Response to Vreeland's Olympia's Look

I liked this short story of Vreeland’s better than The Yellow Jacket. I thought she portrayed Suzanne Manet’s character very well. Throughout the story the reader notices Suzanne Manet’s growth from a jealous wife, to an understanding wife. In most of the story, Suzanne is a somber widow with unanswered questions. She is dying to know which of her late husband’s models that he had affairs with were, and questioned his love for her. She shows complete bitterness towards all his models, and a tinge of revenge. When she is obligated to talk to one of her husband’s models, who was asking her for money, she breaks out in rage at her going through every detail of his death and last few weeks of his life. As she does this she realizes that what Edouard had with these women was nothing to what he shared with her. Those girls were pure infatuation and lust, nothing more. Edouard always stayed with her through thick and thin and in times of need looked toward his wife. He loved her for her soul, as the story states, even if she wasn’t a beauty like all his models. As Victorine put it, they only “collaborated”, or gave eachother what the other needed. No feelings or emotions, just business. It was at that moment, as Suzanne was yelling at Victorine, did she realize this and began to feel a little foolish for sharing information Victorine did not truly care about. Suzanne developed an understanding of Edouard’s relationships with the models and realized they were all foolish young girls and him just a man, and the love she always felt for her husband grew.
I think the two passages that really explain Suzanne’s character are very similar. They both show how she doesn’t act unless given an opportunity to. For example, in the story, when she sees Edouard slip Helene the letter, only then does she decide to actually take the letter, even though she has always suspected him of affairs. She then puts the letter in a spot where she hopes he’ll see it and wonders whether or not he’ll bring it up. She never took action and just asked him, she just hoped he would say something first so she could then bring up her feelings. Also, in another part of the story, she gets a letter from Victorine asking for money. It is only because of this does she go to see Victorine and spill her guts about how she feels about all his affairs. She never would have done it on her own, she needed a reason to, and Victorine’s letter was the reason. Basically, these passages showed that Suzanne was afraid to conflict others without some kind of support or evidence. In a way, that is good that she waits for evidence, but instead of living in doubt and depression, she could have just brought it up to her husband in the first place and just talked to him, without needing evidence, because if he loved her he would care more about her feelings than anything. Instead, she made herself suffer and waited for an excuse to blow up in the end. But she learned from her mistakes and took action, finally, but going against Edouard’s wishes and not paying Victorine for something she felt Victorine didn’t deserve. These two passages really captured Suzanne’s character well. In general, this is a very good historical fiction. One would wonder how Suzanne really felt and reacted to Edouard’s affairs, if she ever knew they existed.