Fifth Business Group

Question:

afterburn
afterburn
Student
Graduate School

In the novel Fifth Business, what may one's opinions be about Mary Dempster? Is she crazy? Is she a modern day woman? etc.

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Posted by afterburn on Friday July 4, 2008 at 5:11 AM and tagged with characters, fifth business, mrs dempster.

Answers:

  1. rachhhhael
    rachhhhael Student
    High School - 11th Grade

    well in the book the town people refer to her as "simple"

    however this was before the gravel pit inncident.

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    Posted by rachhhhael on Wednesday October 15, 2008 at 1:04 PM


  2. danylyshen Teacher
    High School - 12th Grade

    eNotes Editor

    If we interpret Mary Dempster along Jungian archetypes, we see her in various roles and see her as a dynamic character who changes as much as Dunny does in the novel since she is arguably, one of the active agents for change in Dunny's life. Firstly, she is the mother figure, brining forth a weakened child into the world. She then becomes a type of a saviour figure, not only because of her appearance to Dunny as he crawls through the mud in WWI, but also because she gave of herself unselfishly to the drifter in the gravepit. After this incident she is not crazy, but distracted. She becomes the jungian outcast in the novel since the small town mentality cannot accept why she would ever prostate herself to a drifter. Mary becomes other things through the novel. This is just a start. The point is that Mary Dempster cannot be dealt with so tritely. She fills a complicated function in the novel so we should have many opinions about her. 

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    Posted by danylyshen on Wednesday November 26, 2008 at 8:38 AM