The Virgin Suicides door Jeffrey Eugenides

General questions
The author of the book is Jeffrey Eugenides.
The title of the book is The Virgin Suicides.
The book was published first in 1993.
The book has 249 pages.

Contents

Summary of the book.
The book is about a strict Christian family, the Lisbon family, around the 70s. Mr. And Mrs. Lisbon have five daughters: Therese, Mary, Bonnie, Lux and Cecilia. They are all young girls. Therese is the oldest and she is 17 years old. Then Mary, she is 16 years old. Bonnie is 15 years old, Lux is 14 years old and Cecilia, the youngest, is 13 years old.

The first time Cecilia attempted suicide, she had slitting her wrists. But the first time it failed. Neither the neighborhood, nor her parents didn’t understand why she wanted to be death. Her parents decided to give a party for their daughters, wishing to make their daughters happier and that their daughters get more contacts.

Cecilia asked if she can go away for a while. She went upstairs and jumped out of the window and landed with her head at the garden fence. This time her suicide didn’t fail.
The Lisbon family was shocked and from that moment on, the family became more careful. Mrs. Lisbon became very depressed and came less out of the house.
The most popular boy of the school asked Lux if she want to go with him to the schoolball. When the other girls had a partner too for the schoolball, the father of the girls gave his assent. But when Lux broke the rules and came home too late and drunk, the parents took stricter measures: the girls may not go out of the house anymore and more and more became forbidden for the girls, till they didn’t go to school anymore. Mr. Lisbon, who is a maths teacher at the school, took discharge and the Lisbon family more and more faded away. The Lisbons didn’t care for their house or garden anymore and they almost never left their home. The boys of the neighborhood read the diary of Cecilia and began to know more things about the family. From a safe distance, all the people in the neighborhood watched the Lisbons’ lives. They saw that Lux every night climbed upon the roof to have sex with several boys.

In course of time the girls tried to get contact with the neighborhood. The boys tried to call the girls and for the first time they had contact with the girls. The girls send a message for help escaping the house.

At one evening the girls called the boys and they agreed upon to be there the next day at twelve o’clock midnight.
The next day the boys were there on time. They met Lux in the livingroom. She said to them that she went away with her mother’s car and that the boys must wait till the other sisters go away. When the boys went downstairs they saw that Bonnie hang herself. In the bedroom Therese had taken an overdose sleeping-pills and passed away. Lux had gastify herself in her mum’s car. Mary put her head in the oven, but she survived her suicide attempt. After she came out of the hospital, she succeeds in ending her life with sleeping-pills a few weeks later, what nobody suprised.

After the funeral of the girls, Mr. And Mrs. Lisbon left the neighborhood. The house is sold by a young couple and they do up the house and all memories of the Lisbon family faded away.
The boys of the neighborhood have still the question why it all happened, but it is still a mysterie. The girls took their secrets with into their graves.

Theme of the book.
The theme of the book is suicide. The story is about the five Lisbon sisters. They all commited suicide. After the suicide of Cecilia, the other sisters behaved more and more stranger. The sisters tried to find a way out of the house. They felt lonely and they saw only one way out: suicide.

What does the author want to make clear with the book?
The Lisbon family had no contact with each other. Each member lived in their own world. And because there was no communication in the house, the members felt lonely and desperated. So I think that the author want to make clear that communication in a family is so important, otherwise it makes people sick, unhappy or depressed.


Where does the story take place?
The Lisbon Family lives in a little and a quiet village. The story takes place in the house of the Lisbon family and in the neighborhood. The story also takes place at the school of the Lisbon girls. Their father, Mr. Lisbon, works at the school as a maths teacher.

When does the story take place?
The story take place in the 70s.

Fiction or no-fiction or mixture of both.
Fiction, but it can be based on a true story.

The main characters.
Mr. Lisbon: He has five daughters. He is a maths teacher at the school of his daughters.
He gives his daughters a strict christian adjucation, but he is also a
sensetive father.
Mrs. Lisbon: She has together with Mr. Lisbon five daughters. After Cecilia’s suicide
she got very depressed. She almost didn’t come out of the house anymore.
Lisbon girls: Cecilia (13), Lux (14), Bonnie (15), Mary (16) and Therese (17). They all
lived in their own world, and each of them were different. Lux became

very violent after the death of her youngest sister Cicilia. And after she
came home too late and drunk, she and the other girls got punished. Cause
of her behaviour the other girls got punishment too and that was the
reason they saw only one way out: the death.
Lux smoked cigarettes, what her parents had forbidden. But Lux was also
the most secure girl of the Lisbon girls.
About Mary is told the least. She didn’t like her hear. Therese, the oldest,
loved science. Bonnie was very insecure. She always went to music camps
to play instruments, but by one instrument her hands were too small and
by another instrument her lips swelled.
Cecilia, the youngest, commited suicide the first. She had a diary but in her diary was nothing remarkable for her suicide. She was very quiet. She had problems with the puberty and that was maybe the reason she commited suicide.
Trip Fontaine: He is the most popular boy at the school of the Lisbon girls. He invited

Lux to join him at the schoolball.
Paul Baldino: He is the boy who found Cecilia death in the bathroom.

The climax of the story
The climax of the story is Cecilia’s suicide. From that moment on everything went wrong. The Lisbon family didn’t talk about what was happened and Mr. And Mrs. Lisbon protected their girls more. But that was wrong. The girls felt more and more lonely and they saw only one way out: the death.

Genre and style
The genre of the book
The genre of the book is a novel.

What is the construction of the story?
The story is written in five chapters.

Who is the narrator?
The story is told by an anonymous narrator in the first person plural. He is one of the boys who were obsessed over the Lisbon girls. The narrotor looks back on the time that the boys knew and loved the Lisbon girls. The men are now middle-aged men and the narrotor tells the story about the Lisbon girls.
The boys included Cecilia’s diary, family photographs and personal objects from the girls’ rooms to examine why the girls commited suicide. The boys also refer to several interviews they have conducted with people who lived in the neighborhood during the time of the suicides of the Lisbon girls.


What kind of language is used?
Standard English.

Are there many dialogues or many descriptions?
There are many descriptions. The narrotor describes all things clearly and careful. There are also dialogues, but not much, more discriptions. He answer in long sentences, very describable.

Literary background

When did the author live?
Jeffrey Kent Eugenides was born at the 13th April of 1960 in Detroit, Michigan, in the United States. His nationality is American, but his parents are Greek and Irish. He has finished the Brown University in 1983 and after the Brown University he has finished the Stanford University for creative writing. In 1986 he received the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for his story Here Comes Winston, full of the Holy Spirit.
In 1993 he wrote The Virgin Suicides and in 1999 came a movie of the book, directed by Sofia Coppola. Jeffrey is a fiction writer but he also is a teacher. He now lives in Chicago with his wife and daughter.

Name some other important books by the author.
After the novel The Virgin Suicides he wrote the novel Middlesex, published first in 2002. After Middlesex he wrote the novel My Mistress’s Sparrow is Dead published first in 2008. Jeffrey Eugenides also wrote short stories, like Air Mail, The Ancient Myths, Baster, Early Music, The Speed of Sperm and Timeshare.

Name the most important events in the author’s life.
His book The Virgin Suicides was filmed in 1999 and he got a lot of prices for his books.


Is the author’s life important in the book? Why (not)?
No, the author is a real story narrator and he has a rich fantasy.

Did the author belong to any literary movement?
I don’t know.

Is the work (partly) autobiographical?
No, it is not an autobiography.