“The Patron Saint of Liars” by Ann Patchett (post 2): Rose reports a memory gap for her first wedding

I have just finished the first 130-page section of this novel, which is narrated by Rose, the married, pregnant young woman, who, in the previous post, was noted to have temporarily forgotten how to drive a car.

Now, at the end of her section of the novel, Rose has another temporary mental disturbance. She wanders out into freezing, snowy weather, inadequately clothed, and is saved from hypothermia and frostbite by the handyman of the home for unwed mothers where she has been staying (still pregnant). She then insists on marrying the handyman later that same day.

Rose’s wandering into freezing weather is regarded as due to temporary insanity, and her insistence on marrying the handyman that same day as amazing impulsiveness. She even admits she doesn’t love the handyman, any more than she loves her husband, to whom she is still legally married.

A rave review of this novel noted its illogic, but called it an endearing fairy tale. https://www.nytimes.com/1992/07/26/books/a-sense-of-the-miraculous.html

Actually, there is a way to explain Rose’s behavior, because she has a memory gap, a cardinal symptom of multiple personality. On her way to getting married that evening, she says: “I was getting married. I tried to remember something about my first wedding, but I couldn’t, not even the dress I wore” (1, p. 136).

Later, during the marriage ceremony, she does find that some of the words are familiar—“Dearly beloved. Honor and obey” etc.—but that is all. In short, she has a memory gap for most of a major event in her life—her first wedding—which (like her temporarily forgetting how to drive) suggests the presence of separate memory banks in alternate personalities.

1. Ann Patchett. The Patron Saint of Liars [1992]. New York, Mariner/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011.