Eating Sugar

The short story Eating Sugar is written by the British novelist and short story writer, Catherine Merriman. Merriman is an award-winning novelist, whose novels often describe and address women's experiences, which is also one of the themes in the short story, Eating Sugar.

In the story we meet Alex and his wife Eileen, who are visiting their daughter, Suzanne, in Thailand. The three are on a tourist trip to the jungle, and the story begins in medias res with the family realizing that they have lost track of the rest of the tourist group. Alex and Eileen are both curious and scared of what will happen to them. Suzanne, on the other hand, is very cool and calm, and she is convinced that they will get home eventually. As they are there, waiting, a group of young Thai men finds the family. The men make both Eileen and Alex very uncomfortable, although Alex tries to hide his feelings. But as things progress, Eileen seems to calm down and she even talks to the men. Alex, on the contrary, is still very affected by the men's presence and he even suggests that the family should leave the others. Alex's reaction to the strangers is very unlike him. We are told about his and Eileen's youth, where they were not afraid of trying wild things, such as taking some LSD and hitchhiking to Yugoslavia. In the end though, a car comes around and picks everyone up, and takes them all home.

Alex is the main character of the story, and you follow him and his development throughout the story. As mentioned above, Alex and Eileen were not afraid of experimenting in their younger days, but as time has went by, they have both turned away from that lifestyle. They are no longer as open-minded and outgoing as they once were. Not only does he fear the Thai men, but he also complaints about several things, such as the weather (p. 2, line 9-10) and the fact that he and Eileen had to visit Suzanne in April, that he even describes as 'idiocy' (p. 2, line 20-21).

Another theme is what people go through, when they realize that they are suddenly becoming old and that their children have become adults. Alex points out this transition several times, for example when he talks about where they live in Thailand and how they feel like helpless children. Or, if you interpret it a little more, old people have the same 'worries' as kids have. Whereas kids normally have help in the shape of their parents, old people like Alex and Eileen are expected to be able to cope on their own. That is also one of the themes in the poem Follower written by Seamus Heaney. First the son is following his father, but as the son becomes an adult, the roles change. Now all of sudden the young has to take care of the old. So the transition from a middle-aged man to an old man is definitely a theme in the story.

Prejudice and xenophobia are also a part of this story. As mentioned earlier, Alex and Eileen used to be very open-minded