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Let's get one thing straight—Lyman Ward is writing a book about his grandparents, not their children. Because of this, we don't actually learn much about Ollie, Betsy, and Agnes as individuals.
What we do learn is how their parents' tumultuous relationship affects them. Although each of the children is affected differently, they all bear the scars in one way or another:
So, what are we to make of these sad stories? All we know is that Susan and Oliver's children are all deeply affected by their parents' marital strife, even if no one (Susan and Oliver included) realize it at the time. In that way, we think that the struggles of Ollie, Betsy, and Agnes reveal the truth behind Lyman's assertion that we are all the result of "moral errors that [we] defend as if they were personal and not familial" (1.1.3).
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