Victoria Lancelotta's "The Anniversary Trip"

Author biography
Victoria Lancelotta is the author of two novels: Here in the World: Thirteen Stories and Far, and her fiction has appeared in such literary magazines as Mississippi Review, The Threepenny Review and McSweeney’s, among others. “The Anniversary Trip” was originally published in The Gettysburg Review in the Spring 2008 issue.
The inspiration for “The Anniversary Trip” came from the frequent trips Lancelotta and her husband took to Paris. Like the main character Monica and her husband Martin, Lancelotta and her husband never felt compelled to “do” anything; they slept in, ate and drank, and wandered aimlessly about. Lancelotta mirrored her blasé feelings toward Paris in the character of Monica. She wrote the first paragraph of the story in a small hotel room. She had woken up in the middle of the night, suddenly frantic and worried about how she would remember her time in Paris.

Plot Summary
In “The Anniversary Trip,” Lancelotta tells the depressing story of Monica and her husband, Martin, who are on vacation in the romantic city of Paris with Martin’s mother, Elizabeth. Despite Paris’ beauty, Monica is disinterested in what the city has to offer. As the story progresses, Monica comes to the realization that she is utterly unhappy with her life and her marriage. Though Monica went out of her way, and social class, to marry Martin, she realizes that she chose wealth and grandeur over a relationship based on love. She decides in Paris, of all places, that she is going to leave Martin.

Significance of the title
The title is ironic. The obvious meaning is that it represents Elizabeth’s 40th wedding anniversary, and also the anniversary of the death of her husband. However, it is in Paris that Monica makes the decision to divorce Martin. The title represents Elizabeth’s success in marriage and life, and Monica’s failure in these areas. It highlights just how opposite Elizabeth and Monica are; Elizabeth is beautiful, confident and successful in her life and marriage. Monica, on the other hand, will never be beautiful like Elizabeth, and isn’t strong enough to make her marriage last.

Character
Monica is motivated for the wrong reasons; she is motivated to marry into a higher social/economic class for material reasons rather than marrying for love.
Though the story revolves around Monica and Martin’s deteriorating marriage, it seems to focus more on Monica’s relationship with Elizabeth, who is a woman of striking beauty and abundant charm. Elizabeth and Monica are developed by comparing and contrasting the two women. For example, on page 157 Lancelotta writes about Elizabeth, “She is more beautiful now, in her sixties, than her son’s wife has ever been, or will be.” We began to wonder if the women are friends by association, or if Elizabeth truly cares for this poor girl who could quite possibly be falling into the same trap of unsorted priorities Elizabeth found herself in?
It is hard to ignore the possibility that Elizabeth was once like Monica; where Monica failed in conforming to this life, Elizabeth succeeded. Monica decides to share her decision to leave Martin with Elizabeth, and it would only be natural for Elizabeth to defend her son. Instead, Monica is met with understanding. Not only does Elizabeth admit that she didn’t expect the marriage to last long, she says to Monica, “There are some promises […] that will ruin you. […] If you keep them past their own point, I suppose. Past their point of usefulness.” It is at this point, while Elizabeth is comforting Monica, that Lancelotta explicitly states the substance of the theme: Monica wishes that there were “all the time in the world for Elizabeth to teach her how to be someone completely different from who she is.”
Monica looks up to Elizabeth for enduring a presumably unhappy marriage. Monica ran from the life she was meant for out of fear of becoming like her mother and James. Monica doesn’t want to settle. After Monica tells Elizabeth she’s leaving Martin, she says, close to tears, “I tried.” But what did she try for? To love Martin in an attempt to escape the ordinary life she was meant for, even though the love wouldn’t come naturally, as the text suggests? “The question she finally asked herself was not Do you love him? but Can you love him? Will you love him? Yes. I will be able to do that.”
It appears that Elizabeth is who Monica wants to be. But just like she can’t change her outward appearance to be more beautiful like Elizabeth, she can’t change her fate. At least, not permanently. The mundane life she’s meant for seems to have found her, in the end.
Though this story raises an extensive list of questions, that cannot necessarily be considered a bad thing. The story receives an “A” for Lancelotta’s ability to focus on the development of Monica through the selective development of the characters around her.

Setting
The setting is Paris, which is perfect for the story because it is a special, almost magical place known by all as the city of love. What sets Paris apart from, say, Ohio is that mystical anything-can-happen element that one normally finds on vacation. The interesting part of all this beauty and love is that the only couple in the story spends it alone and at least on Monica’s side, detesting their partner. Monica comments that being in Paris is nice, but that she’ll probably forget it as soon as she goes home. This seems to show that being in this relationship with Martin and the lifestyle that went with it ultimately meant nothing to her, and in the end she’ll forget him as well.
We gave the setting an “A,” because it embodies the conflict.

Point of View
Lancelotta chose to tell the story in the third person limited. Though this view works for the story that Lancelotta is telling, it is the reason for the multiple questions previously listed. Because our viewpoint is incomplete, the narrator becomes unreliable: we only have Monica’s view, thoughts and feelings. It seems as though Martin should play a larger role, considering Monica’s determination to leave him, but that would detract from the development of Monica. However, the audience is never given a reason for the divorce. It is hinted at the throughout the story that Martin is dull, spending all of his time in Paris reading in his hotel room. Besides this, the audience is never given a clear reasoning for Monica’s motivation.
Though the point of view serves the purpose of the story, our fickle narrator leaves the audience with too many easily answered questions. Lancelotta does not give us enough information, and therefore received a “B” in point of view.

Structure
We found that Lancelotta structures “The Anniversary Trip” chronologically for the most part, with the occasional flashbacks. While these are what we would call flashbacks, they really aren’t that detailed. The flashbacks cover memories of people or ideas and might include a short dialogue, like when Monica is remembering her mother and Lancelotta writes,
On these occasions Elizabeth has smiled and sipped at her wine and smoked many more cigarettes than is usual while Monica’s mother has eaten peanuts form a glazed ceramic bowl, a wedding gift from one of Elizabeth’s friends. “These are really good peanuts,” Monica’s mother has said, or “Aren’t peanuts just so good with a nice cold beer?”
While some might find this chronological structure and these mundane flashbacks boring, we feel that Lancelotta uses this structure to parallel Monica’s simplicity.

Language (Diction)
Lancelotta shows through the diction that Monica is only capable of focusing on what she cannot have. The key word that we found in “The Anniversary Trip” was beauty. Lancelotta uses the word beauty or beautiful is used to describe anything Monica wants or anybody she strives to be. Paris is beautiful, but Monica isn’t so she doesn’t belong there; Elizabeth is more beautiful than Monica, even in her old age. Lancelotta also goes out of her way to describe anything about Monica’s appearances and life before marriage as not beautiful: Monica is not beautiful; Monica’s mother is not beautiful; and so on.
Again, Lancelotta has done a good job using this aspect of writing to portray Monica’s alienation to environment she has placed herself in through marriage. Monica settles into a family that she doesn’t fit in with just so she can gain her materialistic goals, and Lancelotta shows this with the word beauty.
For her work with diction, we give Lancelotta a “B” because she makes an effort to portray Monica’s discomfort through the language. However, language is not the strongest tool used in “The Anniversary Trip.”

Tone
The tone that Lancelotta uses in “The Anniversary Trip” is slow and monotonous. This example is from one of Monica’s walks around the Paris streets.
She chooses a street she has not walked before and starts toward the river and falls into a peaceful near-absence of thought, a calm she associates with childhood. She does not know when, exactly, she became unable to love her husband. She knows only that she woke one night and looked at him, at his face, lovely as his mother’s but grave even in sleep, and though, I am finished. I am empty. I have nothing left for you.
Again, people might find the tone that Lancelotta applies to this story as boring and we would usually view this as a bad thing. However, the tone in “The Anniversary Trip” affectively reflects the Monica’s disinterest in everything about her life.
Because of her amazing ability to portray the main character through tone, we gave Lancelotta an “A” for this aspect of her writing.

Theme
The work tells us that it is possible to set your standards too high. The author seems to show that Monica could have been happy with James, yet by pursuing someone outside of her class (like a money over the man kind of situation) she was setting herself up for failure. It is not saying don’t have high standards, rather don’t get greedy. Monica could have had it all by setting standards for her choice in men, but she chose to set her standards for monetary gain. It is the age-old romantic comedy: choose the man over the money; this seems to be the author’s purpose or intent, shown mostly internally by Monica, or otherwise in third person limited. However, it is almost a lose-lose scenario, as if she settles she may not be happy because she will be dreaming of something more, yet if she goes that extra step for the material gain, she finds out that it is not what she had hoped it would be. While both endings are negative, she never tried to stay in her class range (as she could have with James) and this may be the answer. Monica simply wouldn’t be so unhappy if she wasn’t trying so hard to be happy.
The story conveys a clear vision of life: stay where you belong, don’t go out of your way to disappoint or hurt yourself, and if you do, get out of there. James told her when she was leaving, “You belong here,” but she didn’t listen, and so she had to learn these lessons the hard way. One has to be happy with where they are or where they are going, or else they’re doomed. Monica could have remedied her situation had she adapted, but she was unable to do so, so she settled for Martin, and settled into unhappiness. You will have a terrible life if you settle.
Throughout the story, we’re faced with three repeated ideas: beauty, materialism, and social status. Beauty comes in the form of Paris itself, being the pinnacle of what constitutes beauty. Monica is engulfed in the city and takes to exploring it on her own, as her perfect husband doesn’t want to leave his hotel room. Beauty also comes in the form of Elizabeth, who Monica seems to idolize for her pristine and elegant appearance (despite smoking). Materialism presents itself in the form of cufflinks and fancy clothes, both purchased for or worn by Martin which shows that the complicated, rich things belong with him or at least Elizabeth. Also, the only time that Elizabeth seems to compliment Monica is when she is wearing the fancy shoes. The underlying idea of social status is reflected over and over in Monica’s discomfort in the beautiful city with a loving mother-in-law and comfortable lifestyle. Since she doesn’t fit, she cannot be happy.
Monica explicitly states the theme of the story: “He never pretended to be anything he wasn’t. I did. I’m guilty of that.” Not only does she show that she knows she had made a mistake, perhaps has known all along. If you believe the latter to be true, it proves how her character loves to revel in misery.
We gave Lancelotta’s development of the theme an “A” because it is explicitly stated and maintained throughout the text; it is the driving force of the plot.