Are You My Mother?

Alison Bechdel’s Are You My Mother in fact doesn’t really directly deal with her mother, but the indirect or super direct relationship that she houses between herself and her mother. Yes, this is (or can be) a pretty obvious result of childhood, which Bechdel explains: persons act according to the relationship that they have with their parents, and the way that their parents act around them during developmental years. However, Bechdel explores this idea (and herself) through multiple child development theorists, particularly Donald Winnicott, as well as the psychoanalysts that she sees throughout her life.

I find it so interesting that Bechdel rarely speaks directly of or about her mother, but rather refers to her through her own person or through some sort of literary text. I would say that this memoir is divided into a few different facets, which include autobiography, literary analysis, and transcription. The only time that we as readers really see Bechdel’s mother outside of a phone conversation is through a recollection of plays that her mother had been in, all through the perspective of Alison (clearly, this is a memoir, right?). Bechdel even admits to the constant transcribing of the conversations she and her mother have on the phone—I wonder if we really get a sense of their relationship through these interactions (10-11), or if the transcriptions are written with the tone that Alison perceives. This sort of transcription can be seen in Bechdel’s other works, such as Fun Home, the memoir she wrote about her father. Bechdel’s journal that she begins to keep as a child also takes on the form of some sort of transcription—could this also be the way that she writes about the conversations that she has with her mother?

On another note, it seems that Bechdel is really writing about herself in this memoir. The pretty apparent referral to Winnicott (almost every page) points me to think that the mirroring effect that he describes (231 is the closest page that I could find… I think it’s initially brought up before this) is incredibly particular to the way the Bechdel feels about the relationship she has with her mother, as well as herself as a “being.” In fact, the entirety of Chapter 6 is entitled “Mirror” and we as readers encounter Bechdel reckoning with the mirror that she may be making to her mother, whether that is the reverse or the actual mimicking (also, how can we relate mirroring someone or something to mimicking someone or something? Does mirror always necessarily mean the opposite or counterpart? And does mimicking always mean acting the exact same as someone or something? Hm…)

Really, I think that a discussion around the word “cathect” and its subsidiary counterparts is important in exploring this memoir… how can it be applied to the thing as a whole, or is it only applied to the relationship at hand? In relationship to the form of the graphic memoir, can the term be applied? The beginning-each-chapter-with-a-dream thing really caught my attention, and more often than not Bechdel closed each chapter with something similar—black pages, instead of white, created this crazy dreamy or not-of-this-world space. While the word cathect claims an investment of mental or emotional energy into a person, object, or idea, can the physical manifestation of this memoir be considered in the same space or definition?

So much to think about!