Alfred Lambert

Character Analysis

Alfred is like the Wizard of Oz—he's not always directly involved in the plot but he's always the main motivator behind the other characters. But the similarities run deeper than that. Like the Wizard, Alfred is looked upon with a mixture of fear and admiration. In the end, however, he's revealed to be nothing but a frail old man—not the all-powerful superhero he was thought to be.

Everyone has a different opinion about who Alfred is:

• Gary sees Alfred as Enid's tormentor. Gary believes that Alfred has always oppressed Enid and continues to do so today.
• Denise sees Alfred as her advocate. Denise loves Alfred because he's always "taken care to protect her privacy" (6.936) even when Enid didn't give her the courtesy. If this were a Team Edward versus Team Jacob situation, then she'd be the founding member of Team Alfred.
• Chip sees Alfred as evil incarnate. Chip finds his dad's political and cultural views to be so morally repugnant that he's defined himself in opposition to them.

Once Alfred becomes an old man—beset with a host of physical and psychological ailments—these images his children and wife have clung to begin to fade away. Here's what they become:

• Gary realizes that he is Alfred. In his panicked attempts to get as far away from his dad as possible, Gary ends up treating Caroline just like Alfred treated Enid. Oops.
• Denise realizes that she betrayed Alfred. Denise had no idea that her brief fling with Don Armour had such a devastating impact on Alfred. She's not the perfect daughter she thought she was.
• Chip realizes that he was always Alfred's favorite. Despite the fact that he has defined his life in reaction to Alfred, Chip has always been the apple of his dad's eye.

Although Alfred is no hero, we couldn't help but feel a tinge of sadness when he actually passed away. In the end, he's just an old man at the end of his rope—a living example of "disintegration-in-process" (6.1024).

It's true that there was little chance of his life—or his family's lives—getting much better had he lived. But did Alfred really deserve that end, isolated not only from the people he loves but also from reality itself? We're not sure that anybody deserves that, but so it goes in life sometimes.