You Are a Ghost (Probably)

            You awake in a cold sweat to discover that your skin is transparent. Rather, more than skin- your entire body is transparent. Though you take first few moments of consciousness in strides, you quickly succumb to panic. You leap from your bed, a disheveled mess of mismatched sheets, a moistness seeping into the mattress. Upon landing on the floor, you look down and witness yourself standing inside your friend, Clydas, who appears to be perfectly content. Scanning your surroundings reveals a few of your other friends: Ted, Wu, and Reed. All four guests are sprawled out in various, visually uncomfortable positions, filled with all manner of substances and dead asleep. You hastily step out from inside Clydas’s ribcage and stumble for the door across the room. Each step brings the unfamiliar feeling of absolutely nothing at all. You walk through dirty clothes, wrappers, and friends, and each time experience zero contact. Unfortunate, you think. And confusing.

            When you reach your bedroom door, you grab for the handle and lean your body forward, out of a habit of being able to physically manipulate the world around you. However, you once more fail to touch anything. In an exhilarating, heart-attack inducing moment of surprise, you fall through the door.

            You lie in the hallway outside your bedroom for a few seconds, and arrive at the logical conclusion that you are a ghost. All the observable evidence points squarely to your sudden transformation into a non-corporeal spirit. The revelation should carry some amount of weight for your youthful, life-yet-to-live mind. But the hour is late, you can barely see, are mildly hungry, and need to take a leak. You rise up off the carpet-stained hallway in order to address your problems, in order of bodily necessity. An intense mental debate takes place, whereby you mutter unintelligibly to yourself and squint really, really hard. Arriving at the conclusion that even if you are a ghost you must still need to piss (perhaps ectoplasm), you launch yourself back through the bedroom door and towards your bathroom.

            Gliding is beginning to seem less utterly disturbing, and you glibly slide through the meat-bags you once called friends. Yet as you reach the precipice of your bathroom, passing by your bed, you notice another cause for alarm. Your corpse, grotesquely wrapped in multi-colored sheets, emits a great snore. You realize that your body is alive, sleeping, soundly absorbed in whatever drug-fueled adventure his subconscious has prepared for him. You mourn the loss of your brief ghostly existence and begin struggling for a new, probably more complicated explanation. The entire situation is unfortunate; being a ghost would be a pretty good gig.

            Clydas abruptly bursts from his mat on the floor, drooling more so than normal. You watch as he shakes his gritty hair into long black strands and begins to stand up. At first, you fear for his safety and rush to catch him as he loses his balance. But Clydas is a lucky jerk, capable of stumbling out of whatever he happens to fall into. Though he passes through your immaterial hands, he catches himself on the edge of your mattress before crashing through the window. A sigh of relief escapes you, and then the world seems to crash in on itself.

            The walls about you begin to melt, rock, and twist. The ceiling falls through you and into you, becoming the floor. Even the air itself seems to undulate with reckless energy. You feel like you have been thrown into an unholy hybrid of an M.C Escher and Salvador Dali painting. Reality is taking a break and letting the universe play whatever sick games it desires. The current state of the room offends you greatly and you try to fathom the forces at work as you claw at your phantasmal eyeballs and scream into the night.

            It is exactly when Clydas begins to shake your dead-but-sleeping self that everything lurches into elucidation.

A few rough jolts of your shoulders send out a pulse. You, standing at the edge of the room, straining to differentiate the door from the wall, receive an immediate tug. The sensation flows through your ghostly shoulders, as if they were made of sinewy flesh. By this point, a roaring has blown into your ears, like an outrageous waterfall or static white noise.  Concurrently, you are pulled through space towards the mattress while deafening noise twists your thoughts. The walls have yet to cease their malformation and the sound in the room has begun to take on a peculiar quality, as if someone is shouting to you twenty-feet underwater. You pause your mental anguish for just long enough to watch as you are tossed headfirst into your body on the mattress.

A dark abyss greets you. Then you open your eyes. Groggily, you shift your head from side to side, and arrive at the conclusion that someone is shaking you. Looking up from the sheets, you behold Clydas, your oily, unshaven partner-in-delinquency. Once your ears begin to function, you hear the garble of white noise soften and crystallize into Clydas’s pestering please. The walls appear to be obeying any and all laws.

“Dude, dude, dude,” Clydas drones to you, “Dude, I’m so starving right now.”

“Ta gitsh sezin tedeet” you reply, but something about the statement felt awkward in your mouth. Pushing Clydas away with an unfriendly shove, you lean up amidst your sheets and rub your jaw. You pull your bottom lip down, massage your gums, and try to consider what speaking English feels like.

“Then get some thing to eat” you reply again, this time more confidently. When Clydas makes a gesture of confusion, you point out the various bags of whatever processed junk is scattered around the room. Sulking but satisfied, Clydas crawls off, leaving you to reflect on your experiences.

The allure of delving into your out-of-body escapade sets your mind on an energetic track. You almost feel a potential coursing through your veins, through your muscles and organs and synapses. You could make a painting, compose a song, write a novel to convey the mysteries which you just endured. Though you are sitting in a dark, damp, roach-laden suburbia, surrounded by comatose friends, the world grows just a little bit brighter for you. But suddenly the substances in your body kick back in and you fall asleep. Lights out.  

You guess the adventure can wait.

The Catcher in the Rye Reaction: Two Sides of a Coin?

  Holden Caulfield is a tragic character in that he embodies the very thing he hates: phoniness. Throughout the Catcher in the Rye, Holden struggles to accept the world he lives in, rejecting what he perceives as a society of fake personas, self-serving liars, and shallow fools. The author of the novel, J.D Salinger, writes a very understandable teenage character, as Holden provides a voice to the internal conflict of identity that all people experience in maturity. Particularly, Salinger writes Holden as a rebel, a fighter of the system which he perceives. The resulting narrative provided by Holden is both admirable and lamentable; Holden works against fallacies he views in society while simultaneously failing to realize his own faults.

  Teenagers often strive to protect and nurture (and often project) their own identity. Holden shares this desire, but almost in a reversed way. Rather than maintain truth and individuality himself, Holden focuses upon the ways that others bend their own images and identities. In Holden’s worldview, almost everyone has a shortcoming that can be analyzed and criticized. Throughout his sharp and cutting observations of other people, Holden believes he maintains his own identity and sincerity. All that he does, in his mind, is merely a reaction to the problems he encounters in life.

  Holden, towards the beginning of the novel, very peculiarly admits that “I’m the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life” (Salinger 16). This admission is incredibly peculiar due to his focus on phoniness, flashy personae, and so on. However, for Holden, there is a distinction between lying and being fake. One of the more evident examples of Holden criticizing phony behavior is at old Ernie’s bar.  He describes how the piano player, Ernie, “gave this very phony, humble bow. Like as if he was a helluva humble guy. Besides being a terrific piano player. It was very phony” (Salinger 84). In this instance, Holden seems almost entirely focused on character. The fact that Holden (due to influence from D.B) knows old Ernie fairly well enables him to see through the piano player’s façade and understand his deceitful nature.

  Conversely, Holden completely lies to a woman he meets on a train going in to New York from Pencey. The woman’s son is a Pencey student, and she comes to recognize Holden’s Pencey sticker. Rather than be direct with the woman when she asks Holden’s name, he replies with “Rudolf Schmidt.” He explains in interior monologue that he “didn’t feel like giving her my whole life story” (Salinger 55). Yet Holden does not carry himself in an uncharacteristic way during his conversation with the woman. In fact, Holden behaves as only his true self can, at one point even asking the woman if she would like a cocktail. The distinction for Holden seems to come at a crossroads between surface deception and deep, inner deception. Holden throws out fake names like “Jim Steele” and enjoys telling stories, but he does so as himself (if that notion can be followed). People who act phony for appearances, to leave desired impressions and to bend attitudes (like the Pencey principal, or Stratladter, or old Ernie), all try to play a role in society. Holden perceives most of the public in this way, as false at the core and reliant on phony nature. In a sense, he succeeds in finding himself, as he begins to refine his sense of identity and values. And, even in lying, Holden still maintains a fairly fringe existence, living on the boundary of and resisting a true phony life.

Works Cited

Salinger, J.D. The Catcher in the Rye. New York : Little Brown and Company, 1991. Print.

Postmodernism in Jackson's Protagonist, Merricat

            An eerie simplicity is woven throughout We Have Always Lived In The Castle. When the reader is first introduced to Merricat, the character gives off a very childlike, almost innocent air. She states everything with great matter-of-factness, as if all her observations are self-evident, or all her thoughts and opinions are completely justified. Yet the simplicity extends beyond Merricat’s narration. Her household, with Constance and Uncle Julian, functions in a very ordered, simple, and completely unfettered manner. Merricat, her sister, and the Blackwood household exist in a sphere separate from the real world, shunning authority and conventional institutions thereof. Merricat’s family is mostly dead, authority has no place within the Blackwood property, and even formal religion is absent, its place filled by a childish faith in magic.

            No conventional standards exist for Merricat or her sister Constance. The pair exists in a twilight state of routine, and the idea of family does not exist in its traditional sense. The Blackwoods are stable, certainly, but almost impossibly so, and the only driving force they have is their strong sisterly love and peculiar confidence in a static lifestyle. Uncle Julian is not so much a part of the family as he is a piece of the routine that holds Merricat and Constance to some sort of structure. Yet when the fire disrupts the Blackwoods towards the end of the book, the “family” is desecrated even further. The sisters are tested immensely, yet they face their fate with an unreal amount of optimism and juvenile simplicity. Constance begins to lament over the loss of shelter, clothing, and food the girls are up against. The Blackwoods appear so far gone that Merricat is “dressed in a tablecloth like a ragdoll (Jackson 200).” Merricat quiets Constance’s fears, embracing the destruction of standards which the two have suffered. She speaks flatly that “We are going to be very happy, Constance (Jackson 200.”

            The annihilation of the Blackwood family, and a family structure in general, is accented by Merricat’s youthful fancies. As after the fire, she possesses an outlook that contradicts her circumstance. Her perfect world “on the moon” is a perfect metaphor for the Merricat’s simple optimism.  From the very start of the novel, Merricat preaches how “On the moon we have everything… All the locks are solid and tight… and the sun would shine all the time (Jackson 108).” Growing up without a true family after the night of murder, Merricat has never lost her childish tendencies. In many ways, her fantastical dreams give her strength, but mostly they act as goggles, warping her perception of life. After the fire, at the zeroth-level of existence for the Blackwoods, Merricat is practically at her most happy. With the family dead, living solely with Constance, Merricat says “I am thinking that we are on the moon, but it is not quite as I supposed it would be (Jackson 195).” Granted, she has not obtained the true euphoric state of her moon-kingdom, but murdered relatives and a half-burned house is the closest she has gotten. The notion that Merricat enjoys her situation represents the postmodern emphasis on the death of family.

            But beyond family, other forms of authority figures are presented in fairly negative light. Jim Donell solidifies the distrustful nature of authorities. In the great fire scene, after the firefighters quenched the flames, a sizeable mob has gathered outside the Blackwood house. Donell appears from the smoke, and “everyone knew him because of his size and his hat saying CHIEF (Jackson 155).” In this scene, Donell is clearly the authority, the most looked-to figure for the villagers. Of course, he sets an example. Before the mob, he picks up a rock, and “in complete silence he turned slowly and raised his arm and smashed the rock through one of the great tall windows of our mother’s drawing room (Jackson 154).” After this, the crowd goes rampant and destroys all that Merricat and her sister cherish. Authority is equivocated to evil in one swift motion.

            Charles helps to portray a rejection and general mistrust of authority, as well. From his very entrance into the novel, Merricat despises him. Merricat may be viewed as the antithesis of family and traditional norms, so a dichotomy is quickly established. Subsequently, Merricat tries everything in her ability to rid Charles from the house. While generally disagreeable as a stranger, Merricat also dislikes his decidedly “adult” and authoritarian perceptions. For instance, a point arrives in the book when Charles finds Merricat’s silver dollars buried by the creek. “This is outrageous,” Charles shouts, but Constance simply replies with, “She likes to bury things (Jackson 128).” The Blackwood sisters have a hard time understanding why Charles is so caught up on the concerns of wealth, a fact with only stoke Merricat’s hatred of him. Tormenting Charles “was a joyful sight, to see the first twistings and turnings of the demon caught (Jackson 137).” Without a doubt, Charles is rejected by the Blackwoods, and his rejection serves as symbolic rejection of authority by the sisters.

            In rejecting anything and everything that society has established as traditional, Merricat casts away religion and seizes upon a primitive faith in magic. Moments throughout Jackson’s novel are pocketed with allusions to power, sorcery, and artifacts that allow Merricat to shape and interact with her surroundings. Childish and fantastic, Merricat depends upon her magic for protection and warnings (a void left by destruction of her family, and the absence of authority). Merricat very simplistically believes that the Blackwood gate will protect the property, since “on the gate was a sign saying PRIVATE NO TRESPASSING and no one could go past that (Jackson 25).” Words possess a special significance for Merricat, as do random objects. She frequently arranges her material goods in peculiar fashions, calling them her “safeguards.” These objects include “the box of silver dollars I had buried by the creek, and the doll buried in the long field, and the book nailed to the tree in the pine woods (Jackson 59).” Forget God, or the Quran, or temples. Merricat has all the power she needs in rocks and letters and her cat, Jonas.

            Jackson’s novel conveys a great number of elements of postmodern fiction, and they all come out notably by way of Merricat. After all, the murder of the Blackwood family was by Merricat’s own hand. Merricat despises Charles, the central figure of authority in the narrative, and succeeds in driving him away. In a twisted sort of merriment, Merricat even seizes upon Constance’s and her own situation of a burned and broken house. And throughout all the experiences, Merricat maintains a staunch belief in youthful magic and is practically a pagan animist. The character of Merricat is a veritable personification of postmodern fiction in modern America.

Works Cited

Jackson, Shirley. We Have Always Lived In The Castle. New York: Penguin Group, 1984. Print.

Persuasion and Austen's Matured Satire

To be honest, I did not begin Persuasion in any excited or eager fashion. Prior to reading the book, I had engaged with two other Austen works: Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. While I do not find Austen’s writing style disagreeable, I must note a remarkable similarity between her works. Austen certainly wrote what she knew, and what she knew was the landed gentry class, ballroom etiquette, and the strife of courting and marriage. The books are not without merit, but I view them as “beating the same drum.” Yet with Persuasion, though I believe Austen repeats the same themes and topics, she does so with a bit of freshness and maturity that reflects her development as a writer. Particularly, the satirical and critical aspects of Persuasion come through, breathing enough spirit into the text to hold my interest.

            To be as academically topical as possible, I believe that Austen’s usage of both indirect and direct satire is fairly humorous. Characters within Persuasion speak for themselves in terms of actions and speech, but just as often Austen will characterize on her own, portraying exaggerated or ridiculous qualities. From class positions to subtle flaws, characters in Persuasion are effectively presented in satirical fashion. Some characters, such as Sir Walter Elliot, are easily seen as parodies of their nonfictional counterparts. A decent amount of situational irony is also employed throughout Persuasion, which helps to convey Austen’s personal ideals.

            Sir Walter Elliot is the most accessible example of satirical parody in Austen’s book. At the very beginning of the story, readers are introduced to a man who “considered the blessing of beauty as inferior only to the blessing of a baronetcy; and the Sir Walter Elliot, who united these gifts, was the constant object of his warmest respect and devotion” (Austen 4). Help is, indeed, given by Austen rather directly as a narrator to make fun of Sir Walter. Still, readers get a strong sense of the man as pompous, vain, and self-infatuated. Sir Walter is described as passing his time with the Baronetage, which recounted his family’s aristocratic lineage, and thus “he could read his own history with an interest which never failed” (Austen 3). Through Sir Walter, Austen quickly establishes a connotation with privileged elites, one that associates wealth and status with a penchant for narrow-mindedness and vaporous sense.

            Austen nicely contrasts the likes of Sir Walter, an established and conservative man, with that of Admiral Croft. The Crofts and other characters in Persuasion share the common theme of being Navy members. A reader cannot possibly get through the book without observing the ubiquity of the Navy and the men who serve therein. Of course, such was not done by Austen by accident, but rather her esteem and admiration for the individuals of the service prompted their inclusion. Austen comments on class structure and the validity of merit in weighing a person’s worth, and does so most obviously via Sir Walter and Admiral Croft. When first presented with the idea of a sailor renting Kellynch Hall, Sir Walter replies with his issues with the profession. He declares that the Navy is “the means of bringing persons of obscure birth into undue distinction…  and… it cuts up a man’s youth and vigour most horribly” (Austen 15). Evidently, the parody that is Sir Walter takes issue with someone succeeding on merit over heritage, an offense made worse by a lack of beauty.

A few weeks after the Crofts have settled into Kellynch Hall, Anne goes to visit them. While commenting on slight alterations to the property, Admiral Croft notes that Sir Walter “must be rather a dressy man for his time of life. Such a number of looking-glasses! Oh, Lord! There was not getting away from one’s self” (Austen 91). With a hint of exaggeration, Austen humorously portrays Sir Walter’s vain and narcissistic habits. Of course, it is Admiral Croft who has the mirrors removed (for a much more modest setup). Both men symbolize the virtues (or flaws) that Austen sees in their respective classes. And, in playing the two characters in such a way, leaves the reader with an appreciation for the Navy that is nonexistent for Sir Walter’s sphere of life.

Throughout Persuasion, Austen provides an impression of disapproval for the rigid, stubborn old wealth by highlighting the good lives of all those who do not fit into the class. Admiral Croft and the other Navy officers represent but one chunk of this trend. The experiences of Anne, especially in the enjoyment she gains by spending time with the Musgroves or Mrs. Smith, provide further support. As Austen makes clear, Anne finds no fondness or encouragement amongst her family, specifically her father and Elizabeth, her sister. Though the Musgroves do not rest on the same status level as Anne, she adores their company and familial atmosphere and dreads her eventual residence in Bath with the rest of the Elliot blood. Upon entering Bath, Anne “looked back with fond regret to the bustles of Uppercross and the seclusion of Kellynch” (Austen97). Yet, even in Bath, Anne finds company in Mrs. Smith, a remarkably less well-off individual in comparison to the Elliots. Regardless, Anne respects and prefers Mrs. Smith, as opposed to the boring (but elevated!) company of Lady Dalyrymple and Miss Carteret. Anne even contemplates that Miss Carteret “would never have been tolerated in Camden Place but for her birth” (Austen 108).

While other subtle instances of satire exist through Persuasion, I found myself constantly returning to the juxtaposition of “elite” versus “common”. Though, in the case of the Musgroves or the Crofts, “common” is not quite apt, for they possess positions of status and respect. Yet to the likes of Sir Walter Elliot, a baronet, such people are beneath him and his well-bred company. I definitely experienced greater amusement with Persuasion than Austen’s earlier works, and largely attribute this fact to the maturity of subject and commentary in the book. However, I am much more eager to read O’Brien.

Works Cited

Austen, Jane. Persuasion. New York: Random House, Inc., 1995. Print.