Townie

Savannah Szymanski

Professor Conway

Freshman Honors Seminar

17 November 2014

Townie

            Within the memoir Townie by Andre Dubus III, Dubus’s life as a teenager is vividly described as he grows up in Haverhill, Massachusetts. Dubus’s life at the start of the memoir is uprooted as his family moves from Iowa City to Haverhill, Massachusetts, which is exhibited as a large shift in settings. As if the move from a Midwest City to an industrial ton along the east coast does not already have enough of an impact on an adolescent’s mindset, Dubus is even more distraught by his parents’ divorce when he was ten years old, shortly after the cross country move. Dubus’s memoir displays the negative emotions that accompany dramatic changes in one’s adolescent life, especially while growing up on the lower economic side of an underprivileged town. The result aggression and emotional troubles that are seen through Dubus’s mindset and actions as a teenager can be traced back to his emotional trauma as a child and inability to properly overcome his obstacles until later in his life.

            Any child troubled with the unfortunate penalties of their parents’ divorce is likely to suffer some sort of emotional distress, however these consequences are further maximized by a split devotion to each parent mixed with conflicted resentment. Dubus’s parents announced their separation and divorce after his father left when he was ten and once their marital problems extended beyond disagreements and arguments when they became conflicts resulting from infidelity. Dubus’s father, whose former military profession is turned to being a professor at this point in the novel, is unfaithful in his marriage to Dubus’s mother which not only ends their marriage together with four children, but also creates a large separation between Dubus and his father. Dubus rarely sees his father throughout his teenage years, resulting in a lack of guidance as he endures the troubles of overcoming the various obstacles in front of him while becoming an adult. Being the oldest son of four children, with his sister Susan being the only sibling older than him, Dubus felt a large drive to remain strong throughout his parents’ divorce in order to help his mother and siblings deal with the massive shift in their lives.

            Dubus and his siblings saw their father only a few times each month and on special occasions, meanwhile they barely saw their mother as she worked all day every day in order to keep their house and her children fed. With only a minimal amount of child support money being supplied by Dubus’s father, Dubus and his family were forced to remain in lowest class part of Haverhill where they struggled to stay afloat. In addition to being financially unstable, Dubus also lived in a drug infested portion of his town that had a massive problem with violence and crime. Growing up in this area without any guidance to raise him and his siblings, Dubus had an extremely rough time fighting through the circumstances he was dealt, where for large periods of time he relied on drug use, violence, and fighting back at the man throughout his teenage years. Dubus’s memoir displays the impacts of a poverty stricken town on the up and coming generation that live within it especially when the youth of these generations face other issues, in Dubus’s case these issues include family and financial troubles mixed with exposure too drugs and violence.

            Despite the emotional conflicts and dysfunctional mindset that accompanies his life growing up in Haverhill, Dubus tells an inspirational tale as he develops his skill of writing in order to reshape his life and overcome the hindrances he faces while moving from a teenager to an adult.  Within the memoir, as Dubus ages he develops a strong motivation to leave his life of teenage crime and former rebellious disposition behind in order to attend the college his father teaches at and improve his education beyond the Haverhill academic system. Dubus quickly learns upon his arrival to his new school that his exposure the world is minimal compared to those around him, however he continues to push through his intellectual and emotional dilemmas in order to improve his education while simultaneously developing a somewhat better relationship with his father. Dubus defies the steadfast obstacles that were presented against him from childhood all the way until he became an adult that seems near to impossible given the circumstances he faces throughout the memoir, therefore proving an inspiration to readers and others who are faced with similar and equally troubling conflicts.