Annotated Bibliography
Ait Mohammed, Ania and Harbit, Sylia. “A Cultural Reading of Alice Munro’s Selected Short Stories in Dear Life Collection” (2012).
A research article aimed at analyzing Alice Munro’s short stories, the authors provide a sound and thorough examination of the socio economic struggles of the characters in Munro’s works. The authors look into how individuals adhere or stray from culture and presumed class structure while using Raymond Williams’s “Marxism and Literature” and other sources to provide context and back up their theories in an engaging and informative article.
Awano, Lisa Dickler. “An Interview With Alice Munro. (Cover Story).” Virginia Quarterly Review, vol. 89, no. 2, Spring 2013, pp. 180–84. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=87119387&site=ehost-live&scope=site.
This interview is a personal one in which Lisa Dickler Awano dives deep into Alice Munro’s writing style by quizzing her about her upbringing, her experience in life, and her relationship with her own memories. These are elements that are in the constant spotlight in her work, and this interview does well to peel back the curtain and explain why Alice Munro writes in her style.
Buchholtz, Miroslawa. “Alice Munro’s Legacy: The “Finale” of Dear Life”
Buchholtz remarks on core themes within some of Alice Munro’s stories along with an account of the renowned author’s legacy. Mentions of the war and its oppressive nature serve as source for this article.
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DeFalco, Amelia. “Caretakers/Caregivers: Economies of Affection in Alice Munro.” Twentieth Century Literature, 2012.
A careful analysis of Munro’s works, DeFalco offers insight into the complexities of caregiving in relationships and how easily the act of caretaking can become a form of labor. Through the examination of Munro’s characters DeFalco is able to shed light on the structure of care and relationships in a way that supports a Marxist take on “Dear Life.” DeFalco’s fresh perspective on the complexities of care ethics is a valuable tool when considering the impacts on social and economic structure.
Fiamengo, Janice Anne, et al. “‘First and Last’: The Figure of the Infant in ‘Dear Life’ and ‘My Mother’s Dream’ .” Alice Munro’s Miraculous Art: Critical Essays, University of Ottawa Press, Ottawa, 2017.
In Anne Fiamengo’s section of “First and Last” that focuses on “Dear Life”, she talks about how the title of Alice Munro’s work got its name from the almost melodramatic telling of the little baby, the young mother, and the crazy old woman. The text talks about how the care put into the geographical description of the home town translates to the maps of social boundaries and mobility that affected her seeing Diane, as well as her parents experiences with social aspects. Fiamengo writes about Munro and her mother’s relationship shown in the text, and how their family had to fight through adversity. She includes evidence from other short stories by Munro, including “My Mother’s Dream” to extrapolate on her points. Only this section of the book is utilized to speak to the social conformities that Munro and her mother were resistant to in “Dear Life.”
Forsha, Stephen. “Virtue and Moral Development, Changing Ethics Instruction in Business School Education .” 2017, pp. 432–433, https://web-s-ebscohost-com.cwi.idm.oclc.org/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=2&sid=2ecaba03-028e-42f6-a881-446655eaff09%40redis.
This student journal written by Forsha offers an insight into the relationship between students and their behavior in school, as well as in the workforce regarding morality. This article includes studies done regarding college students, but also takes into account people in general, in how they learn and interact morally in different settings. In the specific pages outlined, Forsha uses Lawrence Kohlberg’s stages of moral development to explain the different stages of one’s life regarding discipline and morality and argues that these stages may not be as linear as we once thought they were.
Readers can use this source to gain insight on the specific stages of moral development and how these stages affect the process of one’s brain when growing up. Readers can expect to learn why Kohlberg’s stages are still useful today when examining societies patterns and mindsets, and how these mindsets can change drastically due to environment. This is a helpful source to rely on when reading Munro’s “Dear Life,” because it gives reasoning to the character’s mindsets and actions due to what is happening around them. Based on the approach of viewing the story through Kohlberg’s stages of moral development and psychological critism, one can better examine “Dear Life” by using this source.
Gittings, Christopher E. “Constructing a Scots-Canadian Ground: Family History and Cultural Translation in Alice Munro.” Studies in Short Fiction, vol. 34, no. 1, Winter 1997, p. 27. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,cpid&custid=ns149246&db=a9h&AN=817034&site=ehost-live.
In this article it discusses the use of Scottish and Canadian culture in the writings of Alice Munro. Many people who remember their cultural heritage often find themselves influenced by it. Alice Munro is an author that has used her cultural background and her knowledge of it when writing. Dear life is a story that shows that the author has included her own cultural background.
This article rather went into depth discussing the connection between an author and cultural background. Munro who is an exceptional author of literature was able to include her culture into her writing. Writing a personal culture into their stories isn’t exactly something that is easy to do unless it is expertly done by someone with experience with cultures. Alice Monroe uses a Canadian and Scottish culture for her background. This source is probably the best one that I could find and has proven to be rather useful.
Halberstam, Jack. “In a Queer Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives.” New York University Press, 2005, pp. 1-2.
Jack Halberstam’s book In a Queer Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives delves into Queer Theory and how queer individuals experience life differently from heterosexual people. Halberstam also uses his own experiences to speak on transgender representation in media. This book uses real world examples of LGBTIA+ experiences and representation to show the temporal differences. Halberstam’s section on what queer theory is and how different individuals experience it is used within the student essay “Nonlinear Memoirs.” Pages 1 and 2 are utilized in order to quickly explain what queer theory is and relate it back to the heteronormative experiences described in Alice Munro’s Dear Life.
Jumani, Fariha Ali. “Textual Analysis of Dear Life by Alice Munro.” 10 Dec. 2016, https://www.academia.edu/30715556/Textual_analysis_of_a_short_story_Dear_life.
In Jumani’s analysis of “Dear Life”, they talk about the characteristics of Munro’s writing, as well as positivity Munro has when recounting memories. They write about how Munro is able to describe and weave memories into a fictional sounding story. They also write about Munro’s ability to jump back and forth between times, and not having to be confined to the linear timeline that we usually see in storytelling. They describe Munro’s underlying motifs that make social statements about lifestyle differences. Jumani explores the limitations implemented in Munro’s life, as well as the vivid imagery used in “Dear Life”. This essay is utilized in order to extrapolate on the social differences in the town and country lifestyles shown in “Dear Life.”
Löschnigg M. ‘Orangesandapples’: Alice Munro’s undogmatic feminism. In: Staines D, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Alice Munro. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge University Press; 2016:60-78.
Löschnigg writes in this chapter Oranges and Apples in The Cambridge Companion to Alice Munro that Munro’s works can be defined as feminist because she, “exposes the absurdities of such imposed gender scripts most radically in her growing-up stories” (Löschnigg 61). Dear Life is a story about Munro’s youth while she is at school and how she is expected to act at home as her mother’s health fails. This chapter notes that while Munro may not consider herself a feminist, her writings allow for feminist readings.
Lucio-Villegas, Spillard, Iris, Melanie. “Before I say goodbye.” International Journal of English Studies, vol. 21, no. 2, 26 Dec. 2021, pp. 139–155, https://doi.org/10.6018/ijes.475711.
A thoughtful look into Alice Munro’s final four stories in Dear Life, Iris Lucio-Villegas Spillard focuses on the mother-daughter relationship in the short story of the same name. This article is biographical and Spillard discusses how the complex relationship affected Munro and influenced her writing. The guilt Munro felt around her mother and because of her mother is an example of how women are socialized, and feminism teaches women that they are allowed to set aside that guilt. The biographical article gives readers insight into Munro’s life from her early works to her last book.
Marrone, Claire. “States of Perception and Personal Agency in Alice Munro’s ‘Dear Life.’” The Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association, vol. 50, no. 2, 2017, pp. 85–101. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/44862251.
Marrone’s essay analyzes Alice Munro’s book Dear Life as well as her other pieces. By examining multiple pieces, Marrone aims to inform readers about Munro’s unique approach to the memoir and autobiography genres. In particular, Marrone delves into things such as childhood memories, family dynamics, and how perceptions change with age. She uses pieces by Munro as well as relevant articles and other information to back up her main ideas. Marrone’s section on perceptions changing with age is used as evidence to argue for heteronormative perceptions in the student essay “Nonlinear Memoirs.”
May, Charles E. “Alice Munro’s ‘Dear Life.’” Blogspot, 1 Oct. 2011, may-on-the-short-story.blogspot.com/2011/10/alice-munros-dear-life.html.
Charles E. May provides a short analysis of “Dear Life” on Blogspot, describing how real life can be put into a story. He described how Munro differentiates reality with fiction, and how Munro has a distinct type of writing that is almost similar to that of a rhythm. May gives a brief recount of the “Foreword” from The View from Castle Rock” to describe the difference or linkage between Munro’s stories and personal history. This analysis is used to describe the discrepancies in Munro’s mother’s earlier and later story tellings of Mrs. Netterfield.
Myers, D. G. “A Fitting Finale.” Commentary, vol. 134, no. 4, Nov 2012, pp. 60-62. http://cwi.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=83713587&site=ehost-live&scope=site
Meyers article “A Fitting Finale” aims at analyzing Alice Munro’s writing style and themes through her collection “Dear Life”. Comparing her to a modern-day Anton Chekov, Meyers takes note of Munro’s use of a specific place, relationships, and her narratives lacking ideologies and political theory. The article goes into Munro’s complex themes of women, sexuality, and responsibility within her characters. This is a useful source for taking a deeper look into the feminist tones within Alice Munro’s stories.
Milder, Robert. “Differently: Alice Munro and the North American 1960s.” University of Toronto Quarterly, vol. 91, no. 2, June 2022, pp. 33–48. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.cwi.idm.oclc.org/10.3138/utq.91.2.02.
This article by Robert Milder discusses Munro’s writings from the 1960s and how they portrayed the lives of women during that time. Milder notes that Alice Munro does not call herself a feminist when asked in 2001, but Munro focused her writings on educated women who fell into the bored housewife trope. Differently: Alice Munro and the North American 1960s discusses the women’s movement of the 1960s and while Munro’s writings were not political, they were empathetic to the movement with rebellious female characters. Milder compares Munro’s characters to her life at the time and her centering of women and the real issues they tackled make her writings feminist.
Munro, Alice, and Lisa Dickler Awano. “An Interview With Alice Munro.” The Virginia Quarterly Review, vol. 89, no. 2, 2013, pp. 180–84. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/26446758. Accessed 9 May 2024.
The article titled an interview with Alice Munro by Lisa Awano. The interview went over the career of the playwright and her success in the business. During her career she published thirteen story collections and even a novel and has received numerous awards. Munro has said that she used human experience and relationships when writing Dear Life. Munro also said that growing up she often heard “oh for dear life.” That is a rather different way to get the title for a story although that does make some sense to use something from her childhood. Many of Munro’s stories have things like characterization and structures. In the interview Munro states she used a paradox to her own relationship with her parents. Across different cultures the relationship of parents and their children is a universal thing that happens with every family. I found this to be a good article showing how the author wrote her stories. With it being an interview with the author it proves plenty of background about the author. This also provides significant cultural information.
Nunez, Elizabeth. “Truth in Fiction, Untruths in Memoir.” Callaloo, vol. 37, no. 3, 2014, pp. 499–504. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24265136.
Nunez’s essay looks at memory and its reliability within fiction and memoir genres. She uses her own personal experiences as well as works from various authors to talk about writing memoirs and how memory can exemplify or diminish such a genre. She also speaks on spreading truth via writing, no matter the genre. Nunez comments on Munro’s use of faulty memory and how she leaves some details up to interpretation. This section is used with the student essay “Nonlinear Memoirs” in order to showcase the nonlinear narrative structure of Dear Life.
Ostrovsky, Parr, & Gradel. (n.d.). “Promoting Moral Development through Social Interest in Children and Adolescents.” https://web-s-ebscohost-com.cwi.idm.oclc.org/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=487376a0-40d1-439d-b6ea-632670fb4e31%40redis
This journal of research and practice by Ostrovsky, Parr, and Gradel dives into the moral development of children starting from infancy to adults, with a focus on how one’s perception of morality changes over time, being a ‘step by step’ basis and process in the way that it happens. This article focuses on the ability to change and adapt morally to your environment based on people’s differing ideas and opinions. One can get insight into how academic learning in a child’s life is no more important than social learning, in the way that a child should be able to foster moral development, especially those within broken homes, or difficult circumstances of the like.
This relates to “Dear Life” because in this story Munro focuses on her relationship with school, and well as her relationship with her family in tandem. Within this journal, readers can gain insight to how Munro’s morality was shaped due to her mother’s strict views and her father’s treatment of her when she was younger, as well as her negative experiences with the boys in her school. This article explains how one’s morality is shaped not only academically, but socially too, as well as being shaped from one’s actions and the consequences of said action.
Ramya, S., and V. Bhuvaneswari. “An Introspective Narrator in Alice Munro’s Select Short Stories.” Language in India, vol. 18, no. 4, Apr. 2018, pp. 288-92. http://cwi.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ufh&AN=129388362&site=ehost-live&scope=site
This article goes into the introspective narrative of Alice Munro’s short stories, specifically the ones from “Dear Life”, “The Eyes”, “Voice”, and “Nights”. After giving a thorough explanation on introspective narration and a background on Alice Munro’s life, this article discusses Munro’s advanced way of storytelling. Showing how a narrator can go from a storyteller to an induvial that readers can connect with on a personal level.
Reimer, J. (n.d.). “A Structural Theory of Moral Development.” https://web-s-ebscohost-com.cwi.idm.oclc.org/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=5baf4661-d626-45e3-a053-2685c47d03ed%40redis
This article is by Joseph Reimer, a Research Associate for the Center for Moral Education at Harvard University. This article is about moral development, and more so the importance of said moral development in real life situations and scenarios. It includes an example of a scenario where a man steals his dying wife’s medication because it is too expensive for him. This brings up the question of morality from both the man who stole, as well as the person selling the medication. This in turn leads to different responses from people, who are all at differing stages of Kohlberg’s moral development theory. This article summarizes that one needs to understand what stage they are at morally to begin with, and then take action from there to grow and develop higher stages of moral capacity.
This article utilizes psychological criticism because it outlines the act of someone’s mind and how they think through complex situations and scenarios like the example used. This article also gives an idea of how one’s desires and fears can influence their reactions and moral capacity for the situation at hand, driving them to either be at a higher or lower level of the morality stages. The responses from people in reaction to the scenario of the man stealing for his wife can help readers understand this idea of a character’s fears and desires in a story such as “Dear Life.”
Valdes, Marcela. “Some Stories Have to Be Told by Me: A Literary History of Alice Munro.” Virginia Quarterly Review, vol. 82, no. 3, Summer 2006, pp. 82–90. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=f5h&AN=21373060&site=ehost-live&scope=site.
This is a summary of the literary history of Alice Munro’s life. The author seeks to explain why Alice Munro writes in such a verbose and flowery nature, and why she focuses so heavily on telling stories from her childhood. It analyzes her beliefs and writing strategies, and pins these to her forced Presbyterian upbringing.
Williams, Raymond. Marxism and Literature. Oxford University Press, 1977.
Raymond Williams’s “Marxism and Literature” is a remarkable work in the field of critical literary theory with a focus on Marxist criticism and how it is reflected in literary texts. Williams highlights the relationship between literature and socioeconomic and historic conditions in a thoughtful approach that imbues the reader with a sound understanding of how social and political cultures affect literature by either inclusion or exclusion.
