In A Dark Wood Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

1. Contemplating his divorce, Benedick describes his state of mind: "What frightened me most was, I could no longer believe in my own life as a story. Everyone needs a story, a part to play in order to avoid the realization that life is without significance. How else do any of us survive? It's what makes life bearable, even interesting. When it becomes neither, people say you've lost the plot. Or just lost it" [p. 19]. At the end of the novel, when Benedick finds acting work, he concludes: "It was this, I think, as much as the lithium, that made me better. It meant that I hadn't been written out of the story of my life. People say that life has no story, that to believe it does is a symptom of madness, and I had thought this, too. But I knew I couldn't go on living without some version of the truth. Every version has its blessing and it curse" [p. 301]. Is Benedick's statement that "everyone needs a story" just the artist speaking, or is he expressing a universal truth? What is the story of Benedick's life? What is his version of the truth and how does it evolve?
   
   
2. How does each fairy tale that Benedick reads reveal more and more about Laura's life and state of mind? What is the significance of the order of the tales in North of Nowhere as read by Benedick throughout the novel? Why might Craig have chosen to name her novel for Laura's first book, In a Dark Wood, when it is actually Laura's fairy tales in North of Nowhere that structure the plot of the novel?
   
   
3. Ruth tells Benedick: "If you read fairy tales carefully, you'll notice they are mostly about people who aren't heroes. They don't have special powers, or gifts. Often they are despised as stupid. They are bullied, beaten up, robbed, starved. But they find they are stronger than their misfortunes" [p. 25]. Is Ruth correct? If so, can "The Wild Wood" [pp. 200—207] be accurately characterized as a "fairy tale" or is it something else? How might the genre of fairy tales be defined or explained? How do fairy tales compare to other literary genres? Is it correct to assume that fairy tales are children's literature, and, if so, why?
   
   

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