Hi BetterMostians,
let's talk about postcards this week. Our resident
Fiona (Optom3) has brought up questions evolving around the postcards and by doing so, inspired a few more questions on my side.
Thank you Fiona! Suggestions for TOTW are always welcome.
Some thoughts/questions about the postcards:a) All the post cards we see, which result in fishing trips, are from Jack to Ennis. The last one is from Ennis to Jack and is of course the deceased one. Is that significant? I.e. the only time when we see Ennis contacted Jack he is thwarted.
b) Why is there a hiatus of four years before the reunion? Not two or three or five? Do you think there is any significance in this?
c) A more speculative question: do you think they kept each others postcards?
d) There are two differences regarding the postcards between the short story and the movie: first, in the short story it's a letter from Jack to Ennis, which leads to their reunion. In the movie this first sign of life is a postcard.
Second, in the short story Ennis calls Jack to tell him about his divorce. In the movie he sent a postcard.
The form of contact is changed to be a postcard twice in the movie. Why?
e) For those who have read more of Annie Proulx's work, maybe even her novel 'Postcards': did you find anything about postcards in Proulx's other work which might also be of interest for BBM? Any parallels maybe?
Let us hear your thoughts about the postcards !