Abduction

Nina Schøler Nørgaard Anne Hess Thaysen Holstebro Gymnasium Engelsk A 27-01-2008 3.a

Abduction

Abduction is a short story written by Shelagh Delaney. Delaney reveals the truth of a woman, sister and mother who abducts the life of her brother and destroys it finally.

We are introduced to the main character, Ann, by the narrator, an elder brother, who describes her as an intelligent, self-confident, strong-minded, independent and powerful woman, who lives in London and spends the most of her time working as a doctor. Her life is perfect according to herself, which is dominated by strict planning and no spontaneity. Ann grows up with no husband or children of her own, and therefore kidnaps her little brother, whose life is everything Ann’s not. In the beginning her little brother is a careless teenager with no plans or purpose of life. Through his whole life he is irresponsible and he ends up being an unhappy unemployed, separated alcoholic, who does not fit in the high society life Ann is living. Ann is extremely shallow and materialistic and she keeps on giving her little brother money, clothes and other things even though he does not express gratitude or care about them. “The first time he left his sister’s house for the office he felt like a fool togged up in a black cashmere and silk shirt” (P.3.L.68). He does not feel suitable in the life style his sister has chosen for him, but he is easily persuaded and does what his commanding and demeaning sister tells him to do. Ann is constantly controlling her little brother’s life and is disappointed every time he does not succeed. When his girlfriend Marianne is pregnant the cynical Ann tells her to get an abortion. Ann will not accept the impulsive coincidence and tries to spoil any relation between Marianne When the little brother’s alcoholism is revealed Ann’s world collapses. “She was a doctor. Her little brother couldn’t have turned into an alcoholic without her noticing. The very idea! Absurd.” (P. 4.L. 97) The fact that he has not achieved anything himself and he has not come up to his sister’s expectations makes him so despaired, that he kills himself. He dies in the bag yard under a tree with his Nike sports bag besides him. The bag is a symbol of his home in Manchester, and as he dies he remembers all the good things he had had there. None of his memories contains his sister, even though he has lived with her most of his life. The relationship between the two is nothing similar to a relationship between a sister and a brother. She is far too possessive, as the girlfriend Marianne says. And if you put in another meaning into the name Marianne, you could interpret as the words “marry Ann”, which refers to the consequence of