unfortunate attraction to problematic men

AGH i'm so glad u asked bc i looooooove love love hangsaman i think it might be my fav shirley jackson book (mb second to whalitc) and i have so many thoughts on it! mostly i absolutely adored all its observations abt life as a woman (one of my fav things abt shirley jacksons writing is the way she articulates thoughts and feelings in such a fantastic and cutting way). so it would help if i knew a little more abt what particularly confused u but i'm gonna assume it was the third act? with the whole forest scene & such

analysis below (TW mention of SA)

Arthur is in many ways a version of Natalie’s own father: he too brings out her desire for male intellectual validation. I kind of want to do a whole analysis of her character and her relation to men (that quote about daughters bonding with fathers against mothers in the hopes of being spared the same fate comes to mind) but that’s irrelevant here so.

The way I interpreted Arthur and Elizabeth’s storyline was that it’s meant to be an exploration and explanation of what Natalie’s own parents relationship was like before she came into being, and how it soured. In Natalie’s mother’s monologue, she warns Natalie against men like her father, because they are condescending and untrustworthy. Natalie sees her father with an arm around a much younger woman at the garden party, which echoes Arthur’s nonchalance and even encouragement towards his female students’ flirtations.

The Arthur storyline seems to end very abruptly; the last time we see him, he mentions that he and Elizabeth are having a child together, and he’s unhappy about it. I think the reason why we don’t get any more development of his storyline past this point is because we know what happens now: this is the part where he and Elizabeth become Natalie’s own parents: bitter and discontent, bound together by a child.

My overall interpretation of the book:

What I struggled with and what I believe a lot of people struggle with is that Hangsaman seems not to really have a narrative arc; rather, it’s fragmented, and each part feels unfinished. The more I reread it, though, the more common threads I discover throughout each act that tie the whole story together and show Natalie’s development as a character.

The whole book has two major themes: Natalie’s (lack of) sense of self, and her experience with and around girlhood and womanhood. Part of her dissociation from herself I think stems from the trauma she experiences in the first act, but more I think comes from her disconnection to the role she will be expected to play as a wife and mother. Whether consciously or not, she’s absorbed her mother’s sadness, and despite going against her advice by falling for Arthur Langdon (aka a man only distinguishable from Natalie’s own father by his age) she ends the book content in her isolation. She’s belittled and condescended to a lot in the first two acts, either by men for trying and failing to be like them, or by women (like Vickie and Anne), for failing to fit the role of the demure and attractive girl. In the third act, she rejects both her dream of being a renowned and respected writer like her father, and of being the beautiful wife of someone like Arthur Langdon. Instead, she chooses to retreat into her own mind: she rebels against the unfair and rigid rules set for her by going to the only place where she can make her own.