Pinc's Picks

"Little Children" -- Tom Perrotta

This weekend I had experienced pop culture synchronicity. The next selection for my book club is Little Children by Tom Perrotta, which I started reading on Thursday evening. Sitting in the movie theater on Saturday night (see post below), one of the previews shown was for the film version of Little Children. The timing was poor in that now that actors was portraying the characters in the book, Sarah became Kate Winslet and Kathy became Jennifer Connelly. Not the worst thing in the world, especially as the casting is good, but I would have preferred to finish the book with my own characters in mind instead of having them personified for me.


An aspect of The Lovely Bones that I did not discuss in my previous post was the image of the mother as a woman who used to have a life and goals who sacrificed them for her children and the idea of what she is supposed to want as a wife and mother. That theme made up a relatively small portion of that book, but to me it was one of the most interesting segments of the book. Little Children picks up on that idea and runs with it, exploring suburban ennui, lost dreams, and the metamorphoses of intelligent people into housewives and househusbands.

Frankly, I find this to be one of the most frightening topics imaginable. I had a stay at home mom who, granted, devoted a tremendous amount of time to volunteer causes, such that she essentially worked without getting paid. However, there was never any doubt that her children were (and remain) her top priority. Since my mother was never particularly into her career, it never struck me that she might resent giving up her life for her kids.

With a role model like that, I would feel guilty having kids if I didn't devote my life to them. But I would feel stifled and trapped if that's the choice I made. Sarah Pierce, one of the main characters in Little Children is trapped in just such a situation -- a former feminist crusader and graduate student who married an older man, had a child, and is stuck sitting at the playground every day with women she despises and who are not her intellectual equal. In fact, the other women are incapable of discussing anything apart from their children and offer recriminating looks when Sarah forgets to pack a snack for her daughter. She sits there wondering how this ever happened to her. I can imagine feeling like that one day, myself.

Little Children could be viewed as "American Beauty" with 30-something characters, trapped in suburbia with all its accompanying boredom. There is much more to the book than this, but because this issue has been pressing on my mind lately, it's been my focus. The book is well-written and a quick and engrossing read. Can't wait to see how the film version stacks up.

posted by Danya @ 9/24/2006 08:10:00 PM