The Rhoda reaction

The Rhoda reaction is the name Christine Penmark and Kenneth Penmark had privately given to Rhoda Penmark’s strikingly cool responses to matters that would ordinarily disturb others. After Rhoda witnesses the recovery of Claude Daigle’s body, Christine recognizes the familiar pattern but can no longer treat it as an amusing peculiarity: Rhoda’s lack of feeling becomes a source of maternal unease, and her later imitation of affection suggests how carefully she reads and copies other people’s emotions.

The Private Name

Christine recalls that she and Kenneth had once smiled together at Rhoda’s characteristic response and called it “the Rhoda reaction.” The phrase names a pattern rather than a single incident: Rhoda appears unmoved by experiences that Christine expects to affect a child. Its earlier place in the parents’ shared understanding gives the expression an intimate, almost familiar quality, but the scene after Claude Daigle’s death changes its weight. Christine still recognizes the same response, yet now feels a depression she cannot fit into her previous understanding of her daughter.

The Daigle Incident

Christine returns to the apartment hoping Rhoda has not seen Claude’s body or the guards’ attempts to revive him. Rhoda has seen both. She says she knew what had happened and had suggested that the guards search among the pilings; when Christine embraces her, Rhoda says the discovery excited her and the resuscitation interested her because she had never seen such an effort before. Christine thinks of her as cool and impersonal about what troubles others, but Rhoda’s direct explanation makes the gap between them sharper: she reports interest, not grief or fright.

The contrast continues over milk, a peanut-butter sandwich, and Rhoda’s jigsaw puzzle. Christine tries to reassure her that the scene was unfortunate to see and remember. Rhoda looks up from fitting a puzzle piece into place and says, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mother. I don’t feel any way at all.” The statement gives the reaction its starkest form: Rhoda does not merely conceal a named emotion in this exchange; she denies feeling any way at all. Christine cannot persuade herself that her daughter has been emotionally shaken, and her unease remains without a clear explanation.

Affection as Imitation

After Christine returns to the living room, Rhoda abandons her puzzle and approaches her mother with a charming, hesitant smile. She rubs her cheek against Christine’s, laughs coquettishly, and later kisses her on the lips, although she has not done so voluntarily for a long time. Christine reads the gestures as an effort to please her after Rhoda senses that she has displeased her mother; she thinks Rhoda has done something “very naughty indeed” to make such an effort necessary.

The episode extends the meaning of the Rhoda reaction beyond emotional detachment. Christine wonders whether Rhoda has begun to notice a separation between herself and those around her and is trying to conceal it by copying their values and displays of feeling. In Christine’s interpretation, Rhoda must observe, consider, and experiment because nothing spontaneous within her tells her how to respond. The affectionate performance therefore unsettles Christine even as it draws tenderness and pity from her. When Rhoda revives a kissing game she used to play with her father, Christine answers according to its familiar rules, turning an apparent bid for closeness into another moment in which learned behavior and genuine feeling remain difficult to distinguish.