Do Not Disturb Response to Literature

Jenna Wilhelmi

9/20/10

Response 1

The Anchor Book of

New American Short Stories

Do Not Disturb

Do Not Disturb made me think about how people are losing the ability to empathize and I am talking about the wife in this story. People seem to think that if someone is not feeling the same pain as them that automatically makes others’ pain less important or easier to bear. As humans, we are constantly trying to win arguments, which includes the game of ‘I’m sicker than you, so I deserve all the pity.’ Even though this is a game you probably don’t want to win, we still can’t stand the thought of losing. I believe that when one person in a relationship is afflicted with illness, both parties are affected. Perhaps the husband’s back pain was his way of empathizing with his wife. He seemed to know that she liked to be the strong one and so he became weak to try and compensate. I also think he may have been trying to regain his part as the ‘victim’ or ‘submissive’ one in the relationship. Some people seem to only be able to play the role they are type cast for.

This story also reminded me of a couple of other things I have seen. One is a short film I saw a while back called ‘The Spine’ by Chris Landreth. In it the husband of a similarly abusive wife literally lost his spine. In the film, peoples’ emotional damage manifested physically. Reading about what happened to the husband at the end of the story reminded me of that immensely. It leads me to believe that the husband’s back pain was real, but that it was due to psychological damage, almost as though he was trying to punish himself for even thinking about leaving his wife.

Subsequently, there was another short story I read a few weeks ago that also tied me to this story. Well, actually it was a one shot comic book. The one shot series is called Demo and it is written by Brian Wood and illustrated by Becky Cloonan. The issue I’m referring to was called Sad and Beautiful World. It was about a couple that fought constantly like the one in Do Not Disturb, but if they left each other or got too far apart in general, wounds would start to appear all over their bodies and this would not stop until they were in each other’s arms again. Do Not Disturb’s relationship is in the same vein. Sometimes the person you hate and who drives you crazy is the one person that you really need in order to live.

Some relationships don’t make sense to me, such as this one. However, they seem to make sense to the people who are in them. It seems as though everyone can’t have the stereotypical fairytale relationship, but that they will instead seek out one that makes sense to them.

So how does this story apply to the word literature? When I think of literature I think o four things: One, it is usually taught in some level of schooling. Two, it makes you think - this is not beach reading. Three, it usually shows some horrid aspect of society. Four, it makes you feel some strong emotion, be that good or bad. In this case, Do Not Disturb, hit the mark on on four of these. Obviously, as stated above, this story made me think quite a bit about the conventions of relationships. In turn, it also show some horrid aspect of society when it made me feel as though people are losing the ability to empathize. Though, I must say that the author showed abusive relationships in a rather comical way. It was hard to figure out whether to be saddened or to laugh. All in all, I would consider it literature based on my criteria, but isn't literature an outdated word? Who says what is worthy of this fancy title or not? Literature is what you make of it, be it bad, good, confusing, infuriating, so-so, adventurous, or depressing.