Alice Munro Short Stories: Nettles, Post and Beam, Queenie, The Bear Came Over the Mountain

Alice Munro Short Story Summaries

Nettles

"Nettles": In "Nettles", the unnamed narrator is recently divorced and making a new life for herself in Toronto. This life is supposed to be one "freed from domesticity", but the narrator is overly aware of the new outward forms her life takes and seems to hope that her consciousness might match this show of independence.

Post and Beam

"Post and Beam"

Lorna, a young mother who, like more than one woman in the book, has married an older man and is beginning to resent his tendentious ways. Lorna, the wife, has escaped the straitened circumstances of her family, but her cousin Polly hasn't, and when Polly comes to Toronto for a visit, Lorna's two lives collide painfully. She fears the worst, she makes a bargain with God, and in the end loses something she'd only begun to realize was her last hope.

Queenie

"Queenie": In this chapter the protagonist has run away from home at the age of eighteen with the much older Mr. Vorguilla, who soon turns abusive. At one point he refuses to speak to her for days when he suspects her of having given a cake that she cannot locate to another man. Though the cake finally turns up, Queenie refuses to avenge herself, to the consternation of Chrissy, who protests. In fact, women do not even have to be married to understand the sacrifices of power and of dignity that it requires.

The Bear Came Over the Mountain

"The Bear Came Over the Mountain": Grant, a retired university professor, and his wife, Fiona, have been together for decades. Their marriage has been mostly happy, although Grant's frequent affairs have deeply hurt his wife. But Fiona develops Alzheimer's disease, forcing Grant to commit her to a nursing home. After a thirty-day waiting period, Grant visits Fiona and discovers that she has forgotten him and initiated a relationship with another patient, Aubrey. He wonders whether this affair might be revenge for his former affairs, but Grant accepts it as unavoidable.

Eventually, however, Aubrey's wife, Marian, withdraws Aubrey from the home. Fiona's condition quickly deteriorates, and Grant confronts Marian, pleading with her to let Aubrey see Fiona. Marian refuses, citing the difficulty of handling Aubrey and her own scant financial resources; Grant also perceives that Marian feels alone without her husband. Disappointed, Grant returns home, but finds that Marian has since invited him to a singles' dance. He realizes that a relationship with Marian will enable him to reunite Aubrey and Fiona, and he accepts.

Grant soon visits Fiona to inform her that Aubrey will see her again. Fiona, however, has briefly recovered her memory and recognizes her husband. She accuses him of leaving her behind, to which he responds, "Not a chance."