Anything Is Possible discussion

Overall Reaction
I thought the book was very sad and melancholy, which seemed to be the intent of the author, Elizabeth Strout. To be quite honest, I believed the book to be a bit dull and monotonous as each of the nine short stories includes a main character who lives a significantly flawed life as a result of their harsh past. However, I get the sense that if I was able to relate to the main characters, the short stories would become immensely more interesting. I do believe that Elizabeth Strout wrote Anything is Possible with the hope that her readers would be able to relate to the main characters, so other readers may have a different opinion of the book.
Character Development
Since Anything is Possible is a novel consisting of nine short stories, there are many different main characters. Yet, Strout finds a way to demonstrate some level of development in many of the characters. For example, Tommy Guptill, a janitor at a small school in a nearby town, is perceived as very calm and sympathetic, even when he is told that his farm was burned down by Pete’s father intentionally. However, as he begins to contemplate what Pete had just told him, he is filled with doubt as he no longer believes that the fire was a sign of God. Another example of character development is when Patty Nicely, a widow who is at first constantly searching for compassion and sympathy, eventually reads Lucy Barton’s memoir and feels that she is finally understood. Shortly after, Patty goes to the person she had once loved and they sit in companionable silence, still being able to understand each other without saying a single word. A third example of character development is when Angelina, the favorite daughter of a mother named Mary, had refused to visit or forgive her mother for leaving the family, however, she eventually decides to visit Mary and indicates that she may forgive her mother after she sees her kindness and grace towards others. Strout is creative in the way that some of her characters develop for the better, and some of her characters plunge into a worst state.
Central Conflict
Although the book has nine different short stories, they all share one specific conflict, which is the main character’s past invading their lives. Therefore, this is a conflict of man vs. past. In each of the short stories, the main character’s past plays a detrimental role on how the character behaves throughout the short story. Charlie Macauley is the best example of someone whos past negatively influenced their life as he falls in love with a prostitute, who takes advantage of him, because he was feeling pain from something he had done in a war and in his past, which had darkened his soul. Charlie ends up taking his wife’s money and giving the prostitute ten thousand dollars as he awaits the pain that he is anticipating to come. All of this, because of what he had done in the past.
Themes
For this book, the title itself is the main theme: anything is possible. The main characters from each of the short stories all came from humble beginnings. Many of the characters were poor and did not have loving parents to support them, and none of them started off on the road to success. However, Strout indicates that anything is possible when she reveals that all of the main characters, who did not seem to have a promising future, did eventually find success in their own way. Every short story included in the book related and built up to produce the main theme: anything is possible.
Symbols, motifs, and other literary devices
Throughout the novel, Strout does a great job incorporating many symbols and motifs, one of the symbols being the wind turbines observed by Patty, which represents all of the main character’s relationship with each other. This is demonstrated by how the turbines always spin at a consistent speed and are not synchronized, which emphasizes that although each character is in a different stage of life (unsynchronized turbines), all of the characters share the experience of being in a difficult situation in life (consistent speed). Another symbol is the toy horse, which symbolizes that anything is possible as the toy horse was the reason that Abel went back into the theater and ended up making a friend while suffering from a heart attack. Abel discovers that anything is possible when he realizes that he made a friend at a very difficult time, which would not have happened if Abel’s granddaughter did not leave her toy horse in the theater. One motif that played a role in each of the short stories is love. There was always a factor of love that played a role in the short stories, so the power of love is emphasized. Based on the short stories, love is clearly a very powerful force.
Meaningful Quotes
“This was many years ago now, but at night Tommy still sometimes woke with the fear that he had felt the night his dairy farm burned to the ground as well; the wind had sent sparks onto the house, which was not far from the barns…. They lost everything, except for the brass frame to the living room mirror, which he came upon in the rubble the next day, and he left it where it was” (Strout 3).
Here, Strout reveals the dramatic event that occured in Tommy’s past. Throughout the novel, Strout uses the negative events from the main character’s past to play a pernicious role, affecting the character’s life as he or she ruminates on the past. This is just one pattern that went on throughout the novel.
“He opened his eyes, and yes, there it was, the perfect knowledge: Anything was possible for anyone” (Strout 254).
Here, the main theme of the novel is suggested, and the theme is emphasized as Strout makes this sentence the last sentence of the novel. The main character in the last short story, Abel Blaine, discovers the ultimate lesson that Strout is trying to teach, just as he is dying from a heart attack. Strout does not need to include the last words, “for anyone,” but she includes them to stress that not only is anything possible, but anything is possible for anyone.
Critique the Book
Personally, I would not likely recommend Anything is Possible to very many people, although, if I think that a person I know would relate well to the characters, then I might consider telling them about the book. I strongly believe that Anything is Possible is the type of novel where the reader will get the most out of the book if they are able to relate to the main characters. For me, the novel was repetitive and confusing, therefore, I will refrain from recommending the book to others.