Analyse af Catherine Merrimans novelle 'Eating Sugar'

The short story “Eating Sugar” is written by Catherine Merriman.

The text is about Alex and his wife, Eileen, and daughter, Suzanne. Suzanne lives and works in Thailand as a teacher and in her only free time period her parents come to visit. All day they have been at a tourist attraction. They decided to stay longer than rest of the western tourists because they wanted the place for them selves. But when they wanted to go home they were all alone and did not know how to get home. For a while they settle at a forest clearing. Eileen is panicking and scared, so is Alex but the fact that Eileen is scared helps him stay calm. Suddenly four Thai men emerge from the narrow forest path. Suzanne who speaks a little Thai talks with one of the men named Wirut Srakan. He is a teacher as well. He teaches “engyish”, but he is not very good at English because he is from the eastern Thailand. He informed them that a car was going to arrive soon to pick them up. The car arrives and the get a lift back to town.

We are told that Alex and Eileen are scared and anxious. They are afraid they will never return to the city, afraid of the forest, and afraid of the Thai men. In the story there are two flashbacks in which we are told about Alex and Eileen’s youth. In both flashbacks Alex is thinking back at their common past and remembering how wild, outgoing, brave, and experimental they were.