Clarissa's Blog

The Pastor’s Wife is a much more serious an accomplished novel than von Arnim’s Vera. By serious I don’t mean it lacks anything in the humor department. The novel is exceptionally funny, and I ploughed through its 500+ pages in three days. I highly, highly recommend. It’s extraordinary.

Unlike Vera, this novel lacks anything resembling a positive character. Instead, it offers a cast of harmless sociopaths whose moderately antisocial behavior creates comical situations. Ingeborg, the female protagonist, is a clinical moron. She’s so stupid and incapable of noticing social cues that it’s both funny and exasperating to read about her utter idiocy. Ingeborg’s husband, the German pastor, is a high-functioning autistic. Her admirer is a narcissist but a harmless one.

What’s captivating about Elizabeth’s writing isn’t the comedy itself but her skill at putting disturbing undertones behind all the laughter. Yes, Ingeborg is a moron but her life is heartbreaking. It’s all so hopeless and dark. Von Arnim’s humor is that of people who speak from a place of tragedy and devastation. Real suffering doesn’t weep in the squares. It laughs because what else is there?

This is the second novel by von Arnim that I’m reading, and both show a relationship between a stupid woman and a narcissistic man. The conclusion from both is that an idiot can defeat a narcissist if her idiocy allows for not a glimmer of intelligence.

I’ll now read a third book by this author to see if the trend continues.