In “Granite” the very obvious fantastic element is the slow transformation of the main character’s boyfriend into stone. However I think the grander fantastic element is the fact that loving a man can physically harm him. Maggie talks about her friends not really having any feelings for the men they are with and everyone advising against falling in love. At first when Maggie says
“Men, they say, are not built to withstand the same internal pressures. You can see it in their hips, the way they breathe after running. A lack in anatomical endurance.”
it made me feel like the story was going to be a role reversal of men and women, like how society sees them. I’m pretty sure the author does this intentionally, making it easier for us to view men as very weak, and almost secondary to women, throughout the story. But instead, it becomes a story about hurting someone by loving them. It seems like her endless affection was actually harming him, regardless of whether or not he returned the feelings. Being loved by her was literally draining the life out of him. I wonder if the intent was to tell a story about how not all love is healthy for both people and how people can suffocate their partner. Even if that partner isn’t aware they’re doing it.
Kaia,
You bring up an interesting point about gendered pressures. The concept of this woman narrator smothering her lover with affection is a gendered cliché itself, while the lover turns to stone, or, emotionless (as cold as a stone). The fantastic here, as you pointed out, is that he turns to actual stone. If you read closer, this message could be tangled with a deeper metaphor; men like it when girls are hard to get.
What is even more interesting is how the narrator feels about this love. We can see that she adores her lover, but then questions if these feelings are true.
“There’s always something with you,’ her friends had said to her. ‘Something with any man you meet. It’s like you don’t want a man at all, you want an object.”
This message straddles this nuanced gendered pressures women face (being swept up off their feet), and the want for freedom (I don’t need a man). Thus, her lover has turned into stone, as, just like the definition of stone (hard solid nonmetallic mineral matter shaped for a purpose), he has served his purpose for her.