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Milkman's name and upbringing reveals lots of information about Morrison's intentions and depiction of the main character in  The Song of Solomon.  We can begin with "Milkman" which stems from Macon Dead III's very long (in comparison to modern recommendations) weaning period. From this, we can draw our first parallel with Sigmund Freud's model of psychosexual development. Freud's model tells us that the oral period usually lasts from birth to age one. A consequence of fixation and a prolonging of this period often results in "orally passive" behavior such as smoking and/or a passive personality. These two similarities are extremely notable as they coincide in two separate scenes.  First, we find that by age 14, Milkman has "tried" to make himself different from his father: "Milkman feared his father, respected him, but knew, because of the leg, that he could never emulate him. So he differed from him as much as he dared. Macon was...

Scattered throughout The Stranger are numerous symbolic representations of ideas, something appropriate considering the purpose of the story. I want to specifically highlight an allusion that stands out to me the most: the sun as “the Absurd”. If we establish that Meursault reacts hyperbolically to the heat of the sun (even though he presumably encounters it very often), it is very... absurd to see that he somehow reacts stronger to the sun than the death of his mother. A similar variation is seen with the death of the Arab: instead of actually portraying a fight between Meursault and the Arab, Camus describes the standoff as more of a fight between Meursault and the sun; instead of the Arab rattling the dagger, it is the sun that provokes and "cuts" Meursault with its rays. We also find further evidence that the sun imposes pain upon Meursault on page 57:  "[E]very time I felt a blast of its hot breath strike my face, I gritted my teeth, clenched my fists in my trouser...

 As I read The Sun Also Rises , a question that lived rent free in my head was whether Brett was emotionally taking advantage of Jake. It is obvious that despite the numerous instances of Brett using Jake as an emotional punching bag, there are few to no examples of Jake using Brett for emotional support. It may be tempting then to assume that this relationship is toxic and Brett is using her femininity to "lock" Jake into a sort of vicious cycle. However, I think that it might be more appropriate to view this relationship as more nuanced. I WANT to blame Brett because it does seem like she is just taking over Jake who is affected by war trauma in a different way than her. However, I have been convinced against this assumption because of a few key factors. Both characters suffer trauma inflicted upon them by the war. If we take it that trauma is the reason for Brett’s “torturous” behavior, then there must be a similar output for Jake as well. While we do see him enjoy Pamplon...

Symmetry in Mrs. Dalloway  is significant in it's portrayal of characters and its careful juxtaposition of storylines. Since the introduction of Septimus Smith and his "universe", the existence of a viewpoint so different to the one first introduced to us, the reader, is puzzling. However, I believe that there is a reason for this... Perhaps Virginia Woolf sought to portray Septimus as a version of Clarissa intensified to a point that he would be unrecognizable; a "reductio ad absurdum" of sorts. There are numerous examples of Septimus being similar to Clarissa.. similar in the same sense and similar in contradicting ways. Here are some of my observations of this idea of symmetry: 1) Lucrezia is unable to really understand and help Septimus; the same is with Richard and Clarissa 2) Clarissa loved Sally or had at least a very close friendship with her; Septimus and Evans shared a very close relationship as well 3) The two characters have a sort of "lost pote...

I apologize in advance for the drab theme of this blog. In this blog post, I seek to address the brilliance of Nicholson Baker and his ability to write a simultaneously awful and fascinating book. I think of The Mezzanine as a sandwich, stacked with layers of thought and communication. Its outward appearance (crusty bread) is the mind of the main character, but as you slowly peel off the layers of figurative plastic cheese and lettuce, you discover the gems (perhaps Grey Poupon or Maille mustard in this analogy?) thus communicated through the text. I will show this in the following ways: 1) the ability to simulate the association of ideas in the mind of a character so lifelike that we are led to believe this could, under certain circumstances, just be an odd memoir, 2) a mischaracterization of the main characters behavior and the dialogues experimental style-compensation and completeness thereof, 3) and the assumptions made and the inability to speculate on meaningful aspects of the c...