Rikke Juelsgaard Petersen                Til d. 22. oktober ’08.

Engelsk aflevering                3e, EG

The Dress

Sometimes a dress is not just a dress, and sometimes it is all that is needed to take a family over the edge. The short-story “The Dress” by Julia Darling takes on the task to try and explain the complex structure of a family with an emotional build-up like a pressure-cooker that at some point has to let off steam.

When girls borrow each others’ things it is usually not a big deal - take my hat, want to try my new lipstick, here’s my new shoes - but nobody likes it when their things get taken from them, get stolen, when you are forced to unwillingly let other people use your stuff, because you cannot stop them, and especially when the thief is someone you by nature consider your biggest rival - your sister. In the short-story the teenage girl Rachel experiences this type of feeling, this frustration of not being able to do anything and not being able to unleash her feelings on the person responsible - her sister Flora, who has stolen her beautiful new dress, who daringly and unapologetic has taken a possession though very well knowing that it is strictly off-limits. Rachel reacts the way many people probably would when their line has been crossed, and when their personal belongings have been besuddled by an “outsider” - she goes berserk, throwing things about in her sister’s room though knowing that the dress will not be there, screams “FLORA!” in the empty house and imagines her sister wearing her dress looking beautiful and chik in a café. These images, though not knowing if they are true or not, infuses her already heated temper and makes the emotions build up inside her. You could say that she swallows her rage, which slowly builds up to a more intense bundle of emotion because it is not acted out.

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Flora on the other hand knows that the act of stealing the dress is wrong, knows that she is not allowed to touch the dress, but does it anyway when she in an unguarded moment is left alone with it. In the beginning it was not her intend to steal the dress, but just touch it, wanting the glamour and confidence of her sister, whom she calls “taller, braver, cleverer” to rub off on her, but eventually she becomes braver, trying on the dress and justifying the act by comments like “…the dress was meant for her, not Rachel” and ...

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