Small Pleasures

Jean Swinney, a columnist and features editor at the Echo, is the protagonist of Small Pleasures. Jean is unmarried, in her 30s, and the primary caretaker of her elderly mother. Highly observed and observant, Jean restricts herself regularly from indulging in life, allowing herself only small moments of freedom in between her obligations, like smoking cigarettes with her garter unbuckled while her mother takes her weekly bath or “eating in public” which is “something her mother would never do”—an action that “still struck her as bold and rebellious, adding greatly to her enjoyment” (48). Jean does not wear make-up and has graying hair and a larger build, which makes her negatively compare herself with Gretchen’s.

As Jean spends more time with the Tilbury family, her understanding of desire and pleasure changes as she unburdens herself and experiences more than she allowed herself before she started researching Gretchen’s case. However, Jean still adheres to her unflinching sense of obligation once she discovers the truth of Margaret’s conception—she refuses to share this truth with the Tilburys and she also feels she should give up her love for Howard out of a sense of

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