check from her father, she spends the money to pay the rent of the flat, or ells she goes to class. She’s an actor. She goes to an actor class. And she might want to be a professional actress once. She is certainly an aspiring one. “He promises to send me the tuition and the rent and something extra.” (p. 15. l 19.)Also because of all the lies she has faced, she hates liars. Unfortunately she is one herself. She lies often. For example does she tell her old boyfriend Skip, that she is pregnant and gets some money that way. The language through the whole history is very marked by slang and swearing. For example does Alison use the expression “My Old Man” for fathers. The spoken language might also not be the one you use at a church service. Words as “Son of a bitch”, “Bimbo” and “Asshole” are often used. There is a lot of spoken language, which also describes what kind of setting she lives in. When I hear the language and what they’re doing I imagine the neighborhood she lives in, like the ones you often see in films. Where junkies sitting all over, taking the daily fix. In the top flats there is always red light on, and they have visitors after 12 o’clock in the night. Alcoholic’s lives in the ground flats with a child, who might nearly be removed by the authority. A homeless guy is seeking shelter in the basement, where young gangsters also hang out. Drinking and smoking in secretly when their parents think they’re at the club. And if it’s such a kind of setting she lives in, it may have an effect on her. I don’t think this is the right place for Allison. I think she only lives where she does because she is in low water. I also don’t think she always can make an effort. Get a job and basically just trying to get her life going more decent. In the end of the story, Alison wakes up at the hospital. She is in treatment. She has been on drugs and alcohol for long time. They have just finished her birthday, which took a couple of days. I think she is sad about the situation with Dean. He has been unfaithful to Alison. She hopes he will call, but she hasn’t heard from him in a long time. She misses him, and drowns her pains in alcohol and drugs.Her dad calls her, and she realizes that 90 % of her life maybe just has been a dream. Why? She doesn’t tell. You could think it was because she all trough her life has been all alone. She has missed love and comfortable circumstances. Therefore she had to dream herself to a better life. And that’s why she had been dreaming all her life through, and also been on a lot of drugs. So a lot of her realizations might have been hallucinations mixed with broken dreams. Drugs, cigarettes and alcohol might have been a way out of her bad life. You also often hear about how drugs can be helpful to bigger problem. Then you forget your problems for a moment, but they terrible come back when you’re not high and realize your real life again. Then there is also all the secondary effects, which make you feel strange, nauseating and you can’t behave normally. Talking about if I did like Story of My Life or not. The novel throws lights on some subjects you can relate to as young reader. I think the story is very well done. It’s a little bit like a dairy, when it’s told as “I”. That’s make the story more personal and you can better set yourself in position as Alison Pool. Unfortunately I didn’t get all the fine points. I think it was pretty tough to read, and a lot of metaphors make it even more difficult. But what I understood was pretty good.