The Stoat by Aditi Prasad

Summary: 

• The story takes place near Strandhill, a coastal village in Co. Sligo, Ireland, where a widowed teacher vacations with his son. 
• When the son is out golfing he stumbles upon a dying rabbit, that had been hunted down by a stoat
• The stoat lithers away but the boy in an act of mercy kills the rabbit and takes it with him, all the while being followed by the stoat.
• The boy takes the rabbit to the father whom doubts whether their evening guest Miss McCabe would enjoy the rabbit
• It then goes into a memory, a flashback as the boy remembers how the father asked for his sons approval to remarry and sent out ads to widowed women who seeked companionship with him. The father, riducled for searching still had many people replying to the ad.
• During this time the son had gotten closer to the uncle and was planning to live with him instead of the father as he found him dull and his uncle’s ideology and moral better.
• Skipping then to the son and MsMcCabe meeting which despite not going very smoothly, ended with the son liking Miss McCabe and approving the marriage- which he claims he would have even if he had not liked her
• Miss McCabe had rheumatism and the sons father needed a walking stick. Though old they seeked companionship from another but that very next day, after the dinner they had with the rabbit, Miss McCabe had a mild heat attack in the salt baths.
• The father, now revealed to be an escapist just like his son, immediately packs his things to leave a he doesnt want to suffer the pain and loss of lossing another women in his life. The son wanting to leave his boring life with his father takes the chance to leave for his uncle’s.
• The story ends with a passage how parenting is a complicated activity and in a way suggests the father in the story had come short in teaching his son to actively and properly pursue the challenges and pain in life.
• In the end the stoat killing the rabbit is an allegory of life. The stoat is death, and the rabbit is the people. You can try to escape death but it will continue to pursue you until there is no other end then death.

Stoat-a small carnivorous weasel

• Inhumanity of taking life
  • Sparse physical description of the student serves to magnify the act of the killing by drawing all the attention to it. He was simply a “long-legged student in a turtleneck” 
  • The cruelty, indifference, lack of remorse, desensitisation and the almost sadistic pleasure of taking the little rabbits life are highlighted by the grotesque images having seemingly no effect on the boy. The poor rabbit was in “pure terror” and his “body (was) trembling in a rigidity off terror” “heat hammer(ing)” yet the boy simply “killed it with one stroke”- no remorse or compassion in his actions.
  • The contrast of the emotions felt by the rabbit and the man, or the lack of it, this juxtaposition once again brings out the cruelty of the killing act and also the pain the rabbit suffers. No internal dialouges are given of the man but the readers can easily decipher the terrorised and traumatised emotions and thoughts of the rabbit. Thus ironically it is the human that is emotionless, giving the rabbit a human-like quality. This highlight further the theme of inhumanity of the life taking.
  • The boy being more concerned with the game the life he took shows how to him it was an insignificant death. Adds on to the idea he has no humanity when rather being saddened by the death of the rabbit he was saddened over the fact that the killing had made him “lose his concentration” of the game.
  • Relates to uncles philosophy of taking for yourself, being selfish to fulfill your own desires. It is instinctive and it is raw. Just like the stoat taking the life. It is very primitive and not like the higher thinking. Its unhumane. “Life has no purpose other than to reproduce itself”

• Stoat–
  • “Slithered like a snake” – it has sneaky, cunning, slithery connotations. Reminds reader of the tale of Adam and Eve and their sly encounter with the snake. Biblical connotation emphasizes the manipulation of the human.  A Simile is used here
  • It feels ownership to the prey as it continued to “(follow) the rabbit still” and even “twice glimpsed the stoat behind him.” The primitive scene of prey vs predator is further emphasized by the jungle setting of the story. 
  • The stoat acts as a leitmotif for death. The stoat “marks down” his prey and like death it is unescapable.

• Prey and Predator or Food chain
  • The intense detailed description- aural, visual, tactile images- portraying sorrow and anguish bring out the relations. Of the chase.
  • The act of the human stealing the prey portrays the human supremacy as at the top of the food chain. – “He took the rabbit down with him”
  • The wildness of the setting compliments the theme of the food chain hierarchy in the wild. “Long grass” , “water from the inlet”, “Calm sea” , “couarse tussocks” , “green to the tee”

• Animalistic nature of events
  • The wildness of the setting compliments the theme of the food chain hierarchy in the wild and in a strange way emphasizes the savagery and brazenness of the attack
  • The stouts possessiveness of the prey shows primitiveness of the situation. “Would not be deflected” shows how focused the stout was. “Marked down” his prey.
  • The stout  plays around with its prey this is cruel and highlights the inevitability of the rabbits death. Making its attempts to survive bleak, it’s almost like the rabbit understands this too as it stops running and simply awaits its death.
  • The sentence length of the chase brings out the inevitability of the death. Although the chase was long (like the sentence) the end was short for the rabbit, too short.  
  • The stout casual and sadistically playful attitude bring out the inevitability of its death due to the juxtaposition of the animals attitudes to imminent death.
  • The parallel of the deaths of human and the rabbit – the stoat being a motif for death – proves death is the only constant, this primal and raw insight thus has an animalistic undercurrent bringing out this prevelant theme.

• Old Age and importance of companionship 

1. The father yearns for a connection with his son, and unsuccessful he moves on to look in the ‘newspaper’ for a women to spend his last years with.
2. “hiding behind the copy” wants to hide from societies glare. He’s self conscious 
3. It’s hard to find someone he likes “both personality and appearance” 
4. Formal language “applicant” “interviewing” brings out emotionlessness of marriage.
5. The uncle realises that life is monotonous and repetitive. That if you don’t do what you love than it isn’t worth it. Thus, though uncle is wise he doesn’t empathise with his brother over him trying to find companionship and some happiness with someone else.  “life seems to have no purpose… and not be in error” We see that uncle feels to live this life as fulfilling your life and happiness. This is selfish. Thus the strained relationship between son and father helps him, it’s good for him. 

• Uncle
  • Common populist who sees an old man looking for a companion as funny. He doesn’t feel empathy for his brother. He mocks him for it
  • The relationship is strained with brother which probably pushed the father to look for someone. The fathers familial ties are broken.
  • Paradox brings out the irony of people not thinking that old people are lonely and are looking for companionship. As people actually replies to the newspaper. It’s ludicrous he got replies at all. 
  • Setting when the two go for a “long walk” “after dinner” – here of beautiful and soft nature show the nature of the relationship between son and uncle. Blossoming gently but clearly.
  • The fact that the son chooses to become a doctor like his surgeon uncle, going against his fathers wishes of becoming a banker shows their increasing closesness and also the reason of the distance the father has with his uncle.

Uncle is boastful, arrogant- “bigwig”

He doesn’t try to make himself bigger and move onto a new city to be bigger rather than in the “small town”

• Competition 

There is a childish rivalry between father and uncle. There is competition between them over the favour of the son.

Stoat against the human.

There is no compromising by either side. 

• Father and son

Can’t relate together cause son is pragmatic but father is sentimental – Seen when his father talks about the cook.

Doesn’t want to get into this emotional conversation with him. 

“unconscious” described the father – the son – unaware, irrationality, emotional.

“anxious for his approval” father cares what son thinks. Wants him to like and be part of the family. 

Embarrassed of fathers facade with the woman and he doesn’t care how it would impact him he just wants be distanced from this uncomfortable position. 

Elipses ‘…’ shows hesitation of the father he desperately want his approval.

“Complicated activity” – by recalling the uncles words indicates the boy blames the father for how he is now. Emotionally repressive and escapist of all and any situations that make him uncomfortable.

• Miss McCabe 

Dull, ordinary, not flashy, simple, sickly

That’s why she sees something in the father they both aren’t gaudy 

Has rheumatism

• Escapist 
  • The Son is an escapist and so is the father. “The stoat the father had glimpsed in Miss McCabe’s hotel room” – death/suffering – “he was running” away from. This can be paralleled with the rabbit and the stoat. The rabbit were the humans, the old people, whom were trying to outrun death, the stoat.  By ending the story with the same excert that had described the long-winded chase and the agonising death of the rabbit the author highlights the fact that death is constant and the only inevitable end for all living beings. Giving this story a disturbing and existential moral.
  • “They were all running” – the son is about to become a fully qualified doctor and is now going to move out from his father and live independently thus the end of their relationship. The son longs for the end of this relationhip because despite feeling “guilty” about it, the father bores him.thus no matter how long we may prolong it relationhips run its course and must end eventually at some point.