Narrative Analysis

By Genevieve M. Nangit
February 26, 2024

The Bath

This chapter is about Norma Jeane’s birthday as she celebrate it with her mother.

Primary sentence
For Mother was “Gladys”, and “Gladys” was the child’s true mother. When she chose to be.
When she was strong enough. (Page 13)

Sub-primary sentence
Did I want any other happiness? No, just to be with her. Maybe to cuddle a little and sleep in her
bed with her if she’d let me. I loved her so. (Page 15)

Supporting sentences
1 For Grandma’s hands were chafed old-woman’s hands, as Grandma’s smell Page 13
was an old-woman smell, but Mother’s smell was so sweet it made you dizzy,
like a taste of hot sugary lemon.
2 Gladys’ life was “three dimensions verging into four” and not “flat as a Page 13
Parcheesi board” like most lives.
3 And giggling like naughty pursued children, Mother and Daughter hurried Page 14
down flights of stairs as down a mountainside, breathless and gripping hands,
and so out! Outside!
4 For Gladys, who was this child’s true mother, would not be cheated of Mother Page 14
Love on this special day.
5 “You’re mine. You look like me. No one is going to steal you from me, Page 14
Norma Jeane, like my other daughters.” These triumphant, terrible words
Norma Jeane did not hear, did not hear, did not, blown away by the rushing
wind.
6 This day, this birthday, would be the first that Norma Jeane would remember Page 15
clearly. This wonderful day with Gladys who was sometimes Mother, or
Mother who was sometimes Gladys.
7 She had of being born — wanting to ask Gladys or Grandma, How do you be Page 15
born, was that something you did yourself? — to her mother in a charity lying-
in ward at the Los Angeles Country General Hospital after twenty-two hours
of “unremitting hell” (as Gladys spoke of the ordeal) or carried on
Gladys’ “special pouch” beneath her heart for eight months, eleven days.
 Narrative Analysis
By Genevieve M. Nangit
February 26, 2024

8 Never doubted that the infant in the snapshot was her as all through my life I Page 16
would know of myself through the witnessing and naming of others. As Jesus
in the Gospels is only seen and spoken of an recorded by others. I would
know my existence and the value of that existence through others’ eye, which I
believed I could trust as I could not trust my own.
9 Her life didn’t belong to her — “The way Catholic nuns are ‘brides of Page 16
Christ’ ”.
10 Norma Jeane saw at once that Gladys was in an “up” mood: distracted, flamey, Page 17
funny, unpredictable as a candle flame flickering in agitated air.
11 This is home! This place I remember. Familiar, too, was the airless heat of the Page 19
apartment, for Gladys didn’t believe in leaving windows open even a crack
while she was away, the pungent odor of food smells, coffee grounds, cigarette
ashes, scorch perfume, and that mysterious acrid chemical odor Gladys could
never entirely wash away even if she scrubbed, scrubbed, scrubbed at her
hands with medicinal soap and made them raw and bleeding. Yet these smells
were comforting to Norma Jeane for they meant home. Where Mother was.
12 Gladys mood had shifted. It was often this way. The movie music, too, shifted Page 22
abruptly.
13 In such household matters Gladys was a perfectionist, scolding Norma Jeane if Page 22
the child left towels hanging crooked or books unevenly aligned on shelves.
14 It would be said of me that I was unhappy as a child, that my childhood was a Page 23
desperate one, but let me tell you I was never unhappy. So long as I had my
mother I was never unhappy and one day there was my father, too, to love.
15 Grandma Della! A neighborhood “character”. Page 23
Grandma Della was the source of all Norma Jeane knew, or imagined she
knew, of Gladys.
16 “Nobody is adopting my little girl,” Gladys said vehemently, “while I’m alive to Page 24
prevent it.”
17 That day! A haze of happiness like warm damp for drifting over the flatlands Page 25
of the city. Happiness in every breath. Gladys murmured, “Happy birthday,
Norma Jeane!” and, “Didn’t I tell you, Norma Jeane, this is your special day?”
18 The sight of the cake, its wonderful smell, made Norma Jeane’s mouth water. Page 26
19 “And now, Norma Jeane: your presents.” Page 26
 Narrative Analysis
By Genevieve M. Nangit
February 26, 2024

20 The doll wore a little lace nightcap and a flannel nightgown in a floral print, Page 27
and her skin was rubbery-smooth, soft, perfect skin, and her tiny fingers were
perfectly shaped! And the small feet n white cotton booties tied with pink
ribbons! Norma Jeane squaled with excitement and would have hugged her
mother to thank her.
21 How Norma Jeane would love her blond baby doll! One of the great loves of Page 28
her childhood.

Reference
“Blonde” by Joyce Carol Oates. 2000. 4th Estate: London, UK.