Labrador Fiasco and Plot

In reading the” Labrador Fiasco” from Margaret Atwood’s Moral Disorder, there was an endearing simplicity to the way she told the story. Nonetheless, it is clear that there is an interweaving and complex sense of development in the story, but somehow the reader is never allowed to acknowledged just how well developed the progression of events, external and inscribed into the story’s world, because it has a linearity and familiarity that would denote a sense of comfort. For instance, there is the story within the story, the bedtime story that is told of the adventurers to the father, which is completely linear. Two men decide to go on an adventure, they hire a guide, they ignore the consultation of the guide who has seemed to receive divine direction, they eventually fall prey to the hardships of nature’s cruel brutality, and everyone but the guide dies, albeit peacefully one could say. Then there is the real story presented, that of an old man desperately trying to make sense of the bitterness of old age and the closing chapters of his life, his own Labrador Fiasco, as Atwood reconnects small tidbits of the past into the character, a shell of a man, which is presented in the telling. And it is not merely through direct details that the audience is given an understanding of this man’s past life, but the backstory is read through just his interactions with the story being told, suggesting that either he knew people similar to these men or that quite possibly he was in a situation like those men. Then, of course, there are pieces of backstory told through observations concerning his seizure, the details given about his characteristics embodying a strong display of ‘show and not tell’.  It was incredibly halcyon at times given the gloomy nature of the story, the uncertain and hazy ending given that gives no appeasement to the audience as to what will occur to the father, but such a boon was given through the finer manipulations with the story’s development, interrupting the grim story of cocky young men with memories of the father when he was once so as well. These memories were given through a prop device, the same book they read these stories from also contained in the back pictures and notes from the father, again suggesting a personal connection to the three characters of the Labrador story.

               What I could perhaps gain to learn from this story is how to utilize details, small descriptions and subtle cues to suggest plot devices or backstories, to make seemingly innocent items weave intricate plotlines. There doesn’t necessarily have to be an outright inference to an event that has occurred or a verbal connection to an event, because just through the back and forth repartee of the father’s memories and the story being told, his interrupting comments and snide remarks, we have received a better understanding of not just his character but of his past as well. One that establishes the tone of the story very well, all without saying much and never giving itself as a heavy hand.