The Unreliability of Memory and the Shaping of Identity in My Darling Dreadful Thing

Johanna van Veen’s Gothic novel is built on a paradox: the narrator, Roos, tells her story with fierce conviction, yet every memory she offers is contested—by the police, by her mother, by Doctor Montague, and even by the reader. The novel’s central thematic claim is that identity is not a fixed essence but a story we tell ourselves, and that unreliable memory can both distort and sustain that story. Roos’s sense of self emerges not from objective facts but from the emotional truths she clings to: her bond with Ruth, her love for Agnes, and her refusal to let anyone else define her past. By weaving together Roos’s first-person recollections, Doctor Montague’s clinical transcripts, and the author’s own framing, van Veen shows that memory is never a simple record—it is a living, contested force that shapes who we become.

The Fragmented Foundation: Early Memory and the Birth of Ruth

Roos’s earliest memory, described in Chapter 1, is of crouching beneath the floorboards of her mother’s séance room as a five-year-old, pulling strings rigged to produce ghostly effects. The memory is visceral: the darkness, the terror, the weeping that led to her mother’s thrashing. In that cramped space, she meets Ruth—a creature who wants to drink her blood. The moment Roos bites her own hand until it bleeds, and Ruth licks the blood, fixes her dislocated jaw, and declares them wedded, becomes the origin of Roos’s identity. This memory is not just a recollection; it is the foundation of her self-understanding. Ruth is her protector, her only friend, and the one who gives her a name—Roosje, darling.

Yet the memory is already unstable. Roos herself reflects that if she hadn’t spilled her blood, Ruth might have found another girl. This suggests that her identity is contingent, born of a chance act. Doctor Montague later offers a psychological explanation: Ruth is a creation of Roos’s mind, a survival mechanism to make her fear comprehensible. But Roos rejects this, insisting that Ruth is real. The novel never resolves this dispute, and that ambiguity is central to the theme. Roos’s identity is built on a memory that may be a delusion, but the emotional truth—that she needed love and found it in Ruth—remains undeniable.

The Séance as Performance: Identity as Role-Playing

The prologue and early chapters depict Roos’s childhood as a series of performances. Mama presents her as a frail child in white dresses, and Roos invites Ruth into her body to pretend to channel spirits. The séances are fake, but they are also a space where Roos’s identity becomes fluid. She is not herself; she is Ruth, or a vessel for Ruth. This blurring of boundaries is both a survival tactic and a source of trauma. Clients pinch, fondle, or strike her, and she must feign exhaustion afterward. Her body becomes a stage on which others project their desires, and her sense of self is constantly overwritten.

The novel’s use of the bog as a symbol deepens this. Ruth is described as a bog body—her skin dyed brown, her hair red, her jaw broken. The bog preserves but also erases; it holds bodies in a state between life and death. Roos’s identity is similarly suspended: she is neither fully herself nor fully Ruth, neither child nor adult, neither sane nor mad. The blood that binds them is both a wound and a covenant, marking her as Ruth’s even as it marks her as damaged.

Therapy and Confession: The Contest over Memory

The novel’s structure—alternating Roos’s narrative with Doctor Montague’s transcripts—turns memory into a battleground. Montague, a young doctor assessing Roos’s fitness for trial, tries to reinterpret her memories through the lens of Freudian psychology. He suggests that Ruth is a split psyche, a shadow-self, and that Roos’s stories about Agnes’s past are fabrications. In one transcript, he confronts Roos with a nun’s denial of the convent school incident, and Roos responds with fury: “Why can’t you just let me tell you my story?” This moment crystallizes the theme. Roos’s identity is her story, and Montague’s attempts to correct it threaten to erase her.

Yet Montague is not a villain. The author’s interview reveals that he acts out of genuine intent to help, but he has blind spots because of the scientific theories he works with. His transcripts are anachronistic, and his conclusions are reductive. The novel thus critiques the authority of clinical memory, which claims to know the truth better than the patient does. Roos’s memories may be unreliable, but so are Montague’s interpretations. The reader is left to weigh competing versions of the past, and the novel refuses to declare a winner.

The Epilogue: Memory as Sustenance and Identity as Waiting

In the epilogue, years after the events, Roos lives quietly, typing for Montague and waiting for Agnes. She fears Agnes has forsaken her, but she holds that the love and yearning must mean something. She plans to rise from the grave if she dies before Agnes returns, believing that even if all other memories fade, Agnes will not be forgotten. This is the culmination of the theme: Roos’s identity is now defined by her memory of Agnes, and by her hope that Agnes will become a spirit. She senses a presence—a ghost of a hand, a familiar scent—and concludes that Agnes is stirring. “Until then, the narrator lets the memory possess her.”

This ending is both hopeful and ambiguous. Roos’s memory of Agnes may be as unreliable as her memory of Ruth, but it sustains her. The novel suggests that identity is not about objective truth but about the stories we choose to live by. Roos’s identity as a lover, a survivor, and a faithful companion is built on memories that may be fantasies, yet they give her purpose and meaning.

Complexity and Contradiction: The Unresolvable Question

The novel deliberately leaves the question of Ruth’s reality unresolved. Doctor Montague offers a psychological explanation, but Roos argues that if a pill could make him unable to see colors, he wouldn’t think colors were an illusion. This analogy is powerful, but it doesn’t prove Ruth is real—it only proves that perception is subjective. The author’s note calls the book a love story, and the reading group guide asks readers to consider whether Roos is an unreliable narrator and whether they trusted her perspective. The novel thus invites multiple readings: Ruth may be a ghost, a hallucination, or a metaphor for Roos’s trauma. Each reading changes the meaning of Roos’s identity.

This ambiguity is not a flaw but a feature. It mirrors the way memory actually works—fragmented, self-serving, and emotionally charged. Roos’s identity is not a stable thing; it is constantly being renegotiated through her memories, her confessions, and her relationships. The novel suggests that we are all unreliable narrators of our own lives, and that the stories we tell ourselves are both our salvation and our prison.

Symbolic Connections

The symbols in the novel reinforce this theme. Ruth’s jaw is broken and dislocated, and Roos must slot it back into place—a physical act that mirrors the way she tries to fix her own fragmented memories. The plaster saints that appear in the narrative represent a hollow, institutionalized faith, contrasting with the genuine, if unorthodox, devotion Roos feels for Ruth and Agnes. The bog preserves bodies but also erases them, just as memory preserves some details while letting others decay. Blood, as a symbol, is both a wound and a covenant, marking the moments when Roos’s identity is forged through sacrifice.

Study Questions and Answers

1. How does Roos’s earliest memory of Ruth under the floorboards establish the theme of unreliable memory?

Roos’s memory is vivid but already unstable—she notes that if she hadn’t spilled her blood, Ruth might have found another girl. This suggests that her identity is contingent on a chance event. Doctor Montague later offers a psychological explanation, but Roos rejects it, leaving the reader to decide whether Ruth is real or a creation of trauma. The memory is foundational to Roos’s sense of self, yet its reliability is never confirmed.

2. In what ways do the séances blur the boundaries of Roos’s identity?

During séances, Roos invites Ruth into her body, pretending to channel spirits. This performance makes her identity fluid—she is not herself but a vessel for Ruth. The fake séances also expose her to abuse, as clients touch her and she must feign exhaustion. This blurring of self and other, reality and performance, is central to the novel’s exploration of identity as constructed rather than fixed.

3. How does Doctor Montague’s therapy challenge Roos’s memory, and why does Roos resist his interpretations?

Montague tries to reinterpret Ruth as a split psyche and suggests that Roos’s stories about Agnes’s past are fabrications. Roos resists because his interpretations threaten to erase her identity. She insists on telling her own story, even if it is unreliable. The novel critiques the authority of clinical memory, showing that Montague’s theories are also limited by his historical context.

4. What role does the epilogue play in the theme of memory and identity?

In the epilogue, Roos’s identity is defined by her memory of Agnes and her hope that Agnes will become a spirit. She senses Agnes’s presence and lets the memory possess her. This suggests that identity can be sustained by unreliable memories, as long as they provide emotional meaning. The epilogue leaves open whether Agnes will return, but Roos’s faith in her memory is what keeps her going.

5. Does the novel ultimately suggest that identity is real or constructed?

The novel suggests that identity is constructed through memory and storytelling, but that this construction is not false—it is the only way we can make sense of our lives. Roos’s identity as a lover and survivor is built on memories that may be delusions, yet they give her purpose. The novel refuses to declare a single truth, instead showing that identity is a process of continuous reinterpretation, shaped by trauma, love, and the stories we tell ourselves.