Happy Endings Margaret Atwood\'s Happy

Happy Endings

Margaret Atwood's Happy Endings is an illustration of the premise that the ending of a story is always the same, only the middle matters. This premise is predicated on the fact that ultimately everyone dies, conveniently ignoring the fact that a story need not be carrying through to this ultimate conclusion to have relevance.

This contrivance aside, Atwood's point is to focus the reader on the importance of understanding how the conclusion is reached and why. The six story sketches contained in Happy Endings illustrate vast differences between the beginnings and middles of six stories that end the same way.

Thus, the six stories present differing views of cause and effect. The underlying theme is that in the absence of love, conflict arises. That conflict is necessary to propel the story, to make it interesting. For example, Atwood renders a, D and E. quickly. These stories are full of love, and have no particular conflict. The result of this lack of conflict, as Atwood presents it, is a lack of an interesting story.

The examples of B. And C. illustrate stories with conflict. The point Atwood makes towards the end is that it is not the actions themselves that are the main point of interest, but the reasons for the actions. The conflict that arises between Mary and John in B. derives from a lack of love on the part of John. The heart of the story is not that John does not love Mary, but why he does not and why she does love him. These questions reach into the core of the two characters and are the key to insight.

With C, there is more conflict, again deriving from a lack of love. Mary is not in love with John and from that conflict arises. John's motivations are explored somewhat, while Mary's are given only superficial treatment. Indeed, the superficiality of the treatment given to the how's and why's in story C. show that without them, the story is less compelling. While more action happens in C. than in B, it is less interesting. B was focused more on the how's and why's, which helped to drive the story. C focused on action, at Atwood puts it later the 'what', and this is why the story in C. fails to compel.

In using the framework of the six plot sketches, Atwood further illustrates the point about cause and effect. The F. sketch seems completely glossed over to the point of flippancy, but it serves to illustrate that the 'what', 'what', 'what' of the plot is essentially irrelevant. The story might seem more interesting, she points out, because more things happen, but ultimately there is no particular cause or effect. The relationship between John and Mary contains love, and therefore contains no conflict. The revolutionary plotline serves to infuse a sense of conflict into a story that essentially has none. Therefore, the revolutionary plotline is window dressing, serving merely to distract the reader from the fact that the underlying story - the real story - is devoid of conflict and therefore not compelling.

Atwood's other point in Happy Endings is that the endings themselves are mere window dressing. Readers typically favor a happy ending, but the happy ending should not be the point of the story. The story lies not in the ending at all, but in the how's and why's of the characters and their actions. Her choice of device to illustrate this point is unfortunate, however. She decides that to make her point all endings are "John and Mary die." This is a straw man, since the ultimate end we all face is not the ending constructed in most stories. Atwood's point is that all other endings are contrived, but this ending of hers is equally contrived since the world doesn't end when somebody dies. The true end is the end of the universe itself, not the end of the characters' lives. A story is not necessarily a life story, but a snapshot in time, fictional or otherwise.

There is, however, good rationale for Atwood to seek to make this point. Her primary argument regarding the value of cause and effect is a valid argument. Stories are not about endings any more than they are about the sequence of actions leading up to the endings. Writers should not focus on their endings so much as they should focus on cause and effect for their characters' actions. In removing focus from endings, particularly the perceived need for a happy ending, the emphasis of the story is shifted to more important parts. This shift takes the focus away from a plot that is based on a series of actions and places the focus on the reasons behind those actions. This is opposite to what occurs when a writer places emphasis on an ending. The plot then becomes a robotic series of steps, with the only objective being to traverse the path between the chosen beginning point and the desired ending point. Such stories, Atwood contends, are ultimately less compelling.