The Intruder by Andre Dubus

Conflict Essay on "The Intruder" by Andre Dubus

"The Intruder" by Andre Dubus tells of an adolescent boy, a fantasist and recluse among his peers whose family is at its summer cabin in the woods. On a night when his parents are out at a banquet, his older sister amuses her boyfriend, whose departure is merely a trick to get Kenneth to sleep. When the boyfriend comes sneaking back, Kenneth awakens, bringing dreadful consequences to the intruder. The point of view is third person limited omniscient because he escapes his reality and gets to be someone else that is opposite of himself. An outrageous coming of age lies at the center of the short story.

Kenneth Girard is a shy, solitary boy and he is not athletic which is important because his sister dates a jock. He is jealous when her boyfriend is coming over, and he is thirteen and has no one else; also, he is a round and dynamic character. Kenneth wants to feel adored by his sister as much as he adores her and through this ambition, Dubus competently authenticates how an attentive imagination can be dangerous. Dubus makes the viewer's conscious of Kenneth's adoration for his sister in the first line of the story when Kenneth escapes to the woods to dream. "Because Kenneth Girard loved his parents and his sister and because he could not tell them why he went to the woods, his first moments there were always uncomfortable ones, as if he had left the house to commit a sin" (Dubus, 219). The viewer's know that Kenneth admires two things, being in the woods where he can dream, and being alone with his sister. The viewer's also understand that their relationship remains more than just sibling affection when Dubus writes, "She was the most beautiful girl he knew. She was also the only person with whom, for his entire life, he had been nearly perfectly at ease. He could be silent with her or he could say whatever occurred to him and he never had to think about it first to assure himself that it was not foolish or, worse, uninteresting" (Dubus 220). He is utterly taken with his sister and all that she does. Dubus is not only initiating the love Kenneth feels for Connie, but also the admiration he has for her. She is like a friend to him; the viewer's also know that he admires his sister and enjoys his relationship with her.

Young Kenneth Girard struggles with the angst filled "inbetweeness" of adolescence. Dubus portrays this agonizing time through the boy's forbidden love of fantasy, imagination and story, rather than focusing on sexual awakening like most stories in this vein. Kenneth's powerful and slightly awkward love for his worldly sister pales when compared to his love of imagination, and both forces - the child like wonder and the adult like lust - work together to drive the story to its perfect conclusion.