The Death of a Beekeeper: Analysis of Major Characters
"The Death of a Beekeeper" explores the major characters surrounding Lars Lennart Westin, a retired teacher grappling with terminal cancer in isolation. At thirty-nine, Westin is portrayed as self-absorbed and introspective, documenting his life while wrestling with pain, deception, and communication breakdowns in his relationships. His ex-wife, Margaret, embodies a complex mix of independence and control, with their unsuccessful marriage marked by guilt and a shared disdain for societal hypocrisy. The character of Ann, a caring doctor, offers Westin a semblance of maternal affection, deepening his emotional struggles as their affair unfolds. Additionally, Westin finds warmth in his interactions with two young boys, Uffe and Jonny, to whom he writes a science fiction story, reflecting his longing for connection. His Uncle Sune represents a cunning individualism, while the imagined figure of God introduces a philosophical contemplation on desire and consequence, leading to an unraveling of human connections. Lastly, memories of Nicke, a childhood friend, serve as a poignant reminder for Westin to persevere despite his dire circumstances, emphasizing themes of resilience and introspection throughout the narrative.
The Death of a Beekeeper: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: Lars Gustafsson
First published: En biodlares dod, 1978 (English translation, 1981)
Genre: Novel
Locale: The countryside in the Swedish province of Västmanland
Plot: Domestic realism
Time: The 1970's
Lars Lennart Westin, a retired elementary school teacher living in virtual isolation in the Swedish province of Västmanland. A lean, spent man, he is thirty-nine years old but looks much older. Intensely self-absorbed, he keeps a series of notebooks that record the mundane facts of his life, his imaginative explorations of past and present, and the course of his fatal disease, cancer of the spleen. As the novel begins, he has received a letter from a local hospital, probably containing test results and the diagnosis of his ailment. He burns the letter, unopened. As his story unfolds, he reveals his obsession with pain, the deception and lack of communi-cation that have marked most of his relationships, his desire to understand himself, his resolution never to give up in his various struggles, and his terrible conclusion that his life was real only during his last few months of terminal suffering.
Margaret, Westin's wife for ten years until their divorce, around 1970. The pale and thin daughter of an intensely bourgeois family dominated by a tyrannical father, Margaret initially shared with Westin an aversion to a hypocritical and uncaring society and a desire for independence. As he reviews their uneventful, unsuccessful marriage, Westin discovers that deception, guilt, and Margaret's need to control him were the foundations of their relationship. He refuses to notify her of his disease.
Ann, a large blond doctor in her late thirties or early forties. She radiates motherliness, a quality that Westin craves and that forms the basis of their love affair in the last year of his marriage. When Margaret learns of the affair, the two women become allies and give Westin a strange, yet real, sense of peace.
Uffe and Jonny, two young boys who meet Westin during the course of his illness. He treats them with affectionate warmth and writes for them the first episode of a science-fiction adventure story, in which the hero must locate and destroy a source of great pain created by the evil Emperor Ming.
Sune Jannson, Westin's uncle, a clever storekeeper and operator in the black market during World War II. Westin admires him as a cunning and persistent individualist and recounts a wartime incident in which Uncle Sune outwitted a contingent of local bureaucrats.
God, who is imagined by Westin—during a temporary cessation of his pain—as a mother who awakes after twenty million years and begins to answer the prayers of human beings. At first, the answers seem wonderful, but because the motherly God grants all wishes indiscriminately, the process soon leads to the dissolution of all human relationships and institutions, and of language itself.
Nicke, a boyhood friend of Westin who died in 1952, after a short life of reckless yet successful adventures. Nicke is the last significant character to appear in the novel, in a flashback that reminds Westin to begin again and never to give up. In Westin's flashback, the fearless young Nicke dives deep into the whirlpool of a dangerous canal lock to retrieve a golden fishing lure. He emerges from the water with a different treasure from the bottom: a unique gold coin.