Where We Have to Go

Pic: Photo credit: Donna Santos

The title of Lauren Kirshner’s mesmerizing debut novel is adapted from a Theodore Roethke poem. Kirshner was kind enough to republish the section of the poem before the novel, and the difference in the title is subtle, but represents a marked shift. In the poem, Roethke kept the ‘going’ in the first person singular for Kirshner, it is where we go, which invites, or perhaps even commands the reader to come along on the main character’s journey of self-discovery through the events of late childhood, and into adolescence.

By calling out to the reader, there is a keen awareness that where we have to go is impossible without an examination of where we have been. Throughout the novel, which follows a culturally Jewish girl named Lucy Bloom as she grows up in Toronto, Kirshner charges the story with the awkward recollections that we often choose to forget. But this is a novel of fiction, so Kirshner is able to use the element of fiction to explore personal events. Though the details of the characters may share a resemblance to Kirshner’s own background, this is solely the tale of Lucy Bloom and her experiences. The naming of this character could be a possible allusion to James Joyce’s portrait as a young man in Ulysses, or simply alluding to the idea that Lucy is still ‘in bloom.’ Yet the immersion of so much realness of Toronto within the fictional version presents an interesting take on the coming of age novel. Changing some names and locations, while keeping others the same, may be what allows Kirshner to dip into the past, in order to retell her past events with the benefit of future foresight.

Where We Have to Go walks a fine line in deviating from the CBC breakout hit Being Erica. The superficialities, on one hand, are quite similar: urban Jewish woman revisits crucial coming-of-age events from an adult perspective. The effectiveness of Kirshner’s writing, however, is that she knows that the payoff does not come from changing the past. Kirshner instead channels the pain of past events, and does not blot it out. She reaches forcefully to examine the personal tragedy and the general uneasiness that accompany such events as the sickness of a beloved pet, or a friendship that has become less than reciprocal. Kirshner shares the pain of these incidents and others in such excruciating detail that as the reader, we must begrudgingly reencounter our own experiences in similar situations.

Perhaps the most winning aspect of this book, which is at times charming, at times painfully corporeal, is the sense of familiarity that it engenders. During an interview, Kirshner was quick to point out that this was not a girl’s coming of age story, but a universal coming of age story. Yet the elements that were so relatable to me – growing up culturally, but perhaps not religiously Jewish in midtown Toronto, and in particular, during the era longingly evoked by Kirshner– were what made me want to go read it. A reader without similar sensibilities and experiences may not find these elements quite as relatable. Kirshner’s aim, which she may or may not have met, was to make the story instantly relatable to readers entirely unfamiliar with the experience. Would a non-Jew be as able to channel the endearingly first generation Canadian Old Worldness of Lucy’s parents? Could a Calgarian or a Vancouverite (or Berliner or Amsterdamer, as the book is now translated into German and Dutch) feel the same sense of city spirit captured by Kirshner’s depictions of 1990’s Hogtown?

Kirshner confided that she is finished with the characters of the novel (for now), and is going to channel the essence of Twentysomethings in her next project. The novel as confessional works shockingly well, as Kirshner has managed to fully embrace the social awkwardness that can accompany growing up, and instead of letting it fester unaddressed, she embraces it fully. Lauren Kirshner presents a story filled with messy friendships and messier separations, struggles with weighty issues, and briefly hints at a profound pedagogical influence (a shame that angle was not further explored). Kirshner adeptly carries us throughout, not to where we want to go, but – we come to realize – were we have to go.