Kinflicks by Lisa Alther
"Kinflicks," Lisa Alther's debut novel, presents a comedic yet poignant exploration of a young woman's journey of self-discovery during the tumultuous 1960s. The story centers on Virginia (Ginny) Babcock, whose narrative alternates between her adolescent experiences and her return to her Tennessee home in 1974 to confront her mother’s terminal illness. Throughout the novel, Ginny grapples with her identity, particularly in relation to her family dynamics and her sexual orientation.
As a teenager, she rebels against her parents’ contrasting influences—her father's strictness and her mother's preoccupation with death—ultimately seeking validation through her sexual relationships. Ginny's experiences range from her high school popularity to her relationship with a marginalized boy and her transformative romance with a woman named Eddy at college. Their shared decision to leave school for a commune becomes a turning point, leading to tragedy and further exploration of Ginny’s desires.
Following Eddy's death, Ginny attempts to find fulfillment through marriage and motherhood, yet remains emotionally unfulfilled. Her return to her mother is fraught with unresolved conflicts that drive Ginny into despair, contemplating suicide but ultimately choosing to persist in her quest for identity. "Kinflicks" offers a rich narrative that captures the complexities of growing up, familial relationships, and the search for personal meaning amidst societal expectations.
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Subject Terms
Kinflicks by Lisa Alther
First published: 1975
The Work
Kinflicks, Lisa Alther’s first published novel, is a funny, realistic account of a young woman growing up in the 1960’s and of her struggle to come to terms with her mother’s approaching death. Virginia (Ginny) Babcock’s story is told in chapters which alternate between her own narrative of her growing up and third-person narrations of the present (about 1974) in which she returns to her Tennessee home to be with her desperately ill mother. In both story lines, the emphasis is on Ginny’s attempts to define herself sexually and as a member of a family. Neither struggle concludes with any final definition.
Ginny rejects her parents when she is a teenager. She is repelled by her father’s rigidity and her mother’s fascination with death, and she is not close to either of her brothers. Her rebellion takes different forms, but once she is in high school her search for definition is largely in terms of her sexual behavior. Her mother tries to ignore Ginny’s activities, while the father is enraged by what he learns.
Ginny’s early efforts to find a sexual definition are based on her popularity in high school. She is the flag twirler with the marching band and the girlfriend of the school’s athletic hero. In a series of very funny scenes, they experiment with a variety of sexual activities, always stopping short of intercourse, but one side of Ginny’s nature rejects conventionality, and she loses her virginity with a half-crippled boy who is an outcast. None of this activity is very satisfying.
Ginny finds sexual fulfillment with a lesbian lover named Eddy, whom she encounters at the New England college to which she is sent by her father. When Eddy convinces Ginny that they are being socially irresponsible by remaining in school, they leave and join a small female commune in rural Vermont. When this episode ends in Eddy’s violent death, Ginny tries marriage to one of the townsmen, and has a daughter named Wendy. She loves her daughter, but in other ways she is unsatisfied.
Ginny’s husband eventually rejects her, and she returns to Tennessee to be with her dying mother. The two disagree about almost everything, including the events of their past, and Ginny is unable to provide much comfort for her mother. When the mother’s death leaves their family disagreements unresolved, Ginny tries several times to commit suicide. None of these attempts is successful, and in the end she decides to live, although she has already decided not to return to her husband and daughter. Her search for definition has not succeeded, but she will keep trying.
Bibliography
Braendlin, Bonnie Hoover. “New Directions in the Contemporary Bildungsroman: Lisa Alther’s Kinflicks.” Women and Literature 1 (1980): 160-171. Asserts that Alther’s book is a new type of maturation novel because it emphasizes the woman rather than the man. She says the book alternates between the picaresque and the confessional modes, the first being patriarchal and the second matriarchal, as Ginny struggles between freedom and security.
Brown, Laurie L. “Interviews with Seven Contemporary Writers.” In Women Writers of the Contemporary South, edited by Peggy Whitman Prenshaw. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1984.
Ferguson, Mary Anne. “The Female Novel of Development and the Myth of Psyche.” Denver Quarterly 17 (Winter, 1983): 58-74. Discusses the myth of Psyche and Cupid in Kinflicks and works by Eudora Welty and Erica Jong. She discusses Ginny’s relationship with her mother as it parallels Ginny’s development as heroine.
Ferguson, Mary Anne. “Lisa Alther: The Irony of Return?” Southern Quarterly 21 (Summer, 1983): 103-115. Ferguson discusses Ginny’s relationship with her mother, including Ginny’s attempt to imitate her mother by following her into death. She also focuses on Ginny’s rebellion against the South and her return to it.
Hall, Joan Lord. “Symbiosis and Separation in Lisa Alther’s Kinflicks.” Arizona Quarterly 38 (Winter, 1982): 336-346. Hall examines Ginny’s behavior as symbolically related to her mother’s blood: As Mrs. Babcock’s blood cells turn upon themselves, Ginny wonders whether she is like a cell functioning in a larger organism. Hall asserts that Ginny can find freedom only when she becomes part of a larger community.
Leonard, John. Review of Kinflicks, by Lisa Alther. The New York Times Book Review, March 14, 1976. Compares Alther to Doris Lessing. Discusses Kinflicks as a comic maturation novel, putting Ginny Babcock in company with Holden Caulfield, Augie March, and Huck Finn.
Peel, Ellen. “Subject, Object, and the Alternation of First-and Third-Person Narration in Novels by Alther, Atwood and Drabble.” Critique (Summer, 1989): 107-122.