“Self-centered? Probably. Aren’t we all? Why is it a term of accusation? That is what it was when I was a child. I was considered difficult. Impossible, indeed, was the word sometimes used. I didn’t think I was impossible at all: it was mother and nurse who were impossible, with their injunctions and their warnings, their obsession with milk puddings and curled hair and their terror of all that was inviting about the natural world-high trees and deeper water and the texture of wet grass on bare feet, the allure of mud and snow and fire. I always ached-burned-to go higher and faster and further. They admonished; I disobeyed.”
Claudia is not a conformist girl for she flouts all the standards that her mother has for her. Her noncompliance is what contributes to her being catalogued as problematic. Manifestly, her mother and nurse are self-centered, for they impose their wishes on Claudia, yet Claudia is enthusiastic with exploring nature. Although they reproach her, Claudia is resolute to lead her life like a free-spirit. Tagging Claudia as difficult is authoritarianism which exhibits Claudia’s mother’s self-centeredness which she Projects on Claudia.
“Mythology is much better stuff than history. It has form; logic; a message. I once thought I was a myth. Summoned to the drawing-room, aged six or so, to meet a relative richer and more worldly than Mother, of whom Mother was in awe, I found myself swept up, held at arms’ length by this gorgeous scented woman.”
The allegorical myth accentuates Claudia’s Self-concept. Equating herself to a myth implies that she is extraordinary. Her super-naturalness can be explicated through a mythology which would highlight her exceptionality. For Claudia, conventional history would not expound her lifespan sufficiently for she is more than an historical figure.
“When I was about nine I asked God to eliminate my brother Gordon. Painlessly but irreversibly. At Lindisfarne, as it happens, to which we had been taken not to reflect upon the Viking raids of which probably Mother had never heard but to walk out to the island along the causeway and have a picnic thereon. And Gordon and I raced across the spit of land, and Gordon being one year older and quite faster was all set to win, of course. And I gasped up this prayer, in fury and passion, meaning it-oh, quite meaning it. Never again, I said, will I ask You for anything. Anything at all. Just grant this. Now. Instantly. It is interesting to note that I had to demand Gordon’s extinction.”
Claudia’s prayer presents connotations of sibling rivalry. She is envious of her brother since he is fast. Her innocence convinces her that Gordon’s demise would bid her the prospect of being perceived a fast runner. The prayer does not indicate that Claudia does not adulate her brother, though. Claudia is competitive and she reckons her brother an opponent in terms of the running competition.
