Why Trust Holden?

Holden Caulfield is a very unique narrator.  As established in the famous first line, he speaks directly to the reader, and is aware of the that fact during his narration. He also tells us quite frankly, "I'm the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life."  This statement, in the context of his awareness of the act of narration, calls in to question his reliability as a narrator.  However, I do not think I'm alone in feeling like I can trust Holden as a narrator.  I think this is partially because of the way he speaks his mind to us all the time and certainly doesn't hold back with his criticism of others.  In addition to criticizing others, he is also fairly self-deprecating.

I was sixteen then, and I'm seventeen now, and sometimes I act like I'm about thirteen. It's really ironical, because I'm six foot two and a half and I have gray hair. I really do. The one side of my head—the right side—is full of millions of gray hairs. I've had them ever since I was a kid. And yet I still act sometimes like I was only about twelve. Everybody says that, especially my father. It's partly true, too, but it isn't all true. People always think something's all true. I don't give a damn, except that I get bored sometimes when people tell me to act my age.

As a teenager, admitting to acting like you're twelve is pretty significant, as we teenagers generally look down on younger kids and their behavior.  Holden also calls himself a moron repeatedly while discussing his flunking out of school (again).  I think Holden's self-deprecation is part of what makes him likable as a narrator and easy to believe.  Holden can be quite harsh in his criticism, for example when he first tells us about Ackley.

He was one of these very, very tall, round-shouldered guys—he was about six four— with lousy teeth. The whole time he roomed next to me, I never even once saw him brush his teeth. They always looked mossy and awful, and he damn near made you sick if you saw him in the dining room with his mouth full of mashed potatoes and peas or something. Besides that, he had a lot of pimples. Not just on his forehead or his chin, like most guys, but all over his whole face. And not only that, he had a terrible personality. He was also sort of a nasty guy. I wasn't too crazy about him, to tell you the truth.

Hearing all of Holden's thoughts almost makes one feel like a co-conspirator of sorts, getting all the dirt on the people in Holden's life.  Also, he is criticizing pretty much every character in the book including himself, but does not criticize the reader, which, I think, endears him somewhat to the reader.  When I think about it logically, I have very little reason to trust what Holden tells us, but his familiar voice and understandable tiredness with the world around him lure the reader in.  Do you trust Holden as a narrator?  Is there a specific reason you trust/mistrust Holden?  I have had trouble identifying any specific reason as to why I feel like I can trust Holden's narration, but for some reason I do.

Stephen's Isolation

Through A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce, the central character, Stephen Daedalus, is an outsider.  However, by the end of the novel it is apparent that this is by choice instead of by any social inability he might possess.  In fact, he seems to see his self-enforced isolation as both a political statement and a prerequisite for becoming an "artist."  He seems to subscribe to the idea that art should be unbiased and therefore feels that he must separate himself from the subject of his art to ensure lack of bias.  For this reason, he rejects his friend Davin's efforts to make him an Irish nationalist.

—I'm an Irish nationalist, first and foremost. But that's you all out. You're a born sneerer, Stevie.—When you make the next rebellion with hurleysticks, said Stephen, and want the indispensable informer, tell me. I can find you a few in this college.
—I can't understand you, said Davin. One time I hear you talk against English literature. Now you talk against the Irish informers. What with your name and your ideas—Are you Irish at all?
—Come with me now to the office of arms and I will show you the tree of my family, said Stephen.
—Then be one of us, said Davin. Why don't you learn Irish? Why did you drop out of the league class after the first lesson?
—You know one reason why, answered Stephen.

Stephen is very critical of the idea of nationalism in this passage, despite the fact that he admits his heritage is Irish. It seems that he is not rejecting his background as much as he is separating himself from the influence of it, which confounds his nationalist friend. A few lines later, Stephen says, "This race and this country and this life produced me[.] I shall express myself as I am." He is not denying the fact that he was born in and molded by Ireland, but at the same time Stephen rejects further outside influence and desires to create his art without any other forces trying to change him.

Stephen's aloofness can also be seen when he refuses to sign MacCann's petition for universal peace.

—I am waiting for your answer, said MacCann briefly.
—The affair doesn't interest me in the least, said Stephen wearily. You know that well. Why do you make a scene about it?
—Good! said MacCann, smacking his lips. You are a reactionary, then?
—Do you think you impress me, Stephen asked, when you flourish your wooden sword?
—Metaphors! said MacCann bluntly. Come to facts.
Stephen blushed and turned aside. MacCann stood his ground and said with hostile humour:
—Minor poets, I suppose, are above such trivial questions as the question of universal peace.

In this scene, Stephen's rejection again seems ridiculous to others.  Why would someone not sign a petition for universal peace?  For Stephen, this is partly because of the imagery associated with the presentation of this petition, but I think mostly because signing would be indicative of the fact that Stephen has a political view.  Stephen's desire to be an artist without bias is so strong that he feels signing such an innocuous petition would show bias.  However, I think that his refusal to sign is also partially motivated by his pride and the opportunity to make a public statement about his self-imposed isolation from any outside influence in his quest to become an artist.

Crater

I think the imagery of Room as a crater in the last line of the book is perfect. It the statement, it is very simple: Jack says, "It's like a crater, a hole where something happened." However, it is impossible to understand the full meaning of this word for Jack without reading this book. He learns the word "crater" from ma while putting chocolates on his cake in the first chapter.

“Look,” I show her, “there’s holes in my cake where the chocolates were till just now.”
“Like craters,” she says. She puts her fingertop in one.
“What’s craters?”
“Holes where something happened. Like a volcano or an explosion or something.”

Clearly, Ma's words stuck with Jack, as he echoes her definition in the last line of the novel.  In this case, the meaning of crater is simply the physical mark left in the absence of the chocolates.  This is also part of Jack's meaning in the last line, as many of the the items in Room are gone.  However, I think that he is thinking about much more than the missing items when he makes this powerful statement.

We can learn a little more about what Jack thinks about from how he uses it in this conversation with Ma.

“You know your heart, Jack?” “Bam bam.” I show her on my chest.
“No, but your feeling bit, where you’re sad or scared or laughing or stuff?”
That’s lower down, I think it’s in my tummy. “Well, he hasn’t got one.”
“A tummy?”
“A feeling bit,” says Ma.
I’m looking at my tummy. “What does he have instead?”
She shrugs. “Just a gap.”
Like a crater? But that’s a hole where something happened. What happened?

In this case the imagery of a crater is used to represent something more abstract: the lack of Old Nick's capacity for feeling.  Despite the fact that he instinctively associates the word "crater" with this idea, Jack doesn't seem to be totally sure that this is a proper use of the word.

By the end of the novel, Jack has a much better sense of how the world works, and is much more confident with his use of the word "crater."  I believe that in addition to the missing items in Room, he is referring to it as a mark left by the events of the past 7+ years, starting with Old Nick building Room, and ending with their eventual escape.  This really works well as simile, portraying Room as an empty shell where something significant happened, but is no longer relevant.  By comparing Room to a crater, Jack acknowledges that he and Ma have moved on for good, and there is nothing left for them in Room.

Room as a Hero's Journey

Room is very different from the other books we have read so far this semester, but since this is a hero's journey class, there must be some classic heroic journey aspect to the book. At the point we are at in the book, it does not really seem to fit the classic, campbellian hero's journey.  I think either Jack or Ma could be considered a hero, and will make a case for how each of these characters makes a journey.  

For Ma this journey is fairly clear, but her life before what we see in the book must be taken into account.  The "ordinary world" at the beginning of her is the normal world outside, with no Old Nick or Room.  Then, she is kidnapped and everything changes.  In a way, this kidnapping functions as a "call to adventure" in that it starts the heroic ordeal of living in Room.  Also, Ma's attempts to escape from Old Nick can be seen as a classic "refusal of the call."  There has been no shortage of heroic challenges so far in Ma's "journey," and we have yet to read how this journey concludes.

Jack undergoes a very different kind of hero's journey.  He is born into Room and it is all he knows, so the world view he has at the beginning of this novel can be seen as his starting point, or "ordinary world."  His heroic task is then to break free of this mindset and to break free of Room itself.   In Jack's case, I think the call to adventure comes from Ma starting the process of "unlying" and starting to make Jack understand just how small his world is.  When Ma first tries to explain this to Jack, he resists her explanation, refusing to acknowledge that there is more to the world than his mother and him.  However, at this point in the novel, he is on his way towards escaping his narrow worldview, and perhaps even Room.  

Perhaps these characters do not fit the paradigm of the hero's journey perfectly yet, but there is still a lot of development left in the novel.  Do you think that Room would be correctly called a hero's journey narrative? Which of these characters is closest to the idea of a campbellian hero?

The Advantages of a Graphic Novel

Usually when we think of graphic novels the first things that come to mind are light-hearted kids' books without a deep story.  Perhaps this is because there is much less text than in a traditional novel.  However Persepolis is not like this.  The format of a graphic novel works to emphasize and augment the concise words of the story with powerful images.

I think the reason that this novel brings forth so many emotions is that it tells the story in these two separate ways, combining words that tell you the history with pictures that show you what words alone cannot.  A good example of this is the bottom panel of the first page in which all of the little girls are playing games with their veils.  In this frame we, as westerners, are instantly made aware of the fact that kids do the same things in Iran that they do everywhere.  Also, we see one of the Islamic government's policies through the eyes of these children.  Through the graphics, it is clearly evident that the kids do not see the veil as something of religious significance deserving of respect.

Another way the graphics in this novel are used is to emphasize the descriptions of what these people went through.  A great example of this is the frame depicting Marji processing the torture the political prisoners went through.  Because this is shown graphically, the torture seems much more intimate and terrible and the effect of this knowledge on Marji is very clear.  She hears of tortures such as whipping followed by the torturer urinating on the wounds, but the one that seems to stick with her the most is the iron.  She is shocked by the fact that the iron could be used for torture, and from the bottom frame on this page it seems like she will never look at an iron the same way again.  

These are just two examples of how the graphics contribute greatly to the reader's perception of the story.  I think that this format also makes it easier to process the difficult topics presented in the book and is certainly easier to read than a traditional text-based novel.  Do you like reading such a dark plot in this format?  Does the graphic novel format take away from the seriousness of the issues presented.  

Grant is the Hero

I think that Grant is the journeying hero in this novel, not Jefferson.  He is the one who is given the heroic task of  making Jefferson a man.  He takes the classic Campbell path of resisting the call at first, dragging his feet at every step when getting access to Jefferson.  However, he does accept the call eventually and starts to teach Jefferson despite the fact that he seems to be a little overwhelmed by the challenge.

"What do you plan on doing when you come up there —if I let you come up there?" Guidry asked me.
"I have no idea, sir," I told him.

This conversation shows how Grant does not really know what he is trying to teach to Jefferson, much less how he will go about teaching it.  He has an idea of what Ms. Emma wants, but does not seem very certain about why she wants him to spend time with Jefferson.  The fact that he continues on this journey despite this uncertainty is a sign of his heroism.

Grant is also the one who changes the most during this novel.  In the beginning, he is an educated but sort of naive man who doesn't recognize the cycle he helps to perpetuate.  However, because of the challenge that Jefferson presents him with, he comes to realize that the black community is trapped in a cycle of ignorance and oppression.  His part in the oppression becomes apparent to him when the superintendent visits his school and looks at all the children's teeth while they stand in perfect lines just like he taught them to.  

"Rise," Irene called to the class.
They came to their feet, their heads up, their arms clasped to their sides. But instead of feeling pride, I hated myself for drilling them as I had done.

This is when he starts to see how he himself is part of the power structure that has put Jefferson in prison on purely circumstantial evidence.  In the follow chapter he begins to see what his old teacher meant when he said that attempts to change the situation were futile.  Grant realizes just how continuous this cycle is while he watches his students chop wood for the winter.

And I thought to myself, What am I doing? Am I reaching them at all?  They are acting exactly as the old men id earlier.  They are fifty years younger, maybe more, but doing the same thing those old men did who never attended school a day in their lives.  Is it just a vicious circle? Am I doing anything?

It is in this moment that he makes the transition from being a passive school teacher who plays along with the system to someone outside the system who sees it for what it is.  This is what sets him apart from the other characters in this book and what makes him a hero.

Anse's Role

One way to explain the plot in As I Lay Dying is to consider that the driving force behind the plot might be the reader's inevitable disgust with Anse.  He is just a bad human being.  First of all, he is lazy, and I find his excuse of dying if he sweats a little too convenient and unlikely.  He pretty much forces his wife and children to do all the work of running his farm, and just sits around on his porch all day rubbing his hands and trying to look pitiful.  At this early point in the novel, the reader must begin to dislike Anse, and one thing that keeps them reading is a search for more justification for this hate.  They don't have to wait long for more evidence.

The point of the journey he forces the family to take is supposedly to honor his wife's wish to be buried in her family plot, but for Anse this burial takes second priority to getting himself a pair of dentures.  In fact, nothing else seems remotely important to him.  In the process of getting his teeth, he harms all of his children.  First, Cash's leg is broken while he tries to get Anse's wagon across the river.  Then, because of Anse's cheapness and incompetence, Cash's leg is set in cement which takes several layers of skin with it upon removal.  Cash may never walk again. As the story progresses, the list of Anse's self-serving acts grows long and the damage to his family increases, driving the plot forward and keeping the reader wanting more.

Another result of Anse's stubbornness in crossing the river is that both of their mules are drowned, and Anse refuses to borrow the mules offered to him. To buy new ones, Anse trade's away all of Cash's money and Jewel's prized horse, as well as an insignificant amount of his own possessions.  By Cash's interpretation, this unfairness is what causes Darl to set the barn on fire as he sees it as making things more even.  So, indirectly, Anse is responsible for Darl being sent of to an institution as well.

Finally, when they get to Jefferson, Anse guilt-trips Dewey Dell into giving up the ten dollars she had received to pay for her abortion.  Having stolen from and hurt all his childern who made his journey possible, Anse buys his teeth, becoming the only Bundren to get what they wanted out of the trip.  Also, he takes a new wife just hours after burying Addie.  This conclusion of the novel caps off a buildup of increasingly disgusting things that Anse has done, and thus serves as a relatively satisfying conclusion of the book.

Do you think this interpretation of the plot makes sense?  Can we view this book as driven by hate of the central character?