The life and fate of Elaine Coleman are stated in the story’s first paragraph: “Gradually the posters became rain-wrinkled and streaked with grime, the blurred photos seemed to be fading away, and then one day they were gone, leaving behind a faint uneasiness that itself dissolved slowly in the smoke-scented autumn air (Millhauser, 21).” She went unnoticed by everyone and was easily forgotten in daily life until this disinterest turned into excitement at her disappearance. However, the guilt people felt over her fate caused them to move on until their guilt dissolved with their interest in the case.
The point to the short story “The Disappearance of Elaine Coleman” was that we only remember certain people when something horrible happens to them. Elaine never made any lasting impression on anyone. The people of the unnamed town could only remember glimpses of her from high school. She only existed in the background, seen but never noticed. The only information we received about Elaine was purely factual, stemming from the police reports and newspapers the community reads. Everything else was imagined or theorized predominately by the narrator. He obsessively tried to remember something about her:
I tried to bring her into sharper focus, but it was like I hadn’t looked at her directly…I could not summon Elaine Coleman’s face…I now recalled catching glimpses of a half-familiar face during summers…I had long ago forgotten her name…I noticed her without looking at her, as one might notice a friend’s aunt (25-26)
Any other detail about Elaine that could explain who she really was came from the narrator’s dreams and half memories.
Because no one could remember her, there was an overwhelming feeling of guilt throughout the story. As the narrator stated, “I felt that we were guilty of some obscure crime. For it seemed to me that we who had seen her now and then…who without malice failed to give her our full attention…pushing her in the direction of disappearance…Sometimes I had the impression that people were angry at her, as if by disappearing she had complicated our lives (Millhauser, 31-33).” It was because of this guilt that the narrator sees the truth about her disappearance. But is it really the truth? All of his impressions of Elaine were in dreams or imagined. Her literal disappearance was emotionally satisfying because of his feelings of guilt. No one, not even the police, figured out what happened to Elaine because no one in town could remember her. There are two explanations for her disappearance: fantastic and realistic. Did she literally disappear (fantastic) or was she kidnapped or abducted or did she simply run away (realistic)?
I never considered the possibility that Elaine might have chosen to run away, as opposed to being taken against her will. This interpretation provides a somewhat hopeful ending to a very dark and uncertain story; while her old life may be gone and forgotten, perhaps she is currently living the life of her dreams elsewhere with people who will actually respect and cherish her.
I agree with their being two explanations to the story. The entire time you think it’s very realistic: a girl goes missing and no one seems to remember her. That’s just a classic mystery. But when you get to the ending, you realize this was the fantastic all along. I love how you pointed out that this may not be the truth. It’s true that sometimes we will use the fanatic to explain things when we have no further ideas of logic. Since no one knew her, no one actually cares enough to find out what happened to her. So the fanatic was probably easier to digest than the truth.
Or a third choice…did she ever really exist?
At the very end of the short story, the narrator suggests that everybody had a play in her disappearance. He speculates that Elaine disappeared emotionally years before she disappeared physically. This story had an eerie tone to it, which was appealing, to say the least. In the beginning, Millhauser opens the story by saying, “The news of the disappearance disturbed and excited us.” (21) By including this, I believe that he is trying to create the since of unfamiliarity between the connection of Elaine and the town. I also agree with what you said about how people only remember people if something happens to them. For example, if someone gets into a car accident, everybody is suddenly their best friend. The main character turned obsessive when trying to remember who Elaine was and what role she played in the lives of others.
I linked the obvious guilt to a little bit of selfishness. Everyone makes tragedies about themselves, it’s the best way that any of us can relate. But this character really takes it to the extreme. He makes up memories about her, analyzes her and forms her character and life around himself, and eventually says that he killed her. To me that’s peak selfishness. Ignoring what her fate must’ve been (most likely unfortunate) and making her into everything he thinks she is.