Live Like a Dog, Alone
The text “Live Like a Dog, Alone” by Fay Weldon, is about the cheerful, lonely and self-assured lady, Miriam at the age of 55.
She has a stressful job, which has turned her in to a regular at the Casualty because of her heart. She has been married once and been voted Businesswoman of the Year. Many things has happened to her through out her life, and as we read the text we got to know her and her inner thoughts as she tells her story to a minicab driver.
The story is characterized by dialogs and long passages where we are following Miriam’s thoughts. We have inner sights at her as well and get to know her feelings and experiences.
The persons in the story are Miriam as the main character, and a minicab driver from Kosovo.
She tries to inspire him to look at his life in another way just like she does not to feel alone and to be strong. As they talk, she noticed that his hair is greasy; his shirt is cheap and awful. His accent wasn’t quite right, and he made her uncomfortable when he constantly drove through the red lights. She reached a point where she had had enough, she got irritated. She wanted to yell to him that he just needed to take a shower, wash his hair and clip his nails, but then she thought “A minicab driver is a minicab driver.” (p. 3 ll.22-23) as she mentions in the following line “You can’t let them into your life though a lot of them will try” (p. 3 ll. 23-24) she’s scared to. Her husband left her and she’s now scared that if she lets anyone else in, they might do the same thing.
When her husband left her, he took all the money but she had decided to come out strong and started her own nursing agency and had been voted the Businesswoman of the Year. Then she was all out of sudden wealthy, and the ex-husband demanded alimony and took her to court, but she thought that it was about time for the gender equality to breakthrough. She paid him off.
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In the end right befor they reaches her house they have...