Is ignorance bliss, or is honesty the best policy? This question could be up for debate after reading Irwin Shaw’s The Girls in Their Summer Dresses. Michael and Frances, the two characters in the story, are a married couple walking hand in hand along a New York City street. “Look out,” Frances said. “You’ll break your neck”, she said, insinuating that Michael was looking at another woman. What kind of person doesn’t look at other people as they pass?
As the story evolves, we see that the couple is isolated. She wants to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, see a French film, and “have a nice Sunday.” He makes no objection, but for other reasons. “Let’s not see anybody all day,” she said. “Let’s just hang around with each other. You and me. We’re always up to our neck in people, drinking their Scotch or drinking our Scotch; we only see each other in bed. I want to go out with my husband all day long. I want him to talk only to me and listen only to me.” “What’s to stop us?” Michael asked. What is stopping Michael is his infatuation with other women. When Michael stares at other women, it drives Frances crazy.
“—say, are you listening to me?” Frances said. “Sure,” he said. He took his eyes off the hatless girl with the dark hair, cut dancer-style like a helmet, who was walking past him. “That’s the program for the day,” Frances said flatly. “Or maybe you’d just rather walk up and down Fifth Avenue.” “No,” Michael said. “Not at all.” “You always look at other women,” Frances said. “Everywhere. Every damned place we go.” Michael’s explanation, and his inadequate attempt to console his wife, is what produces the story’s conflict. "I have a fine home," Michael said. "I got nice books and a phonograph and nice friends. I live in a town I like the way I like and I do the work I like and I live with the woman I like. Whenever something good happens, don't