“Like Mother Used to Make” (1949)

I’m starting to see where Shirley Jackson may have been done some disservice by editors and/or publishers. The Library of America edition edited by Joyce Carol Oates restores the full title to Jackson’s Lottery collection originally published in 1949: The Lottery; or, The Adventures of James Harris. It was simply The Lottery and Other Stories in most editions. The idea of James Harris, a literary figure who traces back at least to an English 17th-century murder ballad, may not have been fully developed across all of Jackson’s stories in the collection, but James Harris (or variations of the name) shows up frequently as a sinister demonic figure, notably in “The Daemon Lover” and “Like Mother Used to Make.” “Like Mother” is one of his best appearances. He seems to have unusual powers, or at least a preternatural, seductive confidence. David and Marcia are neighbors in an apartment building and have some kind of ill-defined relationship. Marcia would likely call it a friendship, no more. David has traits that suggest he could be gay. He’s fussy and fastidious and thinks a lot about things like decor and silverware patterns. Marcia is more of an ungainly mess, always late to everything. On this occasion, David is making her dinner at his place and we get well inside his head as he works on it. He doesn’t seem terribly attracted to Marcia. In many ways she annoys him. But they are friends and get along with mild friction. Just as they finish eating Marcia hears someone at her door across the way. It’s “Mr. Harris,” who says, “I just thought I’d stop by.” He completely takes over the social situation and seems to have designs on Marcia. Somehow, before long, David is excusing himself from his own place, leaving it and going over to Marcia’s. He can hear that Marcia and Mr. Harris have turned on his radio. “Wearily,” he begins to clean Marcia’s place. It’s a remarkable situation and unsettling to witness as a reader. Even if David is gay it’s still humiliating, forced (somehow) to leave his own place to them. Jackson may have intended, somewhat homophobically, to deepen David’s humiliation by making him gay and explicitly less manly and thus prone to the will of Harris, as opposed to gay and why would he care. Although, well, it’s 1949 and likely at best he is closeted—and he abandons his own place to them, that’s the fine point, bowing to Harris. Presumably Harris could have David too if he wanted.

Shirley Jackson, Novels and Stories
Listen to story online.