Meike's Reviews > Molly

Butler's controversial memoir about the suicide of his first wife Molly Brodak led to a rather outraged discussion whether it's valid to write about how a mentally ill person who took her own life pushed her loved ones to the psychological limit - and bless all those self-righteous people who think they take the moral high ground by condemning the author, you very obviously didn't spend years of your life trying to take care of a psychologically disturbed family member. The thing is: It's a taboo to talk about how the sickness of a loved one can destroy their caretakers, especially when these caretakers deeply love the afflicted person. And it's a common occurrence: Many people who tend to seriously (physically or mentally) ill family members over a longer period of time develop illnesses themselves, due to exhaustion, and, yes, moral pressure: "How dare you complain, you're not the one being sick!" They have to suffer in silence, or they are declared to be bad people.

And that's what at the root of the conversation here: Butler tries to understand Molly's mental disposition, which was likely bipolar disorder, he tries to get to terms with their toxic dynamic, and with the things he discovers about his dead wife after she shot herself. He aims to construct explanations related to her childhood, which is, of course, futile kitchen psychology, he will never truly know. At the same time, he loses both of his parents to dementia. It's pretty hard to maintain that this book is literary revenge, because Butler himself looks pretty bad in the text: Unfaithfulness, lots of alcohol, general edgelordery, problems with personal borders, a temper, giving a ton of psychedelic drugs to a mentally ill woman, the list goes on.

The dynamic between Molly and Butler is so toxic, you don't even know where to begin. But this is not the source of Molly's problems: Trying to find some kind of transactional cause-and-effect relation means blaming Butler for Molly's bipolar disorder, but the disorder adds to the situation, the illness itself is not Butler's fault. And there are limits to what Butler can do about it. Let that sink in, and ponder what that degree of helplessness means for him. The illness also doesn't take all personal responsibilty from Molly, she still has agency. The problems of course lie in determing where, when and how the illness affects her agency.

So is Blake Butler a great guy? Who knows, the rendition he shows us in the novel is a flawed guy struggling to be a husband to Molly, who herself struggles to be a wife. What's hard to maintain is that he is here to demean a dead person. The text has plenty of contra-arguments, and it's important to let family members of ill people talk without judging them so harshly and self-righteously. Also, the whole thing is very well-written, especially the beginning which takes us along when Butler discovers the body: It's devastating to read.