Analysis Of Kate Taylor's Serial Monogamy

Storytelling’s impact on people who use it has been life saving in certain cases. By asserting the existence of different perspectives, writers get to suppress their own opinions in order to sympathize with others. (insert thing about meta-fiction) With this idea in mind, author Kate Taylor wrote the novel Serial Monogamy, a meta-fiction of a writer recalling the story of her husband’s affair and her deal with terminal breast cancer, all through her telling of Dickens’ secret life and tales of the Arabian Nights. In Serial Monogamy, storytelling makes people more understanding as they explore new perspectives. Sharon, through her telling of Nelly’s story, gets to understand the mistress’ perspective. By trying to see how a mistress might …show more content…

At first, Sharon tries to see life from his perspective with his childhood background when he used to live in Tehran. When Al was young, “In this happy, balanced world, [he] was the neighbourhood marble king” (313). This passage is relevant because it shows how Al felt as a kid. Sharon tries to understand her husband’s dreams, fears and feelings through the way he was brought up in his natal country. By imagining him as a king, the narrator understands how Al has always felt like he deserved an important place in this world. Moreover, Sharon understands more Al’s need for power as he resembles Dickens a lot when it comes to love relationships. The two adulterous husbands are admired by their younger mistresses, as we can see with Shay’s image of Al: “she also assumed her inspiring supervisor, blessed in every aspect of life, must be happily married too” (168). This quote shows how both Nelly and Al’s mistresses were younger women who admired the two men, which is exactly what Al and Dickens must have been looking for in the affairs: a sense of power, importance. By giving Dickens his place in her story, Sharon is accepting that even in every great man, there is a portion of humanity. Finally, Al and the prince in the Arabian nights’ story told in the book share the same charming, confident, and arrogant traits. Sharon’s telling of “The …show more content…

In fact, the main character is even aware of her change of character when it comes to being a writer. When recalling how her writer side would have attempted to understand the contradictory opinion of her editor Jonathan, Sharon states that “sometimes [she] think[s] the novelist is [her] better self, interested, understanding, wanting to know more” (277). (add explanation) Also, a comparison between Sharon and Scheherazade as storytellers can be made, demonstrating the importance of storytelling for both women. In the final part of Serial Monogamy, Hope expresses to the two daughters Sharon’s heritage: “if people ask where you came from, tell them your father was a prince of Persia and your mother a storyteller from Samarkand. And no one could ever really say which one seduced the other” (341). The fact that Hope was able to see Sharon as her best self shows how the storytelling characterized the writer so much that she became one with the Scheherazade from Arabian nights. Just like the famous storyteller, Sharon was able to grow with storytelling and made it part of her heritage. Through the telling of her own story, Sharon is able to accept her situation enough so that she can share her texts with her daughters without any bad intentions. At the very beginning of the book, Sharon emotionally expresses her final feelings toward Al and Hope for her daughters to read: “Please don’t think I wrote