Twenty years later, Jeffrey Eugenides’ first novel still captures readers with lyrical writing and intriguing plot.
On the surface, it’s the story of five teenage girls who, suffering from the oppression and isolation of suburban home life, commit suicide.
Underneath, Jeffrey Eugenides’ The Virgin Suicides is the story of its narrators as much as its protagonists. It’s the tale of how a group of young men, narrating the novel as a collective “we,” became enraptured and entangled in the lives of the Lisbon sisters, peering down the street at the tragic home as if it were a snow globe on a shelf. It’s the tale of how simultaneously separate and intertwined our lives can be — the narrators know much about the case of the sisters because they’ve done extensive research in the wake of their suicides, but we never hear the story from the perspective of the sisters themselves, and the facts of what happened to the five girls is often foggy. Interspersed, it’s the story of being a teenager — dates and dances, parties and sex, the story of innocence, and how quickly innocence can be taken away.
Now, 20 years since the novel was first published, and 14 years since it was adapted into a film, the story of the Lisbon sisters and their admirers remains as poetic and dramatic as it once was.
Part of what is so captivating about the novel is Eugenides’ lyrical writing style, which stands in stark contrast to much of the disturbing plot and makes it easy for readers to maneuver even the most troubling passages. The novel was the author’s first, and according to The Daily Beast, he was so certain it wouldn’t be published that he used the names of his friends for the characters.
But The Virgin Suicides is also appealing simply because of its ability to be relevant without resorting to the typical novel about teenagers. The conflict is much larger than teenage flirtation gone awry, and it touches on more than just who likes whom. It approaches those high school feelings of crushes and embarrassment and social standards while really tackling those bigger ideas of life and death and community. Though written two decades ago, and about people living two decades before that, these sentiments still hit home today.
Eugenides has gone on to write several other novels since then, including his incredibly insightful and mesmerizing novel Middlesex. But The Virgin Suicides stands out as a story that is as unique as it is relatable, as dreamlike as it is real. These contrasts create a novel that has lasted as a significant work for 20 years and will continue to do so for many more.
