Alice Munro

(Part I)

[1] The solution to my life occurred to me one evening while I was ironing a shirt.It was simple but audacious.I went into the living room where my husband was watching television and I said, “I think I ought to have an office.”

[2] It sounded fantastic, even to me.What do I want an office for? I have a house; it is pleasant and roomy and has a view of the sea; it provides appropriate places for eating and sleeping, and having baths and conversations with one’s friends.Also I have a garden; there is no lack of space.

[3] No.But here comes the disclosure which is not easy for me: I am a writer.That does not sound right.Too presumptuous, phony, or at least unconvincing.Try again.I write.Is that better? I try to write.That makes it worse.Hypocritical humility.Well then?

[4] It doesn’t matter.However I put it, the words create their space of silence, the delicate moment of exposure.But people are kind, the silence is quickly absorbed by the solicitude of friendly voices, crying variously how wonderful and good for you, and well, that is intriguing.And what do you write? They inquire with spirit.Fiction, I reply, bearing my humiliation by this time with ease, even a suggestion of flippancy, which was not always mine, and again, again, the perceptible circles of dismay are smoothed out by such ready and tactful voices — which have however exhausted their stock of consolatory phrases , and can say only, “Ah!”

[5] So this is what I want an office for (I said to my husband): to write in.I was at once aware that it sounded like a finicky requirement, a piece of rare self-indulgence.To write, as everyone knows you need a typewriter, or at least a pencil, some paper, a table and chair; I have all these things in an corner of my bedroom.But now I want an office as well.

[6] And I was not even sure that I was going to write in it, if we come down to that.Maybe I would sit and stare at the wall; even that prospect was not unpleasant to me.It was really the sound of the words office that I liked, its sound of dignity and peace.And purposefulness and importance.But I didn’t care to mention this to my husband, so I launched instead into a high-flown explanation which went, as I remember, like this.

[7] A house is all right for a man to work in.He brings his work into the house, a place is cleared for it; the house rearranges itself as best it can around him.Everybody recognizes that his work exists.He is not expected to answer the telephone, to find things that are lost, to see why the children are crying, or feed the cat.He can shut his door.Imagine (I said) a mother shutting her door, and the children knowing she is behind it; why, the very thought of it is outrageous to them.A woman who sits staring into space, into a country that is not her husband’s or her children’s is likewise known to be an offense against nature.So a house is not the same for a woman.She is not someone who walks into the house to make use of it, and will walk out again.She is the house; there is no separation possible.

[8] “Go ahead, if you can find one cheap enough,” is all my husband had to say.He is not like me; he does not really want explanations.That the heart of another person is a closed book is something you will hear him say frequently, and without regret.

[9] Even then I did not think it was something that could be accomplished.Perhaps at bottom it seemed to me too improper a wish to be granted.I could almost more easily have wished for a mink coat, for a diamond necklace — these are things women do obtain.The children, learning of my plans, greeted them with the most dashing skepticism and unconcern.Nevertheless I went down to the shopping center which is two blocks from where I live; there I had noticed for several months, and without thinking how they could pertain to me, a couple of For Rent signs in the upstairs windows of a building that housed drug store and a beauty parlor.As I went up the stairs I had a feeling of complete unreality; surely renting was a complicated business in the case of offices; you did not simply knock on the door of the vacant premises and wait to be admitted; it would have to be done through channels.Also, they would want too much money.

...

[10] The room where I waited was evidently a combination living room and office.The first things I noticed were models of ships — galleons, clippers, Queen Marys —sitting on the tables, the window sills , the television.Where there were no ships there were potted plants and a clutter of what are sometimes called “masculine” ornaments —china, deer heads, bronze horses, huge ashtrays of heavy, veined, shiny material.On the walls were framed photographs and what might have been diplomas.One photo showed a poodle and a bulldog, dressed in masculine and feminine clothing, and assuming with dismal embarrassment a pose of affection.Written across it was “Old Friends”.But the room was really dominated by a portrait, with its own light and a gilded frame; it was of a good-looking, fair-haired man in middle age, sitting behind a desk, wearing a business suit and looking preeminently prosperous, rosy and agreeable.Here again, it is probably hindsight on my part that points out that in the portrait there is evident also some uneasiness, some lack of faith the man has in this role, a tendency he had to spread himself too bountifully and insistently, which for all anyone knows may lead to disaster.

[11] Never mind the Malleys.As soon as I saw that office, I wanted it.It was larger than I needed, being divided in such a way that it would be suitable for a doctor’s office.(We had a chiropractor in here but he left, says Mrs.Malley in her regretful but uninformative way.) The walls were cold and bare, white with a little gray to cut the glare for the eyes.Since there were no doctors in evidence, nor had been, as Mrs.Malley freely told me, for sometime, I offered twenty-five dollars a month.She said she would have to speak to her husband.

[12] The next time I came my offer was agreed upon, and I met Mr.Malley in the flesh.I explained, as I had already done to his wife, that I did not want to make use of my office during regular business hours, but during the weekends and sometimes in the evening.He asked me what I would use it for, and I told him, not without wondering first whether I ought to say I did stenography.

[13] He absorbed the information with good humor.“Ah, you’re a writer.”

[14] “Well yes.I write.”

[15] “Then we’ll do our best to see you’re comfortable here,” he said expansively.“I’m a great man for hobbies myself.All these ship models — I do them in my spare time; they’re a blessing for the nerves.People need an occupation for their nerves.I daresay you’re the same.”

[16] “Something the same,” I said, resolutely agreeable, even relieved that he saw my behavior in this hazy and tolerant light.At least he did not ask me, as I half expected, who was looking after the children, and did my husband approve? Ten years, maybe fifteen, had greatly softened, spread, and defeated the man in the picture.His hips and thighs had now a startling accumulation of fat, causing him to move with a sigh, a cushiony settling of flesh, a ponderous matriarchal discomfort.His hair and eyes had faded, his features blurred, and the affable, predatory expression had collapsed into one of troubling humility and chronic mistrust.I did not look at him.I had not planned, in taking an office, to take on the responsibility of knowing any more human beings.

[17] On the weekend I moved in without the help of my family, who would have been kind.I brought my typewriter and a card table and chair, also a little wooden table on which I set a hot plate, a kettle, a jar of instant coffee, spoon, and a yellow mug.That was all.I brooded with satisfaction on the bareness of my walls, the cheap dignity of my essential furnishings, the remarkable lack of things to dust, wash, or polish.

[18] The sight was not so pleasing to Mr.Malley.He knocked on my door soon after I was settled and said that he wanted to explain a few things to me — about unscrewing the light in the outer room, which I would not need, about the radiator and how to work the awning outside the window.He looked around at everything with gloom and mystification and said it was an awfully uncomfortable place for a lady.

[19] “It’s perfectly all right for me,” I said, not as discouragingly as I would have liked to, because I always have a tendency to placate people, whom I dislike for no good reason, or simply do not want to know.I make elaborate offerings of courtesy sometimes, in the foolish hope that they will go away and leave me alone.

[20] “What you want is a nice easy chair to sit in while you’re waiting for inspiration to hit.I’ve got a chair down in the basement, all kinds of stuff down there since my mother passed on last year.There’s a bit of carpet rolled up in a corner down there; it isn’t doing anybody any good.We could get this place fixed up so it’d be a lot more home-like for you.”

[21] “But really,” I said, “but really I like it as it is.”

[22] “If you wanted to run up some curtains, I’d pay you for the material.Place needs a touch of color; I’m afraid you’ll get morbid sitting in here.”

[23] “Oh, no,” I said, and laughed, “I’m sure I won’t”.

[24] “It’d be a different story if you were a man.A woman wants things a bit cozier.”

[25] So I got up and went to the window and looked down into the empty Sunday street through the slats of the Venetian blind, to avoid the accusing vulnerability of his fat face and I tried out a cold voice that is to be heard frequently in my thoughts but has great difficulty getting out of my cowardly mouth.“Mr.Malley, please don’t bother me about this any more, I said it suits me.I have everything I want.Thanks for showing me about the light.”

[26] The effect was devastating enough to shame me.“I certainly wouldn’t dream of bothering you,” he said, with precision of speech and aloof sadness.“I merely made these suggestions for your comfort.Had I realized I was in your way, I would have left some time ago.” When he had gone I felt better, even a little exhilarated at my victory, though still ashamed of how easy it had been.I told myself that he would have had to be discouraged sooner or later, it was better to have it over with at the beginning.

...

[1968]

Notes

Alice Munro (1931-present): She is a Canadian contemporary short story writer who wins the 2013 Noble Prize Literature award and has also won multi-awards nationally and internationally.Munro has established her international reputation as one of the greatest contemporary writers of fiction with her frequent theme concerning female dilemmas in their growth and following stages of life. The Office is selected from her early collection of short stories Dance of the Happy Shades (1968), which got her 1968 Governor General’s Award for Fiction.

After You Read

Knowledge Focus

1.Discuss the following questions with your partner.

1) What is the setting of the story?

2) Why does the narrator need an office?

3) Why does the narrator have sense of humiliation when talking about her writing of fiction?

4) What does the narrator tell her husband about reasons for renting an office?

5) How does the narrator depict a woman’s role at home?

6) How is the room to be rented like?

7) What is the narrator’s first impression of Mr.Malley?

2.Learn literary devices together with your partner.

Characterization in literature refers to the creation of characters so that they exist for the readers as life-like.

a.Discuss the following questions with your group members.

1) how the image of Mr.Malley was portrayed?

2) how was the narrator herself depicted?

b.Try to identify lines where descriptive expressions of people are embodied in the story and make comments with your partner.

3.Discuss the following topic with your partner.

What will happen after the first unpleasant conversation between the narrator and Mr.Malley? Discuss the possible ending with your partner.

Language Focus

1.Explain the following expressions to your classmates and try to translate them into proper Chinese.

2.Discuss the subtle difference of the words in each group and fill in the blanks with the right word.

disclosure exposure enclosure

1) The newspaper’s _______ of their crimes led to their arrest.

2) The ________ of public land meant that ordinary people couldn’t use it.

3) She chose the room with an eastern ________.

4) The ________ that he had been in prison ruined his chances for public office.

5) That government information ________ system needs to improve.

outrageous courageous advantageous

1) Flying across the Atlantic for the first time was a ________ achievement.

2) His ________ behavior at the meeting offended everyone.

3) His ________ deed obtained the admiration of people.

4) I think a joint venture would be ________ to both of us.

5) The city has ________ geographical environment and convenient transportation.

6) The news was ________ and insulting.

emphatic sympathetic

1) ________ words said to people in sorrow will alleviate their suffering.

2) “You must go”, she said in an ________ tone.

3) Chris was very ________ about the whole situation.

3.Fill in the blanks with the right form of the given word.

1) People often call the scientist erratic and ________(fantastic).

2) Often, people’s answers are ________(convince) or they just don’t know.

3) The change in her is scarcely ________(percept).

4) We heard ________(insist) calls from people: “Help! Help!”

5) Efficient and effective management is the guarantee of the enterprise’s ________(prosperous).

6) Travel and entertaining conversation will be ________(information) and uplifting.

7) He was in an ________(expand) mood on the night of the party.

4.Read the following sentences and identify the grammatical phenomenon used in italic parts.Discuss it with your partner.

1) Had I realized I was in your way, I would have left some time ago.

2) ...he would have had to be discouraged sooner or later.

3) He behaves as though he were better than us.

4) If only I were not so nervous.

5) I’d rather I were not at the spot of the accident.

6) Just imagine everyone were to stop littering.

7) All the doctors in the hospital insisted that he was badly wounded and that he be operated on at once.

8) I forget where I read the article, or I would show it to you now.

9) — Shall I come tomorrow?

— I’d rather you didn’t.

5.Fill in each blank with the correct form of the given word, paying attention to unreal conditional sentences.

1) If a better material _________(use), the strength of the part would have been increased.

2) Had the weather been good, the children _________(go) out for a walk.

3) The general’s command was that the soldiers _________(leave) their fort and carry out more important task.

4) It’s desired that she _________(come) to teach us at least twice a week.

5) I am too busy these days.I would rather all of you _________(come) next month for a dinner.

6) He talks as if he _________(know) everything in the world.

7) Peter wishes that he _________(study) law instead of literature when he was in college.

8) I advised that he _________(send) to the hospital at once, but he insisted that he_________(feel) quite well then.

9) — I’ve told him about it.

— But I’d rather you _________(have).

Comprehensive Work

1.Group work: Dramatization.

Role-play the scene when Mr.Malley came to visit the narrator in an annoying way.Pay attention to the tone of the narrator.

2.Pair work.

Retell the story to your partner as if you were Mr.Malley and discuss with your partner the difference between the original text and the retold one.

3.Pair work.

Discuss with your partner:

If you were the narrator, what would you do when Mr.Malley bothered you in his visit?

4.Group work.

Discuss with your partner other dilemmas women have in their lives and try to work out relative solutions.

5.Writing.

Write a story depicting an incident you were bothered by someone, for example, your roommate, classmate or friend.Try to indicate your inward activity.

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