Canadian Teen Literature
Prof. Guðrún Björk Guðsteinsdóttir
The Mother-Daughter Relationship
As Seen in Linda Holeman’s The Raspberry House Blues
Nína Rúna Kvaran
Vorönn 2004
The relationship between mother and daughter is perhaps the most complicated, deep, and sometimes tragic relationship in existence. According to editor Gerd H. Fenchel in her introduction of the book The Mother-Daughter Relationship: Echoes Through Time, the mother-daughter relationship is very different from the mother-son relationship and “ [. . .] in some ways more intense and more awesome” (Fenchel xvi). Why the mother-daughter connection is so popular a subject, especially in literature by women, is a good question that can partly be answered by the fact that all women are their mothers’ daughters and many eventually become the mothers of daughters. Mothers are the most important role models daughters can have and the mother-daughter connection is multi-dimensional, having an immense impact on the entire spectrum of the daughter’s journey into and through womanhood. As I personally see it, women have fundamentally a triangular relationship with their mothers. Firstly, they all want to be different from their mothers and break free from their regime. Secondly, they inevitably compare themselves to their mothers and compete with them, whether it be on a Freudian level with the attention of the father as the goal or simply in the way they compare their lives in general to that of their mothers’. Thirdly, as they eventually develop into womanhood, daughters sometimes become their mothers whether they like it or not. Fenchel further notes that as women go through this process:
Difficulties that arise along the way have consequences concerning how the daughter feels about her body, self-esteem regulations, career choices, and relationship to men (Fenchel xvi).
Raspberry House Blues by Linda Holeman is a book about a teenaged girl’s self-discovery and process of growing up in relation to three prominent but very different mother figures in her life. It is dedicated to Holeman’s own daughter Brenna or as she puts it herself: “For my daughter Brenna, who dyed her hair red while I was dreaming about Poppy.” The reason is probably because the mother-daughter relationship is the main theme, which underlines the whole story, and in this essay the intention is to look a little closer at that particular theme as it is presented in the above-mentioned book.
Raspberry House Blues is a novel for teenagers or young adults. Poppy, the main character, is an adopted child of divorced parents who goes on a mission to discover her birth mother. She has not seen her father in three years and has severe communication problems with her adoptive mother, though not exactly unique amongst mothers and teenaged daughters. She is resentful of her parents’ divorce, of being adopted and of the fact that her mother is trying to start a new life with a new man, a writer named Marcus. Poppy’s obsession is her birth mother. Her favourite hobby is to take pictures from glamorous magazines of women that are tall and red-haired like she is herself, and glue them into her “M Book” (Holeman 6), a scrap book into which she collects these mother figures. After a serious argument, Poppy’s mother Denise decides to go to Greece with her boyfriend for a vacation and Poppy is not invited. She is left in the care of Jan, her mother’s friend. In a tantrum of sorts, Poppy runs away to her father in Winnipeg, determined to find her real mother to whom she has very unrealistic and high hopes of.
The three most important and influential figures in Poppy’s life are three women who all represent a different kind of motherhood to Poppy, each one presenting a part of the triangular mother-daughter experience mentioned above. Firstly, there is Poppy’s own adoptive mother, Denise, who has raised her from infancy and Poppy, in her teenaged immaturity, resents immensely for not being her real mother. Poppy’s behaviour towards her is very cruel and unfair and she repeatedly throws in her face that she not her real mother:
I lowered the book to my lap. “No, you’re not,” I called, not loudly, but loud enough for her to hear. “No, you’re not,” I repeated. “You’re not my real mother. And you never will be.” (Holeman 8)
Denise is the mother figure that Poppy resents, rebels against and wants to break free from. As Poppy leaves without her mother’s permission and settles in her father’s home, she is literarily taking the first step towards womanhood and independence, although one might question whether she is not rather young to be doing so. This behaviour may be seen as symbolic to the Freudian view of maturing daughters needing to make “ [. . .] libidinal connections to the father and -unlike boys -having to overcome the rivalry with the mother” (Fenchel xvi). In Poppy’s case she breaks free from her mother to join her father, but to her horror, realizes that she is not going to be able to enjoy her father by herself since another mother figure has entered the picture.
The second mother figure to come across Poppy’s path is her stepmother, Calypso, whose hippie-vegetarian lifestyle completely disgusts Poppy. Calypso is an object of comparison since Poppy competes with her for her father’s affection. But Calypso does not only offer competition or comparison to Poppy herself but her existence also offers Poppy a new way of looking at her mother Denise in comparison to Calypso. As Poppy accidentally walks in on her stepmother as she is drying her hair, naked in the bathroom, the sight of her huge, pregnant body both serves as a point of revulsion in Poppy’s mind and diverts her thoughts to Denise, her mother:
She’s the total opposite of my mother. In body and mind. I’ve never seen my mother’s body in less than a bathing suit, and I realize now that I’ve never even had a glimpse of her mind (Holeman 115).
One might even interpret Poppy’s disgust of Calypso’s nude and very pregnant body as a sign of her own inner struggle and perhaps resistance to enter the inevitable womanhood that awaits all young girls. Calypso is the ultimate Mother Earth figure and in her huge, pregnant state, with long sleek hair, stretch marks and total lack of bodily shame, she presents a powerful image of proud womanhood.
The third mother figure in Poppy’s life is Becca, the worn-out actress who never made it and Poppy suspects to be her biological mother. In her immaturity, Poppy believes that biological connection is the most important in life as she confesses to Mac, her love interest:
“I’m talking about my real mother, not an adopted one or a stepmother. I’m talking about the connection of blood. The way that connection is so special, so huge that it can make you finally feel that you know who you are.” (Holeman 188)
Becca represents everything that Poppy wants to become. She is a beautiful and sophisticated actress with more then a hint of tragedy around her person, accentuated by her blatantly obvious reference to Tennessee Williams’ most famous, female character, Blanche Dubois from his play A Streetcar Named Desire. Becca even quotes the famous last line of the play and names the small, white kitten Poppy gives her, Blanche. She furthermore flirts with teenager Mac, and seems to share Blanche Dubois notorious affection for the young male.
Becca is almost like a fantasy role model that, as it turns out, is too good to be true. Unlike Calypso, Becca lives in the unrealistic world of a child, with even a governess/mother type (Rakel) to take care of her and very scarce grown-up responsibilities. Poppy’s infatuation with Becca can be interpreted as her own wish to stay eternally away from mature womanhood with all the complication that come along with that, even as she grows up, just like Becca seems to have successfully done. Becca therefore represents the unrealistic mother figure and even self-image Poppy always dreamed of. In her denial, Poppy looks desperately for approval and affirmation from Mac:
I wanted him to tell me that it was the most wonderful thing in the world that I had found my real mother, and that my real home, the one I truly belonged in, was the big beautiful, clean house on Palmerston Avenue (Holeman 189).
Poppy resents her mother Denise’s relatively small (poor) home, Calypso’s jungle of obese cats, bizarre potty training, and chaos and feels she has finally found a sense of belonging in Becca’s sophisticated and richly endowed house. But that illusion comes crashing down on Poppy in the end when she discovers the truth about Becca.
All three women have their own very unique personality and all three of them play a special part in Poppy’s progression from childish selfishness to maturity and young adulthood. Poppy learns by firstly the distance from her mother and secondly the disappointment in others, that Denise, her adoptive mother is of course her real mother, always was and always will be. She is the one that raised her and loved her through all her life and therefore has the biggest claim on Poppy.
From pregnant Calypso, Poppy learns to appreciate a different view of life and a different lifestyle than she is used to. She also learns about responsibility as she lives with Calypso, her father and her two-year-old brother. More importantly, she learns what it means to be a part of a loving family and that the world does not revolve around her. Some problems are far more serious than the ones she has.
From Becca the actress, Poppy learns that things are not always as they might seem and that what we want is not always the best thing for us. Poppy’s disappointment with Becca as the mother image of her fantasies also makes her finally admit to the connection she feels with Denise as she bitterly thinks: “I cried over losing the mother I thought I had, and missing the one I did have” (Holeman 221).
As is so common with literature aimed at teenagers or young adults, the progress of growing up is a major theme in Linda Holeman’s Raspberry House Blues as has been mentioned above. This often takes form in a kind of personal Odyssey where by trial and error the young hero/heroine of the book acquires a new outlook on life and takes the first, delicate steps towards young adulthood, learning how to appreciate what was before taken for granted. Poppy’s journey is no exception from this rule and she certainly is a very changed girl by the end of the novel. The book offers a glimpse into a young girl’s travel to womanhood by way of the opposites of an exciting mystery provided by Becca’s character and very down-to-earth depiction of the modern day complex set of family connections that are the reality of so many children of divorced and remarried parents. All in all, the book offers a deep insight into the complexities of the mother-daughter relations in as beautiful and ugly a form as they can take, brought to the reader through means of a simple and beautiful style of writing.
Bibliography
Holeman, Linda. Raspberry House Blues. Toronto (Canada). Tundra Books.
2000.
Fenchel, Gerd H. Editor. The Mother-Daughter Relationship: Echoes Through
Time. London. Jason Aronson Inc. 1998.
Prof. Guðrún Björk Guðsteinsdóttir
The Mother-Daughter Relationship
As Seen in Linda Holeman’s The Raspberry House Blues
Nína Rúna Kvaran
Vorönn 2004
The relationship between mother and daughter is perhaps the most complicated, deep, and sometimes tragic relationship in existence. According to editor Gerd H. Fenchel in her introduction of the book The Mother-Daughter Relationship: Echoes Through Time, the mother-daughter relationship is very different from the mother-son relationship and “ [. . .] in some ways more intense and more awesome” (Fenchel xvi). Why the mother-daughter connection is so popular a subject, especially in literature by women, is a good question that can partly be answered by the fact that all women are their mothers’ daughters and many eventually become the mothers of daughters. Mothers are the most important role models daughters can have and the mother-daughter connection is multi-dimensional, having an immense impact on the entire spectrum of the daughter’s journey into and through womanhood. As I personally see it, women have fundamentally a triangular relationship with their mothers. Firstly, they all want to be different from their mothers and break free from their regime. Secondly, they inevitably compare themselves to their mothers and compete with them, whether it be on a Freudian level with the attention of the father as the goal or simply in the way they compare their lives in general to that of their mothers’. Thirdly, as they eventually develop into womanhood, daughters sometimes become their mothers whether they like it or not. Fenchel further notes that as women go through this process:
Difficulties that arise along the way have consequences concerning how the daughter feels about her body, self-esteem regulations, career choices, and relationship to men (Fenchel xvi).
Raspberry House Blues by Linda Holeman is a book about a teenaged girl’s self-discovery and process of growing up in relation to three prominent but very different mother figures in her life. It is dedicated to Holeman’s own daughter Brenna or as she puts it herself: “For my daughter Brenna, who dyed her hair red while I was dreaming about Poppy.” The reason is probably because the mother-daughter relationship is the main theme, which underlines the whole story, and in this essay the intention is to look a little closer at that particular theme as it is presented in the above-mentioned book.
Raspberry House Blues is a novel for teenagers or young adults. Poppy, the main character, is an adopted child of divorced parents who goes on a mission to discover her birth mother. She has not seen her father in three years and has severe communication problems with her adoptive mother, though not exactly unique amongst mothers and teenaged daughters. She is resentful of her parents’ divorce, of being adopted and of the fact that her mother is trying to start a new life with a new man, a writer named Marcus. Poppy’s obsession is her birth mother. Her favourite hobby is to take pictures from glamorous magazines of women that are tall and red-haired like she is herself, and glue them into her “M Book” (Holeman 6), a scrap book into which she collects these mother figures. After a serious argument, Poppy’s mother Denise decides to go to Greece with her boyfriend for a vacation and Poppy is not invited. She is left in the care of Jan, her mother’s friend. In a tantrum of sorts, Poppy runs away to her father in Winnipeg, determined to find her real mother to whom she has very unrealistic and high hopes of.
The three most important and influential figures in Poppy’s life are three women who all represent a different kind of motherhood to Poppy, each one presenting a part of the triangular mother-daughter experience mentioned above. Firstly, there is Poppy’s own adoptive mother, Denise, who has raised her from infancy and Poppy, in her teenaged immaturity, resents immensely for not being her real mother. Poppy’s behaviour towards her is very cruel and unfair and she repeatedly throws in her face that she not her real mother:
I lowered the book to my lap. “No, you’re not,” I called, not loudly, but loud enough for her to hear. “No, you’re not,” I repeated. “You’re not my real mother. And you never will be.” (Holeman 8)
Denise is the mother figure that Poppy resents, rebels against and wants to break free from. As Poppy leaves without her mother’s permission and settles in her father’s home, she is literarily taking the first step towards womanhood and independence, although one might question whether she is not rather young to be doing so. This behaviour may be seen as symbolic to the Freudian view of maturing daughters needing to make “ [. . .] libidinal connections to the father and -unlike boys -having to overcome the rivalry with the mother” (Fenchel xvi). In Poppy’s case she breaks free from her mother to join her father, but to her horror, realizes that she is not going to be able to enjoy her father by herself since another mother figure has entered the picture.
The second mother figure to come across Poppy’s path is her stepmother, Calypso, whose hippie-vegetarian lifestyle completely disgusts Poppy. Calypso is an object of comparison since Poppy competes with her for her father’s affection. But Calypso does not only offer competition or comparison to Poppy herself but her existence also offers Poppy a new way of looking at her mother Denise in comparison to Calypso. As Poppy accidentally walks in on her stepmother as she is drying her hair, naked in the bathroom, the sight of her huge, pregnant body both serves as a point of revulsion in Poppy’s mind and diverts her thoughts to Denise, her mother:
She’s the total opposite of my mother. In body and mind. I’ve never seen my mother’s body in less than a bathing suit, and I realize now that I’ve never even had a glimpse of her mind (Holeman 115).
One might even interpret Poppy’s disgust of Calypso’s nude and very pregnant body as a sign of her own inner struggle and perhaps resistance to enter the inevitable womanhood that awaits all young girls. Calypso is the ultimate Mother Earth figure and in her huge, pregnant state, with long sleek hair, stretch marks and total lack of bodily shame, she presents a powerful image of proud womanhood.
The third mother figure in Poppy’s life is Becca, the worn-out actress who never made it and Poppy suspects to be her biological mother. In her immaturity, Poppy believes that biological connection is the most important in life as she confesses to Mac, her love interest:
“I’m talking about my real mother, not an adopted one or a stepmother. I’m talking about the connection of blood. The way that connection is so special, so huge that it can make you finally feel that you know who you are.” (Holeman 188)
Becca represents everything that Poppy wants to become. She is a beautiful and sophisticated actress with more then a hint of tragedy around her person, accentuated by her blatantly obvious reference to Tennessee Williams’ most famous, female character, Blanche Dubois from his play A Streetcar Named Desire. Becca even quotes the famous last line of the play and names the small, white kitten Poppy gives her, Blanche. She furthermore flirts with teenager Mac, and seems to share Blanche Dubois notorious affection for the young male.
Becca is almost like a fantasy role model that, as it turns out, is too good to be true. Unlike Calypso, Becca lives in the unrealistic world of a child, with even a governess/mother type (Rakel) to take care of her and very scarce grown-up responsibilities. Poppy’s infatuation with Becca can be interpreted as her own wish to stay eternally away from mature womanhood with all the complication that come along with that, even as she grows up, just like Becca seems to have successfully done. Becca therefore represents the unrealistic mother figure and even self-image Poppy always dreamed of. In her denial, Poppy looks desperately for approval and affirmation from Mac:
I wanted him to tell me that it was the most wonderful thing in the world that I had found my real mother, and that my real home, the one I truly belonged in, was the big beautiful, clean house on Palmerston Avenue (Holeman 189).
Poppy resents her mother Denise’s relatively small (poor) home, Calypso’s jungle of obese cats, bizarre potty training, and chaos and feels she has finally found a sense of belonging in Becca’s sophisticated and richly endowed house. But that illusion comes crashing down on Poppy in the end when she discovers the truth about Becca.
All three women have their own very unique personality and all three of them play a special part in Poppy’s progression from childish selfishness to maturity and young adulthood. Poppy learns by firstly the distance from her mother and secondly the disappointment in others, that Denise, her adoptive mother is of course her real mother, always was and always will be. She is the one that raised her and loved her through all her life and therefore has the biggest claim on Poppy.
From pregnant Calypso, Poppy learns to appreciate a different view of life and a different lifestyle than she is used to. She also learns about responsibility as she lives with Calypso, her father and her two-year-old brother. More importantly, she learns what it means to be a part of a loving family and that the world does not revolve around her. Some problems are far more serious than the ones she has.
From Becca the actress, Poppy learns that things are not always as they might seem and that what we want is not always the best thing for us. Poppy’s disappointment with Becca as the mother image of her fantasies also makes her finally admit to the connection she feels with Denise as she bitterly thinks: “I cried over losing the mother I thought I had, and missing the one I did have” (Holeman 221).
As is so common with literature aimed at teenagers or young adults, the progress of growing up is a major theme in Linda Holeman’s Raspberry House Blues as has been mentioned above. This often takes form in a kind of personal Odyssey where by trial and error the young hero/heroine of the book acquires a new outlook on life and takes the first, delicate steps towards young adulthood, learning how to appreciate what was before taken for granted. Poppy’s journey is no exception from this rule and she certainly is a very changed girl by the end of the novel. The book offers a glimpse into a young girl’s travel to womanhood by way of the opposites of an exciting mystery provided by Becca’s character and very down-to-earth depiction of the modern day complex set of family connections that are the reality of so many children of divorced and remarried parents. All in all, the book offers a deep insight into the complexities of the mother-daughter relations in as beautiful and ugly a form as they can take, brought to the reader through means of a simple and beautiful style of writing.
Bibliography
Holeman, Linda. Raspberry House Blues. Toronto (Canada). Tundra Books.
2000.
Fenchel, Gerd H. Editor. The Mother-Daughter Relationship: Echoes Through
Time. London. Jason Aronson Inc. 1998.
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