A History of Forgetting

Susan Merskey is freelance writer in London, Ontario.

As his partner Denis descends into the hell of Alzheimer’s disease,
Malcolm Firth copes with weary grace and acerbic wit. At the hair salon
where he works, Malcolm caters to a group of elderly ladies. One client,
a Holocaust survivor, gives Alison, the salon’s apprentice, her first
glimpse into the depredations of the human race.

The brutal murder of one of their coworkers by Nazi skinheads sends
Alison on a harrowing journey toward understanding. She and Malcolm
travel to post-Communist Poland where they struggle to reconstitute the
past through a visit to Auschwitz. Here, the roomful of hair links the
past with the present—the hair of those who perished is inexorably
linked to the Holocaust survivor client at home. Alison’s washing of
Malcolm’s hair after their visit to Auschwitz is not only symbolic of
the need to wash away something of what they have seen that day, but
also expunges some of Malcolm’s grief over the loss of Denis.

Caroline Adderson’s first book, a collection of short stories titled
Bad Imaginings (1993), won the Ethel Wilson Prize for Fiction. A History
of Forgetting, her first novel, grips the reader’s attention from
start to finish. Adderson has a clear gift for description. Her
chronicling of Denis’s gradual deterioration into total helplessness,
narrated at intervals throughout the book, shows a sensitive awareness
of the disease’s relentless progression and its effects on the
patient’s friends and relations.