![]() ![]() ![]() The climaxes of these stories, such as they are, are often moments of sudden self-discovery coupled with a notable increase in intensity of the prose. She is also fond of pursuing the multiple permutations of propositions or hypotheticals that she herself has spontaneously proposed-the disjunction between the needlessness of these proposals and the implacable rigor with which she pursues them being a constant source of humor. She is generally as much as of a mystery to herself as to the reader indeed, the narrative motor of these stories is less plot than the narrator’s attempt to fathom why she did or did not do something, or what exactly the truth might be behind a particular trait she has remarked about herself. A young Englishwoman living in rural Ireland (or so we infer), the narrator is unreliable to the extent that she is often unsure as to what took place in the past, what her motivation was, or why she is even recounting this in the present. The stories in Claire-Louise Bennett’s Pond feature a consistent narratorial voice: a female first-person narrator who recounts past events, hypothetical situations, and self-discoveries to an implied interlocutor. ![]()
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