The Wedding People

“But now Phoebe stands before a nineteenth-century Newport hotel in an emerald silk dress, the only item in her closet she can honestly say she still loves, probably because it was the one thing she had never worn.”

Phoebe’s meticulous selection of her appearance on the day she plans to die by suicide reinforces a recurring motif that links personal appearance to internal values. Like choosing a wedding dress, Phoebe invests considerable thought into her attire for this life-altering moment, underscoring how personal appearance reflects her inner self and her judgments of others.

“Yet there the line is, stretching all the way through the lobby and past the historic oak staircase. The people in it look wrong, too—wearing windbreakers and jeans and sneakers.”

Phoebe’s arrival at the Cornwall Inn highlights her sense of alienation and disconnection from her surroundings. The incongruity between the formal setting and the casual attire of the people highlights her feelings of being out of place in the environment she once idealized. She judges the people around her not by the content of their character but by clothing she finds inappropriate for the setting, evidenced by juxtaposing windbreakers, jeans, and sneakers with a historic oak staircase.

“She is nobody, and the only good thing about being nobody is that she can now say whatever the fuck she wants. Even to the bride.”

Phoebe’s acknowledgment of her anonymity represents a newfound freedom and sense of liberation. Her status as a “nobody” empowers her to express her true feelings without concern for social repercussions, reflecting her shift toward embracing authenticity without fear of scrutiny. Although harsh, Phoebe’s newfound tone and blunt honesty establish her journey to recover her individuality.

“Her whole life felt like work now. Even the parts that used to be the most fun, like reading over the summer or orgasming during sex or having conversations with her husband at dinner. They felt like things she had to be really good at now, in order to prove that everything was normal.”

The narrative marks Phoebe’s depression symptoms by an overwhelming sense of pressure and exhaustion. The activities that once brought joy now feel burdensome and performative, underscoring her struggle to maintain a façade of normalcy while grappling with her internal dissatisfaction and emotional strain. Phoebe initially experiences Cultivating Unexpected Connections to Find Fulfillment Amidst Life’s Challenges by listing how her internal makeup is lost.

“She wanted to walk into the awards ceremony and be noticed. Because if she wasn’t going to have children, she should at least have magnificent dresses.”

Phoebe’s desire for recognition through her attire reflects her yearning for validation in the absence of motherhood. The grandeur of the dresses symbolizes her attempt to assert her worth and make a statement about her identity, compensating for the roles she feels she is missing. Phoebe felt fully prepared to sacrifice all frivolities as a mother, but now she feels entitled to indulge after experiencing pregnancy loss, evidenced here by a “magnificent dress.”

“Phoebe has become good over the years at detecting who has a loving mother and who does not, because Phoebe believes a loving mother gives a person a kind of confidence to exist that Phoebe never quite had. Phoebe could never burst into someone else’s room and give orders like it’s her own.”

Phoebe perceives women who experience supportive relationships with their living mothers as privileged, as this is not something she has, and instilled with greater confidence. In doing so, Phoebe highlights the importance of a nurturing maternal figure and the significant loss she experienced—and continues to feel—without this type of influence in her life.

“Phoebe was quiet and obedient, never talking too fast or too loudly, because she never wanted to be a burden to her father. She had felt this way in her marriage, too—careful never to cry too hard or tell meandering stories at dinner. Careful always to wear nice pajamas to bed.”

Phoebe details a pattern of self-restraint and her tendency to suppress her true emotions and needs. This behavior, shaped by her relationship with her father and later her marriage, reveals her fear of being a burden. This drives her to constantly manage her behavior to avoid causing discomfort. However, by constantly trying to please the men in her life, shown here by emotional restraint and appearances, Phoebe loses sight of her needs and well-being.

“Phoebe thinks you can tell a lot about a hotel by its hot tub, the way she could tell a lot about her husband by looking at his fingernails when she first met him in the computer lab.”

Phoebe’s comparison between the hotel’s hot tub and her husband’s fingernails underscores her belief in the significance of small details as indicators of larger truths. Her focus on these seemingly minor elements reflects her desire to understand and judge the deeper aspects of her relationships and environments based on superficial appearances.

“‘Personally, I never kill myself unless there’s room service,’ he says. She laughs—it feels like a cloud slipping out her mouth, floating up to the sky.”

This moment of dark humor and fleeting lightness amidst Phoebe’s turmoil illustrates Espach’s comedic relief style of writing. The humor in the comment and Phoebe’s reaction symbolize a temporary escape from her pain, providing a brief but significant reprieve from the weight of her struggles.

“But it feels exciting, actually, to put on some other woman’s sequins for the day.”

Phoebe‘s experience of donning another woman’s glamorous attire symbolizes her temporary escape from her reality. The excitement she feels reflects her desire to inhabit a different persona and experience life from a new, more vibrant perspective. This highlights her longing for transformation and reinvention. By hiding behind someone else’s appearance, Phoebe gives herself a vacation to explore other opportunities for herself.

“Lila sits perched on the boat like she’s sitting in her own living room—upright, poised, with the confidence of a woman who has systematically removed all of her body hair. Nothing bad can happen to a woman like that during her wedding week, not even in the middle of the ocean.”

Lila‘s outward self-assuredness contrasts heavily with Phoebe‘s insecurities. Lila’s poised and meticulously groomed appearance represents an ideal of control and perfection, suggesting that her confidence shields her from the uncertainties and vulnerabilities that Phoebe grapples with. In reality, Lila’s physical appearance does not reveal the emotional turmoil and internal conflict that doesn’t come to light until the novel’s end.

“Phoebe is moved to be called upon like this. For too long, she had felt stuck in the depths of her house, in the void of her depression, where she was not actually real. Where nothing was real.”

Phoebe’s emotional response to being needed signifies a moment of reconnection with her sense of self. The author contrasts her previous feelings of insignificance and detachment from reality with her being valued and needed. This marks a notable shift from her isolation, compared to the depths of her house or a void, to a renewed engagement with her identity and surroundings.

“But it’s a different kind of love, Phoebe knows. The wife is the reason the man becomes the architect. The mistress is the reason the architect keeps building. The blueprints of his dreams that he may never realize, so he keeps it in his drawer.”

This quote employs symbolism to contrast the roles of the wife and mistress to a husband, compared here to an architect. While the wife represents stability and foundational support, the mistress embodies passion and unfulfilled desire. The language of “blueprints of his dreams” describes aspirations that remain unrealized, and the act of hiding these dreams in a drawer symbolizes Matt’s secrecy about his infidelity with Mia. Ultimately, the truth comes out.

“And why is she always trying to reduce people, squeeze them into these knowable, tiny boxes where there is room for only one or two personality traits?”

Phoebe develops self-awareness about her tendency to minimize others’ complexity, described here as squeezing them into boxes where they can only have one or two traits. This observation highlights her struggle with understanding and accepting the intricacies of people, revealing her desire for clarity and control in a world that often feels chaotic.

“‘Oh, I don’t mind you being naked,’ Lila says, staring directly at Phoebe’s breasts. ‘I lived in a dorm room all my life. Seeing a naked woman is basically like seeing wallpaper.’”

While Phoebe views Lila’s repeated invasions of privacy and lack of boundaries throughout the novel, including when Phoebe is naked, Lila here describes the banality of the encounter. She compares seeing a naked woman to seeing wallpaper, highlighting its mundane nature.

“It was a good belt, Matt told her when she finally asked about it, said he bought it when he was eighteen, and that he hoped to keep it until he died. And she could see it all, how this man would care for this one belt his whole life.”

Phoebe’s tendency to judge others by their physical appearance often hyper-fixates on their choice of clothing, contributing further to the symbolic nature of physical appearances in the text. Phoebe puts Matt’s care for his belt on a pedestal, applying this habit to all other aspects of Matt’s personality. Phoebe eventually learns to look beyond her initial judgments of people and allow their actions to speak to their character.

“She wipes her tears, drops her phone into the purse, and walks into the sex shop.”

Espach frequently creates dark humor by juxtaposing more serious moments with comedic elements. While Phoebe is experiencing emotional turmoil, she must wipe her tears and face the matter at hand: entering a sex shop to buy party favors for Lila’s bachelorette party—a responsibility that takes precedence as her new maid of honor.

“‘I’m not sure happy is a feeling for me anymore,’ he says. ‘Ever since Wendy died, I don’t really think about what will make me happy. It’s like I decided at some point that I can’t ever be happy again, so I should just think about what will make other people happy.’”

Gary remains a flat character throughout The Wedding People. Unlike Phoebe, Matt never takes responsibility for his happiness, relying on others to make major life decisions and coordinate his experiences for him. Wendy’s death exacerbated this tendency, as he felt like he would never be happy again and should do what would please others.

“Phoebe imagines that rebuilding after each devastation must be a real chore, especially for a place like Flo’s, which has knickknacks covering every inch of the walls. To rebuild each time with the same level of bursting, idiosyncratic personality—how do you do that?”

Flo’s tendency to rebuild after a major storm symbolizes the resilience that Phoebe reflects upon and seeks to emulate. Phoebe’s life and how she is currently in a rebuilding phase make her particularly mindful of the necessity of reconstructing after experiencing devastation.

“I think we talk about happiness all wrong. As if it’s this fixed state we’re going to reach. Like we’ll just be able to live there, forever. But that’s not my experience with happiness. For me, it comes and goes. It shows up and then disappears like a bubble.”

This perspective challenges the idea that one can achieve and maintain lasting happiness, emphasizing its natural fluctuations instead. The comparison to a bubble highlights the fragility and unpredictability of happiness, underscoring its temporary and often elusive nature. In understanding the fleeting nature of happiness, Phoebe can better adjust her expectations in finding future joy.

“I think it’s more like when someone brings a dog to the groomer and the dog comes out looking like it’s been robbed.”

This simile highlights Phoebe’s reluctance to forgo judging people by their physical appearance. Having developed a fondness for Gary’s beard, Phoebe dislikes seeing him clean-shaven and prepared for his wedding. She equates a bearded Gary to the man falling in love with her, even though a shaved Gary still harbors intense romantic feelings for Phoebe.

“Phoebe feels powerless to help. She imagines this is what mothers often feel. Powerlessness is part of the package. So she does what she can: She brings her to the room Juice shares with Gary. But at the door, Juice just cries.”

Phoebe momentarily experiences Motherhood and the Expectation of Sacrifice as she consoles Juice. Phoebe must set aside her complicated emotions about Gary, her mother, and Lila to address the child’s needs.

“A wedding is always a fleeting spectacle that is one hundred percent going to become packed down into a teeny tiny garbage square that’ll wind up in your father’s landfill someday.”

Phoebe addresses Lila’s concerns about waste and offense after canceling her wedding by pointing to the amount of garbage that successful weddings produce. In doing so, Phoebe asks the question, “Are weddings worth all the waste?” While she may have answered with “no” at the novel’s opening, Phoebe affirms that Lila’s wedding week directly contributed to saving her life by the novel’s end.