Intensive Care: Analysis of Major Characters
"Intensive Care: Analysis of Major Characters" explores the complex lives of a diverse cast of characters, primarily focusing on the retired New Zealand worker Tom Livingstone. Tom, in his seventies, grapples with unfulfilled ambitions and personal disappointments as he reflects on his life, facing physical ailments and loneliness. His relationship with Peggy Warren, a bold nurse seeking security after her husband's death, highlights themes of vulnerability and the search for connection amidst despair. The narrative also introduces Tom's brother Leonard, who finds solace in alcohol, and his overbearing daughter Pearl, whose harsh realities have hardened her perception of life. Naomi, another daughter, provides insight into Tom's family dynamics through her poignant, unsent letters as she battles cancer. Additional characters like Colin, Pearl's son, and Lorna, his girlfriend, add layers of tragedy through their destructive choices, culminating in Colin’s act of violence. The inclusion of Milly Galbraith, a mentally challenged woman with profound insights, serves as a stark contrast to the other characters, underscoring the themes of human dignity and societal neglect. Collectively, these characters depict a poignant exploration of disappointment, connection, and the search for meaning in life’s twilight years.
Intensive Care: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: Janet Frame
First published: 1970
Genre: Novel
Locale: New Zealand; London, England; and Melbourne, Australia
Plot: Science fiction
Time: The early 1900's to the 1960's, and the undefined future
Tom Livingstone, a retired New Zealand worker in his seventies. An ordinary old man outwardly, Tom faces the end of his life in disappointment as he realizes that he has fulfilled few of his ambitions and has found little happiness through either his job or his family. It is the novel's intent that the memories, dreams, and fantasies constituting his inner life assume greater importance in character development than do the prosaic events of his daily existence, as he complains of physical ailments, conducts a desultory flirtation with the town's loose woman, and finally dies alone.
Peggy Warren, Tom's girlfriend after his wife's death. Approaching middle age, Peggy works as a nurse in a home for the elderly. She is a brassy, bold, and unrefined sort, considered a bit of a tart by the townspeople. Through her relationship with Tom, she searches for security, which eludes her at his death.
Leonard Livingstone, Tom's drunken, dirty, and disorderly brother, who shares the main character's disappointment with what life offers but finds solace in the bottle, not in dreams.
Pearl Torrance, Tom's daughter, who is enormously obese and overbearing. Her illusions about life faded long ago, leaving her with no sympathy, not even for the battered children whom she serves.
Naomi Whyborn, Tom's daughter, who is dying of cancer. Not appearing within the main narrative, she is introduced through disjointed letters that she writes, but never sends, to her father.
Colin Torrance, Pearl Torrance's son and Tom's grandson, somewhere between thirty and forty years of age. Ordinary in appearance and feckless in behavior, he commits but one significant act: the murder of his lover.
Lorna Kimberly, Colin's girlfriend, young, sensual, unattractive, and stupid. Colin murders her.
Milly Galbraith, a twenty-six-year-old retarded woman whose memoir records most of the futuristic action. Describing herself as fully developed physically, she emerges as one of the novel's most sympathetic characters, for her insight greatly surpasses that possessed by the so-called normal people who inhabit both the realistic and futuristic worlds. Galbraith's only connection to the Livingstone family lies in her love for the pear tree still standing on their former property.
Colin Monk, a mathematics professor and colorless bureaucrat in his forties who blindly helps to administer the “Human Delineation Act” that destroys the retarded Milly Galbraith and may ultimately obliterate him.