Author: Heidi Tiedemann Darroch
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“Turn Back, Turn Back, You Young Bride”: Grim/m Stories of Murderous Husbands
The most common trope of one strand of domestic thriller is the murderous spouse, nearly always a husband. In a milder version of the story, he’s merely untrustworthy: a liar, a con man, a bigamist (arguably, Jane Eyre‘s Rochester is all three). But from Hitchcock’s Suspicion to the gaslighting husband of The Girl on the…
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“The Beating of a Child Was By No Means Reprehensible”: Alice Munro, Freud, and the Long Aftermath of Crimes Against Children
A question from a student about Munro’s Who Do You Think You Are? (the question being whether it’s autobiographical) sent me back to her terrifying story “Royal Beatings” this morning. Then an interview that I read recently had me searching for Freud’s “A Child Is Being Beaten.” This will become a longer critical piece. Just…
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Epistolary Mysteries
I am a woman of letters: I love writing and receiving long, newsy missives filled with gossip, tales of professional rivalries and triumphs, and ideas for the various big projects and life events that friends are contemplating. Alas, no one sends me long letters anymore. My mail is bills, bold political pleas for support, and…
