Emotional Intelligence - This is Water and Alice Munro's short stories

In what ways could Wallace’s theory about education be applicable to the writing of Alice Munro? Justify your conclusion

Throughout the reading of "This is Water" and the numerous short stories of Alice Munro, a connection in purpose and theme were found, emotional intelligence. This is water talks about the ability for people to be able to use emotional intelligence and be able to manipulate which lenses to use in every day situations. Through successful education and the ability to be free in terms of choosing what you want to think about in order to not "die a thousand deaths" one can experience and connect with the world in a different way. The short stories of Alice Munro are extracts of a person's life, very much connected to reality and actual experiences the author has had throughout her journey. Unlike popular fiction which is more plot-focused, these short stories make the reader deeply connect and associate with the characters created through an in depth use of character development. Although all the stories are set in rural Canada, the journeys of each of these characters are relatable in some way, from the struggle of the main character in "Boys and Girls" with societal expectations and trying to break through, complex family relationship of Janet with her two daughters, a broken marriage and the need to seek acceptance from her father and even Alfrida from "Family Furnishing". A character who was idolized by the narrator and her family but the reader is able to sympathize with her at the end story when it is found that she is not what the narrator had thought she would be.

All these examples serve to show the sympathetic tone which is created by Munro to feel compassionate with the characters and the journey they all have gone through. These stories help put ourselves in the shoes of the characters and really understand their situation and feel a connection with them through their perspective on life and therefore be more sympathetic and as a result develop our own emotional intelligence. Although these stories don't appear as exciting and groundbreaking as some others, they still have a great deal of complexity which as to be analyzed in order to fully understand the text. This therefore allows the reader to comprehend the characters better and relate to them as they face numerous conflicts which one faces in their normal "day in, day out" life which is described by Foster Wallace. In addition to this, one can also switch their default setting in order to look at these experiences happening on the short stories through the main character's life.

Munro and her short stories

In the short stories of Alice Munro there appears to be a lot of connections from her lifestyle and the events that happen throughout with the main female characters. This is seen with the settings of all of the short stories she wrote and I have analyzed. Alice Munro is from Western Ontario, Canada, this is an important fact as she bases all her stories within familiar surroundings and previous experiences which all happen in Canada.

Alice Munro had 3 daughters, 2 husbands and had lived in a farm alone with her second husband. She has worked as a waitress, experienced a divorce and her father was a fox farmer. All these experiences and facts have all featured in some way throughout Alice Munro's short stories. In "Boys and Girls" the girl's father appears to be a fox farmer who earns a living by skinning foxes and selling their pelts alongside the help from his daughter. In Royal Beatings, Rose gets beaten by her father while her stepmother tries to stop him, this might also be a similar experience Munro has faced when she was younger, getting beaten by her father as a form of disciplinary action. In Moons of Jupiter, Janet faces a divorce from her husband, has 2 daughters who she experiences complex relationships with and seeks acceptance from her father, all of which Alice Munro could have experienced by being a female and trying to help out her father in the fox pelt business. In Family Furnishings, the narrator idolizes her aunt and explains her journey in becoming a writer for a newspaper, although this is a similar story from the last one, this one focuses more on the rural-urban change she faced as she distances herself from everyone and eventually does get married and divorced.

Overall, one can see how Alice Munro integrates extracts of her life in order to formulate some of her short stories, it allows for greater realism for the reader as well as further character development as she tries to also characterize herself into the stories, all while following this very similar theme of complex family relationships throughout her years.