Analysis: The Bear Came Over The Mountain

To get further into Munro’s ideas of how relationships and marriages can get damaged, the main topic to be discussed is infidelity. Upon reading The Bear Came Over the Mountain, the reader understands that infidelity is the main symptom of the problems within a relationship. The short story deals with Fiona's descent into forgetfulness as she ages. Munro doesn't come right out and tell us that it is Alzheimer's; instead, she lets us make our own decision regarding Fiona's ailment. We read that over the years, Grant has been frequently unfaithful to Fiona. Although we are not given a particular reason as to why, Munro tells us that Grant insists he never dreamed of leaving Fiona. He chooses to indulge his sensual desires while remaining (on

He said, “Not a chance.”
Fiona present to us an interesting moment of lucidity with her statement. The title of the story is based on the song The Bear Went Over The Mountain. In Munro's story, the bear has indeed come over the mountain. We may think that the other side of the mountain looks different and is perhaps more exciting, but the reality of it is that life eventually descends into old age and then death, with illness sometimes thrown into the mix. The other side is not only the same, it's often downhill and rough. It's better to stick with each other, and that's what Grant and Fiona do.
In the story Post and Beam, for example, the graduate student Lionel contemplates the married life of his professor and the professor's wife, a couple he has come to socialize with on occasion:
He came to see them in the evenings, when the children were in bed. The slight intrusions of domestic life—the cry of the baby reaching them through an open window, the scolding Brendan sometimes had to give Lorna about toys left lying on the grass, instead of being put back in the sandbox, the call from the kitchen asking if she had remembered to buy limes for the gin and tonic […]. (Munro, 2007: