Bingo 12: School
Some of the more significant moments especially towards the beginning of Lessons in Chemistry, as well as some later generally consistent episodes related to school work and learning put this one in the School spot.
It’s no secret that being female in academia has been a challenge for a significant part of history, and Lessons in Chemistry starts with the worst parts of the 1950s-1960s horrific treatment of women in higher education (seriously, there should be a CW for the assault scene). The professional struggles that follow for Eliabeth, wherein she is always the smartest person in the room but the only woman and thus never taken seriously (except by one guy, and Calvin’s just different). Think of every discriminatory thing, big and small, that might happen to a female STEM person, including being mistaken for the secretary repeatedly, denied promotion or funding, and then getting fired for being a woman in a certain situation. It all happens to Elizabeth, and the only thing she ever wants is to be taken seriously as a scientist, and she’s got some kind of supposedly brilliant idea about abiogenesis, although no one ever seems to say exactly what it is.
Even though Elizabeth’s problems are real and absolutely unfair of the world, she’s still not that sympathetic. She’s always the smartest and prettiest person in the room. She finds massive success (sort of) as a tv cook/female uplifter, she finds true love, she has the perfect neighbor (who is another tragedy of the times in a different way), and yet she’s never happy because she’s not really a “scientist”. All she is, the entire story, is the scientist who is not allowed to be one. Tragic and unfair yes, but no that interesting after a while when that’s all she ever is. And she’s not the only character like that. The dog, 36, has more character than Elizabeth does; we actually do get some narration from 36’s perspective, and while he’s definitely a dog, he’s an interesting one. Mad, even though she’s a kid, seems more aware of the world than her mother in a lot of ways, and Mad’s the one with some help from the priest she meets in the library who actually helps solve one of the big personal mysteries of the novel. It’s this mystery that surrounds her dad that ends up opening the door to solve everything. Making Mad and Father Wakely more the heroes than the actual hero.
The emphasis on education isn’t done after Elizabeth leaves school; she frames her cooking show as lessons/teaching, and Mad’s school leads Elizbeth to that job, and it’s Mad’s assignment from the world’s most stereotypically evil teacher that kicks off her quest to solve the family mystery.
The ending is just too convenient. Sure it’s nice to see evil get squashed, and good a chance to finally do something, and the literal ‘me too’ is one of the best scenes, but it’s all just to much coincidence and when half the characters are a little one note, it doesn’t mean as much as it could have.