Wilderness Tips

Wilderness Tips is the second volume of short stories by Margaret Atwood. The collection was published in 1991 by McClelland and Stewart with several stories appearing in The New Yorker, Saturday Night, Playboy, Harper’s and Vogue. The overall work has a rural modern setting. The ten short stories share characters, addressing issues, topics, and themes familiar to Atwood’s works, such as consumerism, sexual gender politics, and the construction of identity. The “wilderness” of the work’s title refers to a metaphorical understanding of the term, representative instead of life’s unpredictability and the importance of perspective. Taken altogether, these stories emphasize the importance of personal values and the construction of personal identity.

The first story, titled “True Trash,” begins in Canada in the 1960s and ends in the 1970s. This ten year leap in time is a plot device which demonstrates how these young adult characters mature. Camp Adanaqui is an all-boys summer camp in the interior islands. When a number of immature boys spy on the local female waitresses, Joanne and Ronette, Donny steals Monty’s binoculars and throws them into the water. Ronette rewards this behavior by sleeping with him. Ten years later, Joanne runs into Donny, who now goes by Don, in a diner. As the two reminisce, Joanne pieces together that Don is the father of Ronette’s child. Joanne makes the decision not to tell Don, because she perceives that the revelation, though shocking, would not enable the emotional closure she envisions.

“Hairball” tells a story of the power politics of gender and interpersonal dynamics, complicated by sex and professional competition. Kat, editor of a Canadian journal, is upset by her former lover who has replaced her as editor and returned to his wife. In an odd form of revenge, she decides to send him her recently-removed ovarian cyst, one mostly made up of hair. The “hairball” cyst is a paradoxical representation of the sense of “birth” she gave her lover which benefited both his personal and professional life. Kat temporarily leaves Canada to edit a journal in England. Eventually she returns to Toronto and is employed as a journal editor once more, reclaiming  her sense of identity and dignity.



“Isis in Darkness” follows a male protagonist, who is a failed poet and academic pedantic. He worships a female poet who once enchanted him as an attempt to fall back in love with the literary arts. He refers to this woman as the goddess Isis, worshipping her as the one true poet and viewing himself as an archaeologist of her mythology. The story focuses on his desire to live in a place of nostalgic disconnect from reality and a sense of denial permitted through these delusions he uses to replace reality.

The fourth story, titled “Bog Man,” contains this same academic figure, a real archaeologist named Connor, a man found in a bog, and a young female student who is his assistant and lover. The primary perspective becomes that of the female assistant. Her views of these three men--the academic and the archeologist, decay, much like the man in the bog has. While at the beginning of the story, she views the academic as a remarkable and empowered man, she soon considers him beneath the bog man. A similar deterioration occurs with her view of her mentor and lover, the archaeologist. Soon her once affectionate, flattering view of the archaeologist deteriorates each time she considers him in her mind’s eye.
The next story, titled “Death by Landscape,” is set in Manitou, an all-girls’ summer camp. The main characters are the camp’s owner Cappie, and two girls, best friends Lucy and Lois who are in attendance there. The principle plot tension revolves around the disappearance of Lucy during a canoe trip. Lois reflects on the events of that summer years later as a grown woman. Cappie’s need for an explanation, even an invented one, becomes the focus of Lois’s reflection. Lois now realizes the true extent of her own trauma as she reflects on Cappie’s inability to grapple with Lois’ ultimate and unknown fate.

“Uncles” tells the story of Susanna, a humble newspaper obit writer who quickly ascends in rank to become a celebrated radio and television interviewer. When a former colleague publishes a memoir, Susanna is called to question her recollections of the past. Susanna combs her recollections of the past in order to reconsider her perceptions of her career and self.



In “The Age of Lead,” shifts between two focal points, first the discovery of a frozen Arctic explorer named John Torrington after 150 years, and the death of Jane’s lifelong best friend Vincent due to an unknown and unnamable virus. As the news reveals the cause of death of Torrington, lead poisoning due to lead in canned food, Jane is left to wonder what virus caused Vincent’s death.

The following story, "Weight," follows Jane as she courts wealthy men in order to convince them to raise money for a Woman’s charity named Molly’s Home. The organization is named after one of her close friends, Molly, who was murdered by her husband. Jane’s obsession is unhealthy, and the story ends as she wakes up surprised and unsettled by the fact that she is not in somebody else’s bed.

The penultimate short story, “Wilderness Tips,” takes place within the span of a few hours in a family cabin outside of Toronto. George, a European immigrant and gangster is married to one of three sisters, though he is also sleeping with another and interested in the last sister as well. George accompanies the small group throughout the narrative. This short story, the namesake of the overall work, cues the thematic focus. The masterful shifts in perspective allow readers to view the situation from multitude sides.



The final short story, “Hack Wednesday,” concerns Marcia and Eric, an older, politically active and opinionated Canadian couple. Marcia is a columnist for a local business paper, and receives criticism from her editor, Ian, for writing about political issues such as malnourished kindergarteners, and domestic and child abuse. Ian believes that businessmen are not interested in these topics. She finds herself realizing she is unhappy in her marriage, and unprepared to retire.