27 pages • 54 minutes read
Andre Dubus IIThe Fat Girl
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1977A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Background
Authorial Context: Andre Dubus
Content Warning: This section discusses disordered eating.
Dubus was an American short story and essay writer who was born in Lake Charles, Louisiana, in 1936. Dubus was from a family of Cajun and Irish Catholic heritage and grew up in Lafayette. He graduated from McNeese State College in 1958 with a degree in journalism and English. After spending six years in the marines, he married and had four children. He then moved with his family to Iowa to attend the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and earn a master’s degree in creative writing. The Dubus family afterward moved to Haverhill, Massachusetts, so Dubus could become a professor at Bradford College. He ended up getting divorced and remarrying twice, having a total of six children. He died in 1999 in Massachusetts.
Dubus had depression as well as other medical problems, especially after a car accident in 1986 necessitated that his leg be amputated and he transition to using a wheelchair. Dubus wrote one novel, but he primarily focused on short stories and essays, which he published in literary magazines and in collections of his own work. His books include The Lieutenant (1967), Separate Flights (1975), Adultery and Other Choices (1977), Finding a Girl in America (1980), The Times Are Never So Bad (1983), Voices from the Moon (1984), The Last Worthless Evening (1986), Selected Stories (1988), Broken Vessels (1991), Dancing After Hours (1996), and Meditations from a Movable Chair (1998). His son, Andre Dubus III, is now also an author, and several writing awards have been named after Andre Dubus II.
Socio-Historical Context: Eating Disorders in the 1970s
Although “The Fat Girl” does not diagnose Louise with a specific eating disorder, she and other characters exhibit symptoms of eating disorders and related issues. Although eating disorders have existed for thousands of years, the medical community only began to document them at length in the late 19th and early 20th century, and understanding lagged several decades behind. At the time the story takes place, information about eating disorders was therefore limited, and their causes and treatments were still largely undiscovered. This could contribute to Louise’s friends’ lack of awareness about her problems; these problems may not be on their radar, or, like Carrie, Louise’s friends might have similar problems themselves.
During the 1970s, there was an increase in cases of eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia in the United States, making Dubus’s story timely. Despite growing awareness of eating disorders, the culture was also shifting to value thin forms over thick ones, thanks in part to the usage of thin models in film, media, and advertisements. Louise’s mother has internalized this attitude, believing that Louise must be thin to appeal to men. The emphasis on slimness is also evident in how normalized weight loss culture is in the story, where most people seem pleased when Louise loses weight, even though she also starts smoking. Although it was known by the 1970s that smoking caused health problems, it was still much more commonplace and socially accepted than it is today.
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By Andre Dubus II
