The Willoughbys

As the story approaches its climax, Lowry continues to play with various literary conventions, reinforcing them or inverting them at will in order to poke fun at certain clichés and tropes while crafting a more serious examination of such trends in literature over the years. Much of this critique remains implicit, as when the nanny and the children go for a walk, thereby inadvertently allowing the house to be sold in their absence. However, the very same walk leads them to hear the laughing Ruth in Mr. Melanoff’s yard, and this encounter precipitates the eventual familial relationship that will develop among them. Thus, this intersection and the change it provokes indicate a break from the characters’ usual clichéd lives, especially when they experience a change that runs counter to their expectations. Upon learning that the house has been sold, they conclude: “Terrible things always happen when one is out for a walk. Remember Little Red Riding Hood? And, oh dear, Hansel and Gretel?” (96). However, rather than encountering more difficulty, they find a man who eventually becomes their new family. Thus, the children finally have new experiences that allow them to gain a new perspective and work on Learning from Significant Mistakes.

While the novel takes on a particularly callous tone when it comes to the safety and well-being of Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby, Lowry is careful to rationalize this dynamic by pulling in many hyperbolic details to emphasize just how morally bankrupt the couple really is. This implicit judgment of the narrative is further reinforced by the children’s unconventional and rebellious nanny, who finally admits aloud that she would be glad if the Willoughby parents were to die because their deaths would benefit everyone. Along with the children, the nanny embraces a more ambiguous form of morality and believes that some people do deserve such harsh revenge. The nanny also tells the children that their parents labeled them irritating, repetitive, and greedy and forgot that Jane existed at all. Hearing this further solidifies the children’s knowledge that their parents truly do not love them, and any last shred of guilt about Mr. and Mrs. Willoughby’s ultimate fate is erased from their minds. In this way, Lowry creates a rather farcical version of The Impact of Parental Neglect and Abuse in order to impart a far more serious lesson, for the narrative implies that abused and neglected children owe nothing to their parents in the long term. The underlying message of this passage is somewhat softened by the fact that the Willoughby parents have never shown themselves to be particularly intelligent; likewise, when they travel to the Alps to climb a mountain with crampons on their heads, the true extent of their lack of intellect makes it clear that their own folly would eventually have led them to an unpleasant end, regardless of their children’s encouragement to take a dangerous vacation. Thus, the narrative demonstrates that the Willoughby parents are fully autonomous and are therefore fully responsible for their ill-fated decision to climb a mountain on their own.

In the midst of the primary plotline, Lowry also takes the time to develop a creative subplot around the fate of Mr. Melanoff’s wife and son, who are alive and well, as is implied by the continuous letters that keep arriving at his door. Ironically, Mr. Melanoff’s situation somewhat mirrors that of the children, for his wife’s personality is one-dimensional and her traits deeply exaggerated; this becomes evident when she coldly dismisses her husband and straightens the postmaster’s letters for him, courting a new relationship. Her actual behavior stands as a stark contrast to Mr. Melanoff’s memories of his wife, for he always saw her as a strong opposite to his more creative and chaotic nature. While Ms. Melanoff and her son appear only intermittently, Lowry generously foreshadows the boy’s return in search of his father, for he is very similar to Mr. Melanoff in temperament, and the older he gets, the more obvious this fact becomes to his mother. Thus, this particular family demonstrates a different form of The Impact of Parental Neglect and Abuse. Because Mr. Melanoff’s son does not fit in with his mother’s new life in Switzerland, he senses that he is unwelcome and responds by refusing to learn the language or embrace this unwanted new lifestyle. When his mother marries the postmaster, her decision represents the final step in rendering her own son irrelevant in her life, and she soon sends him away. Like the Willoughbys, Barnaby Melanoff is neglected by his mother, but unlike them, he does have vague memories of being loved by his father: a fact that foreshadows the novel’s “happily ever after” conclusion.