Dear Life: Stories

by Alice Munro

Hardcover, 2012

Status

Available

Publication

Knopf (2012), Edition: First Edition, 319 pages

Description

Fiction. Literature. Short Stories. HTML:WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE© IN LITERATURE 2013 A New York Times Notable Book A Washington Post Notable Work of Fiction A Best Book of the Year: The Atlantic, NPR, San Francisco Chronicle, Vogue, AV Club In story after story in this brilliant new collection, Alice Munro pinpoints the moment a person is forever altered by a chance encounter, an action not taken, or a simple twist of fate. Her characters are flawed and fully human: a soldier returning from war and avoiding his fiancée, a wealthy woman deciding whether to confront a blackmailer, an adulterous mother and her neglected children, a guilt-ridden father, a young teacher jilted by her employer. Illumined by Munro??s unflinching insight, these lives draw us in with their quiet depth and surprise us with unexpected turns. And while most are set in her signature territory around Lake Huron, some strike even closer to home: an astonishing suite of four autobiographical tales offers an unprecedented glimpse into Munro??s own childhood. Exalted by her clarity of vision and her unparalleled gift for storytelling, Dear Life shows how strange, perilous, and extraordinary ordinary li… (more)

Media reviews

The Guardian
Munro's stories are full of smart young women wryly observing men's desire for dominance and other women's collusion with their own subservience. In "Dolly", the narrator observes of a love rival, "men are charmed by stubborn quirks if the girl is good-looking enough… all that delight in the
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infantile female brain." But it would be wrong to think of Munro as a chronicler of the particular disappointments of being female: she draws men just as well. There is a heartbreaking portrayal of a widowed policeman in "Leaving Maverley". Despite the inevitable end of his wife's lengthy and terminal illness, he realises as he leaves the hospital: 'He'd thought that it had happened long before with Isabel, but it hadn't. Not until now. She had existed and now she did not… And before long, he found himself outside, pretending that he had as ordinary and good a reason as anybody else to put one foot ahead of the other." There is an interesting diversion at the end of this book: the final four stories are, in Munro's own words, "not quite stories… the first and last – and the closest – things I have to say about my own life." A less well-known writer would not be allowed to lift her hands and say, "Look, there are some bits here, and I'm not sure what they are, but there you go," but they are delightful additions to this collection. Plainer, with a slightly more bitter edge, than the "fictional" stories that precede them, they are a tantalising glimpse of the memoir Munro fans would swoon for, should she choose to write it. The first indeed – but let's hope she changes her mind and makes them not the last.
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The Telegraph
After the first 10 short stories in her new collection, Alice Munro inserts a single paragraph on an otherwise blank page, under the heading, Finale: “The final four works in this book are not quite stories. They form a separate unit, one that is autobiographical in feeling, though not,
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sometimes, entirely so in fact. I believe they are the first and last – and the closest – things I have to say about my own life.” “Dear Life” describes the house Munro lived in when she was growing-up in Wingham, Ontario, where her mother was a schoolteacher and her father a fur and poultry farmer. “This is not a story, only life,” she notes, signalling the pathways, names, coincidences that might have been woven into her fiction, but here are present as memories. “The Eye” is the most majestic of Munro’s monuments to memory. She remembers being taken, the year she started school, to see the dead body of a young woman whom her mother had hired to help after the birth of Munro’s younger siblings. Encouraged to look into the coffin, she thought she saw the young woman slightly open one eye: a private signal to her alone. “Good for you,” her mother said, as they left the grieving household. It is fascinating to compare this with the end of the story “Amundsen” earlier in the collection. Two people who were lovers long ago meet unexpectedly crossing a Toronto street. The man opens one of his eyes slightly wider than the other and asks, “How are you?” “Happy,” she says. “Good for you,” he replies. In this book, Munro has laid bare the foundations of her fiction as never before. Lovers of her writing must hope this is not, in fact, her finale. But if it is, it’s spectacular.
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User reviews

LibraryThing member RandyMetcalfe
Almost any story you choose to read by Alice Munro will better than almost any other story you might have read, even those by Alice Munro. There is something lulling in the cadence of her sentences, her observational choices, her sudden turns that are not turns at all. Something that makes you
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think, as you read one of her stories, that this is it, this is what real life, a certain life at least lived in a certain place and time is like. Honesty might be a word for it, if fiction can be honest. I hear the voice of my mother, or an aunt, or one of my grandmothers in these stories and I think, even if I disagree with what they are saying, that’s the way they see it.

Of the stories in this collection, I would single out “Amundsen” for its clash of naïveté and self-serving motives, “Haven” for the unflattering portrayal of familial relations, and “Train” for the way it treats a life as iterations in a quest for solidity and peace. But I might just as easily have chosen any of the other stories.

The final four pieces in the collection are grouped together under the title “Finale”. These are, Munro says, “autobiographical in feeling, though not, sometimes, entirely so in fact.” In them, Munro looks at a few incidents of her childhood that cast her, momentarily, in an unfavourable light. They are, some of them, shameful thoughts or actions that she may be excising. In “Night”, her father reassures her. “People have those kinds of thoughts sometimes.” And it is precisely what she needs to hear in order to overcome her anxiety driven insomnia. Other regrets, such as not attending her mother’s final illness, death, and funeral are not assuaged by the calm comfort of a wise father. “We say of some things that they can’t be forgiven, or that we will never forgive ourselves. But we do—we do it all the time.”

Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member Laurenbdavis
Quintessential Munro. This book may well be her last. Certainly the four autobiographical stories at the end of the book seem to hint at this. Perhaps it is the idea she will retire now, or something deeper in the stories, but I admit to feeling terribly sad at the end of the book. The tone here
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is, to my ear, wistful, almost elegiac, as though the author, and the characters are bewildered by the twists and turns their lives have taken and baffled or slightly disappointed at where they find themselves.

It is a book full of the sort of insights into the human heart one has come to expect from Munro. It's true, I found the ending to the first story a bit contrived, but when I reflect on it as part of the work as a whole I find it oddly fitting. Perhaps you will as well. Each of Munro's characters (and there's no need for me to provide a list here, the jacket blurb as well as other reviews will do that), are somewhat buffeted by their lives -- aren't we all? -- and yet there is an overall tone of Grace here, a wonder at the fragility of a people's lives, their love, their possibilities.

The last two sentences of the book -- "We say of some things that they can't be forgiven, or that we will never forgive ourselves. But we do--we do it all the time." -- will, I suspect be much discussed. Certainly there is not a story in this collection to which that line might not apply. Indeed, just as I think of the title of Carson McCullers' novel, "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" as perhaps the perfect title, in that I can't think of a book it wouldn't fit, so I think of Munro's last line. Its simplicity, clarity and profundity (especially so placed) are trademark Munro. It is the sort of writing that makes me proud to be a writer, and to vow to do be a better one.
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LibraryThing member MichaelDC
I know I'm prone to hyperbole sometimes ("everything is AWESOME!") but, well, in this case, I think I'm totally justified in saying that Alice Munro is the greatest living writer in the English language. Spectacular. I think my favorite thing about her writing is that you get a sense of just how
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*big* our lives are. Somehow she not only creates complex stories about the subtleties of how we relate to each other, but also gives a sense of history and place unlike any other writer I know. In lesser hands many of these stories would come very close to melodrama or even soap opera, but Munro goes the other way and creates entire miniature worlds. Sorry if this sounds all fancy-pants, but she really is that good.
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LibraryThing member Mike-L
This isn't the type of book I would normally be compelled to read. If you're not familiar with Alice Munro's work (as I wasn't) the official blurb doesn't really give much of an idea as to what it's about. There's a reason for that, the short stories contained within Dear Life are hard to describe
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in any significant way even after you've read them.

The stories are steeped in melancholy and the quiet frustrations of ordinary existence. Not necessarily sad stories so much as stories that aren't all tied up into easy resolutions or overly happy, contrived endings. I was vaguely reminded of some of the writings of John Steinbeck, perhaps because, like Steinbeck, Ms. Munro seems to capture the essence of a certain kind of people as they existed in a certain place and time.

Each story concentrates on relating a specific time or event in someone's life when their future is somehow changed, sometimes not great huge events but small choices that inform the direction that will, at some point down the line, eventually result in a change of destination... a wonder of what might have been. These are the kind of stories that stick with the reader long after they've been read.

It's a very good book. It drew me in to the point that the characters became very much alive in my imagination and I found myself at times wanting to yell out to them. To offer some piece of advice or warning about what they were doing, to chastise them for poor decisions, or to comfort them in their moment of sorrow.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys literary fiction. There are adult themes and at least one instance of strong language.
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LibraryThing member browner56
In Dear Life, Nobel laureate Alice Munro’s collection of short fiction and personal reminiscences, the author explores several themes associated with ordinary people who find themselves dealing with sudden changes in their lives. Whether due to the death of a loved one, the dissolution of a
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relationship, or the onset of a debilitating illness, the stories in this book capture the myriad ways in which her protagonists confront their own life-altering and sometimes cathartic challenges. These are stories that are abundantly detailed and developed with a subtle hand, even if they are not always resolved in a straightforward manner.

I had a decidedly mixed reaction to this book, which is the first of Munro’s work that I have read. On one hand, the author demonstrates again and again why she is considered to be such a master of her craft. The prose in each of the stories in this volume is concise and emotionally evocative. She does a truly remarkable job of creating a rich, self-contained world within each tale, many of which span decades of a character’s life in a brief amount of space.

On the other hand, though, I also found the subject matter throughout Dear Life to be consistently—relentlessly, in fact—depressing. These are stories of illness, disappointment, and heartbreak, which made them somewhat monotonous to read even if the details changed from one account to the next. Further, the four semi-autobiographical pieces that end the book felt fragmentary and unfinished compared to the rest of the volume. So, while it is easy to appreciate from the quality of the writing how talented Munro really is, the nature of the stories themselves makes it difficult to recommend this book without considerable hesitation.
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LibraryThing member Narshkite
Raced through this is 2 days. A gorgeous, personal, quiet book. Alice Munro is one of the very few authors who gets better with every new book, even when it seems impossible that she can get better. Reading Munro is like living inside another person's skin, not because that person's life is like
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your own (to the contrary, none of the characters are living a life at all famliliar to this reader) but because somehow she injects the reader with empathy which allows one to find common ground and walk in someone else's shoes for 30 pages or so. Wow.
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LibraryThing member rglossne
These are splendid short stories, but I especially liked the autobiographical 'fragments' at the end of the book.
LibraryThing member emmee1000
This is easily the most poignant collection of stories Munro has published. The last four selections in the book are a pure gift from Munro to her readers, offering a deeply personal look into her formative younger years.
LibraryThing member SamSattler
Dear Life is my first experience with Alice Munro’s fiction – but it will not be my last.

Munro was born and raised on a “fox and poultry” farm in Ontario and she now lives in Clinton, a little town of approximately 3,000 residents about twenty miles from that farm. Pure and simple, Munro
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is a short story writer – even her one novel, Lives of Girls and Women, is in the form of a group of interrelated short stories. Dear Life, the thirteenth original short story collection that she has published since her first in 1968, is her first since 2009’s Too Much Happiness. Interestingly, all of her stories seem to be set in the region of Canada in which Munro grew up and lives today.

The stories in Dear Life are not so much plot driven, as they are character driven. They feature strong, but complex, women whose lives are often changed or pushed in entirely new directions by spur of the moment decisions or chance encounters. The reader is reminded that even what appear to be the simplest of lives are not ever so simple to the ones living them.

Strong as the women of Dear Life are, when it comes to men, many of them seem to be attracted to the “bad boy” type – and they usually suffer the consequences. One woman, married and the mother of a little girl, has a sudden fling with a younger man while on a train trip to Toronto to housesit for a friend; a middle-aged woman living alone on remote, broken down farm takes in a soldier who decides to jump off a train near her place; an elderly woman runs off when her husband’s equally elderly old flame re-enters his life; and a rich woman has a long affair with a married man whom she figures out way too late.

In addition, this fourteen-story collection include stories about little girls and one about a confused old woman akin to the kind of tale often found in the classic “Twilight Zone” television series. The collection’s final four stories are set in a separate unit of their own, and are described by the author as “autobiographical in feeling, though not, sometimes, entirely so in fact.” These four stories are intriguing snapshots of incidents, one must suppose, that are based on something from Munro’s own life, but rather surprisingly, they do not carry the emotional impact of the earlier stories.

Dear Life is an excellent introduction to Alice Munro’s fiction, to her unforgettable characters and the sheer power of her stories. She is not a novelist but, somehow, her best stories read like mini-novels, and they say as much about the human condition as will be found in most full-length novels.

Alice Munro is a true short story master.

Rated at: 4.0
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LibraryThing member eglinton
One admires more than enjoys these short stories. They're finely crafted, with no excess or padding, fastidiously lucid. They're about people more than things, yet the characters are unambitious, reserved folk, content to remain in their narrative for years unnumbered. The tone is dour, but not
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slow; Munro moves the stories on, artfully, economically. Secrets from a repressed and distant past resurface, deceits and shocks occur, muffled by gentle, unadorned prose. Which at times is a bit too understated and condensed - leaving the reader double-taking back, asking what actually happened in the calm signing off : did she do that? What
did he mean?

What's really missing is warmth (not to mention humour), so it promises relief when, in the final tales of this collection, Munro turns to more directly autobiographical pieces. But the tone remains: semi-detached, unsympathetic to other family members or herself, portraying the kind of sober and unglamorous lives once associated so readily with Canada.
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LibraryThing member Davidgnp
Canadian writer Alice Munro is the undisputed queen of the short story format and this collection, which the author (approaching 82) hints may be her last, may also be her best.

The stories are all set in familiar Munro territory around Lake Huron and all of them revolve around small incidents in
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generally modest, some would say ordinary, lives. That is not their limitation but their strength. There are no extra trappings to distract from the sensibilities of the (generally female) central characters. The simplicity in the telling belies the complexity of the felt experience but brings us in to experience it virtually at first hand. There is a particularly quality of wistfulness about these late stories, as if the author has turned for one last contemplative look back down a road travelled and not to be returned upon, as if each story carries a personal memory, not simply a story-teller's conjuration.

This is certainly true of the last four pieces which the author introduces with an explanation that these are indeed memoir not stories. They gain an extra poignancy by being avowedly autobiographical, and they add to the sense of valediction. I do hope, however, this is not to be Ms Munro's farewell.
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LibraryThing member eachurch
Alice Munro is a powerful storyteller. Her short stories amaze me. Using uncomplicated language, she moves effortlessly around in time and place. The autobiographical pieces were wonderful. I listened to it all on a rather long car journey. I'm looking forward to reading her words myself.
LibraryThing member nivramkoorb
As always, I enjoyed the sparse stories of small occurrences that have potential life changing impacts. However, there was a flow to some of the stories that did not resonate with me as much as earlier collections that I have read by her. Not sure if I will go back and read anymore from her. I will
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always recommend her but she will never touch me as much as other writers. Perhaps it is the nature of her topics and the lack of humor.
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LibraryThing member tippycanoegal
I love Alice Munro and think she is one of our greatest living writers, but by God her stories always leave me feeling like I want to slit my wrists. Sad, sad, sad....and then even sadder.
LibraryThing member anneearney
Solid story collection, some better than others (as always). My favorite is the second, Amundsen, for the realization the character has at the very end of the story. And I really enjoyed the autobiographical snippets at the end of the book. I'm glad she didn't try to make those into essays or true
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stories, with beginnings, middles, etc.
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LibraryThing member mojomomma
A collection of short stories set in mid-20th century Ontario.
LibraryThing member gbelik
Alice Munro's stories always satisfy, those I didn't find this collection as compelling as earlier ones.
LibraryThing member Milda-TX
Nice wintertime short stories.
LibraryThing member brangwinn
I listened to these short stories on the way to work. Although I am not a short story fan, Monro proved herself a master in the art, I found myself thinking about some of these stories long after I listened to them.
LibraryThing member suesbooks
Most of these short stories were not of the quality of interest I am used to Alice Munro writing. The writing was not outstanding, and the content was less interesting than other stories she has written.
LibraryThing member konastories
Joy's review: It was great to discuss this in our book group just a few days before Munro won the Nobel Prize for Literature. I found every story in this collection to be thought and emotion provoking. Munro's style is understated and yet never fails to paint a vivid picture of the individuals in
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each story. It's clear from her stories about 'ordinary people' that Munro thinks that there is no such thing as a boring person. There are no boring stories here either.
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LibraryThing member bookswoman
I read the first two stories and, while interesting, aren't necessarily the kind of thing I truly enjoy. So, this is a DNF.
LibraryThing member michaelbartley
I am so happy that Ms. Munro won the Noble she is a wonderful writer. I enjoyed these stories, each story has the depth of a novel. there seems to tone of sadness in these stories. not tragic but lonely and a little sad
LibraryThing member CLStern
I read about half of the short stories in this book before giving up. I love bleak and depressing stories, but this just wasn't depressing enough, or perhaps it wasn't depressing in the right way.
LibraryThing member rmckeown
In an exquisitely happy coincidence, I recently purchased Dear Life by Alice Munro, who won the 2013 Nobel Prize for Literature. A representative of the Swedish Academy praised Alice Munro’s “talent in capturing different moods of people, making her a ‘fantastic portrayer of human beings’."
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This collection of stories draws a vivid picture of the lives of ordinary people, faced with mundane situations, which they handle with grace and aplomb.

Munro is the 12th woman to win the prize. Some of the noted writers who have taken this most prestigious award include, Earnest Hemingway, William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, Saul Bellow, Toni Morrison, and Doris Lessing. Reading at least one work by each winner makes an interesting and wide-ranging adventure in fiction.

When I first started reading this collection, I felt a little mystified by the ordinariness of the lives she portrayed. But once I really immersed myself in the stories, I began to see the importance that all lives
have in teaching us about the inner workings of the human mind.

In “Amundsen,” Vivien Hyde has arrived at a school as a new teacher. She is self-conscious about a minor physical deformity and spends most of her time home alone. But she attracts the attention of the headmaster, Dr. Fox, who invites her to his home for dinner. The two gradually develop a bond and he asks Vivien to marry him. They elope, and when they arrive at their destination, Fox says, “I can’t do it,” … ‘He can’t explain it. Only that it is a mistake.” He puts her on a train for home with these words, “Maybe someday you’ll count this as one of the luckiest days of your life.” (63)

Vivien runs into him years later, and he asks if she is happy. Munro continues, “’Good for you.’ It still seemed as if we could make our way out of that crowd, that in a moment we would be together. But just as certain that we would carry on in the way we were going. And so we did. No breathless cry, no hand on my shoulder when I reached the sidewalk. Just that flash I had seen in an instant,” … “For me, I was feeling something the same as when I left Amundsen, the train carrying me still dazed and full of disbelief. Nothing changes really about love.” Munro gives the reader powerless, helpless characters who carry on their lives with quiet dignity.

Yet, somehow, I find these stories anything but depressing. I find myself cheering for these men and women, hoping beyond hope they will succeed and triumph in the end.

I found some passages of Alice Munro’s Dear Life rather confusing, and only after several attempts could I untangle the relationships and emotions of these characters. One story in particular, “Gravel,” is narrated by a young girl who suffers the loss of a sibling who drowned while attempting to save the family dog. The conversations between her older sister, Caro, and her step-father Neal required a lot of extra effort. Overall, Munro is a wonderful writer with lots of interesting characters and a fine narrative eye. 4 stars

--Jim, 11/2/13
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Original language

English

Original publication date

2012

Physical description

319 p.; 6 inches

ISBN

9780307596888

Local notes

fiction
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