Hogarth
Review by Linda Lappin
Anne Tyler’s delightful Vinegar Girl (2016) is often praised as a deliciously witty retelling of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. The novel shares the basic plot of much Women’s Fiction from time immemorial: the transformation of an unmarried woman – in this case a plain-spoken, reluctant spinster—into a loving wife. The ending made me cry – but not for the reasons you’d think. The author portrays a contemporary America as innocent and distant to us now as Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie. Tyler’s effervescent but unassuming romcom unfolds within the context of a social issue now wrecking families and tearing our nation apart: immigration.
Big-boned, gawky Kate Battista, a pre-school teacher, age 29, lives at home with her father – an eccentric scientist with government funding, and her loopy teen-age sister, Bunny. Kate is a practical but awkward woman, opinionated yet colorless, who keeps the household together and doesn’t have much of a life.
When the story opens, Kate’s father, Louis, is at a crossroads. Decades of hard work and sacrifice are about to come to fruition as a major breakthrough in his research looms just around the corner. But if he loses his Russian lab assistant, Pyotr, whose non-immigrant visa for scientific research expires within days, the project cannot be completed. In secret, Louis has concocted a plan whereby his elder daughter must make a marriage of convenience with Pytor ASAP so he can get a green card. Most amazingly, Kate plays along. After all, if her father’s project falls through, the family’s livelihood is at risk. Her “biological clock” is ticking, and she’s just fed up with being stuck in the status quo.
Louis wants Pyotr to move into a spare room in their home—but not into his daughter’s bedroom– until his green card is obtained, then daughter and assistant will go their separate ways. Instead, Kate will end up moving to Pyotr’s humble flat, where she discovers touching details about this man, whom we later learn other women find very sexy. Pyotr prizes Kate’s candor and integrity, while despising Bunny’s false sweetness. Hence his affectionate epithet for his future wife: Vinegar Girl. These two misfits form a strong bond.
Slapdash wedding plans are assembled. Kate’s uncle, a clergyman, will perform the ceremony, but at the appointed time, the groom doesn’t show. An alarming text message soon explains his absence: “A Terrible Event.” Animal rights activists have broken into Louis’s lab and stolen all the mice. Devastated, Louis wants to call the wedding off. No mice—no project, so Pyotr might as well go home to Russia.
Of course, that’s not what happens, or what Kate wants. Before the wedding party breaks up in disarray, Pyotr arrives in pajama shorts and red flip flops and everything works out in the end. Even the mice, unscathed, will be recovered through Pyotr’s heroic intervention. The wedding banquet joyfully concludes with Pyotr’s urgent command: “Kiss me, Katya,” alluding to the origins of Tyler’s plot and its parallels with Cole Porter’s “Kiss Me Kate.” Pyotr also subtly underscores the cultural transformations taking place as Kate acquires a new nuanced identity as Katya.
Tyler’s America in 2016 is open and welcoming, a country where immigrants, clergymen, and scientists can all co-exist, with a minimum of squabbling, within the same family. Nerdy scientists have lives, feelings, and families like everyone else. No bibles are thumped. No slogans are shouted (except by the animal activists). People have cell phones, but social media hasn’t yet become a surrogate for real life. Although Pyotr’s wedding attire is inappropriate and Kate’s plain blue shift is stained with mayonnaise, nobody really minds and the wedding party is a bash. Gentle, good-humored tolerance provides the guiding principle for all social interaction, even in the family.
This quirky, upbeat comedy could not be written today. In our new America 2025, Pyotr would be arrested by ICE before his green card interview, possibly beaten and detained. He might avoid deportation to El Salvador thanks to having pale skin, but his marriage and future would be doomed. Even if the wedding could go through, there might be a shooting at the church.
Not only Louis’ s lab, but the man himself could be targeted by thugs convinced that his genetically-modified mice contribute to Covid, autism, or extreme weather. His government funding would be scrapped by DOGE, and he’d have to move his family abroad to find a new position. The schoolboard in Kate’s district would be banning books about male penguins and climate change. Possibly Bunny would have become a no-vax obsessed with chem trails. Kate might die from an ectopic pregnancy which her hospital declines to treat. At worst, deported to Russia, Pyotr might be sent to the frontlines in Ukraine. At best, Kate might have to self-deport with him to save their marriage and start a family. Although such dystopic events sound like outrageously far-fetched fiction, they are actually happening to people today across the country.
How different from Tyler’s epilogue which fast forwards the story into our decade. Pyotr’s green card is easily obtained and a healthy child is born to the couple. Louis and Pyotr receive an international prize for their research, while Kate, with Pyotr’s encouragement, continues her education to embark upon a rewarding career. But in our 2025, normality has been turned on its head, making these victories and achievements uncertain if not impossible.
Tyler’s Vinegar Girl is a straightforward all-American success story about how what really matters is essence and not appearances. But it’s also a story of how immigrants enrich our culture, our economy, and our personal lives. Though surely the author never set out to make a political statement, Vinegar Girl stands as a mirror of our better selves and of a normality, now shattered, where strangers were once embraced as family. That is the America I believe in and I cried because it’s vanishing before our eyes.
