Introduction to Literary Analysis
This course is designed to acquaint students with the literary genres (especially fiction, poetry, and drama) by means of examples of each and provide various critical approaches to the interpretation of literature so that they may gain the ability to apply them. At the conclusion of the course, students are expected to be able to read literature perceptively and to write critical papers about it.
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Reading Structuralism: Language of an Era
Living Fate or Choice
Reading Structuralism: Language of an Era
For the structuralist reader, the culture we are a part of can be �read� like a language. Since culture is made up of many important structural networks, literature that signifies these systems carries cultural meaning. These networks found in culture and litearture make statements, and they can be read or decoded by the structuralist. In Jay McInerney�s The Last of the Savages, many statements of the era are evident. McInerney uses two characters, will Savage and artick Keane, to portay conflicting beliefs in this politically confused time. Patrick and Will provide parallels for the contrasting structure of issues in the novel and, likewise, in the era. The character �Will� becomes a strong symbol for what became known as a �hippie�. Patrick narrates his life and friendship from the standpoint of a traditional college student with lofty ambitions, a �preppy�. The structuralist notices these contrasts in character and motive but more importantly, sees them as expressive or social paradigms extract in the moment.
By further examining each character�s interaction with his family, the structuralist reader notices not only a pattern among generations, but also patterns between generations. As Will�s history is revealed, the structuralist reader finds similarities and contrasts between his and his father�s behavior. McInerney also provides echoes of situations and circumstance of generations by establishing Patrick�s success as a lawyer (and of course his sexual masks and proclivities).
It is this success that leads Keane to a highly established law practice. Through the practice, McInerney presents the structuralist reader with the enigma of Saul Felson, an associate of Keane�s, and his bewildering death in which investigation is necessary. McInerney states many times that Keane assumed the investigators were there on the behalf of his close friend Will. But if Keane had not been such a close friend to Will Savage, then he would not have assumed that the police were in pursuit of Will rather than in his office for information on someone else, like Felson. This repeated echo of suspicion leads the reader into a plot of friendship. Patrick Keane claims that answering questions about Will �seems to be part of my life�s work�(McInerney 4). But throughout the novel an element of suspicion is evident, in many cases, if not only in police interrogations.
Savage and Keane become acquainted in the way that many strangers meet when attending college; they are roommates. However, instantly their differences are evident. Within minutes Will announces his commitment to the blues, acknowledging that the suffering of the slaves led to the production of such a �pure art�(14). He claims, �it�s like the distilled essence of suffering and the yearning to be free�(14). Then, suddenly, Will announces, �we�re all slaves� and thereby sets prelude to his conviction of being free (14). Patrick on the other hand, is worried only about his roommate�s social quality and thought Will to be �everything [he] wanted to be�(20). Patrick desperately wants to become �uniform to the preppy� and watches as within the year, his new roommate �sheds the inherited uniform of preppy�(14). Though they become friends, Will and Patrick portray contrasting interests of the generations� young people as they each form their own identities in society.
Although, like any other generations, Patrick and Will further identify themselves by rebelling from their parents. Yet even as they do so, they remain opposites in this rebellion. Patrick behaves in a subtle way toward his parents as he �disowned them in his heart�(13). He wanted to become what his father was not. In this attempt it embarrassed him to acknowledge his parents, but he knew, at the same time, that he was �an ungrateful little shit�(13). Keane feels guilty for feeling this way. He realizes that his father has made sacrifices to send him to prep school but still feels impatience and shame when confronted with his upbringing. Patrick strives to build a world for himself that his father could not provide. He is surprised to find that Will�s ambition is to deconstruct the setting his father provides for him. Will was constantly �imagining a world which the Savages did not own�(20). In order for Will to become what his father was not, he has to embrace acts of outlandish behavior. He acts offensively, unruly, and indifferent to the confines of society. But despite all this, Patrick is still surprised to find that Will and his father both contribute to a prickly and hostile relationship.
This father-son relationship is influenced by many stereotypes typical of this era. Cordell Savage is an authoritarian father with old-fashioned outlooks on racial issues and the Southern rights of slave owners. He is one who looked upon present situations of women and blacks in the same way as our ancestors. Cordell Savage, and militant friends of his, love the South and they know they �don�t have no damn peaceniks down here dishonoring the flag and burning their damn brassieres�(140). These beliefs could not make him anymore of a contrast to his son who �attends the seminal event of the generation�(143). Patrick, of course, does not. McInerney provides, with the ongoing cycle of tales between these two young characters, a wider structural context in this free-loving area.
As more and more young people became free-love advocates, the conflict between generations grew. McInerney shows these two evolutions by Will�s newfound love and his increasingly antagonizing rival, his father. Patrick remains narrator and defends the positions of both old-fashioned attitude and open-minded reflection. Taleesha, a young black singer who made Will both giddy and vulnerable upon accepting his proposal, symbolizes the struggle black people faced in attaining equal rights. Her success as a wife and an artist are clearly guidelines for many changes that came about in and around �the summer that men walked on the moon�(144). Able to witness their marriage as best man, Patrick questions Wills intent, or as he says, �tests his resolve�(114). In respect to this racial question, Patrick asks his friend if he�s only marrying Taleesha because she is black. It seems to him that it is a great way to attack historical guidelines. And it is; it threatens his father, who argues, �decent people won�t stand for it �(123). Patrick admits to the reader only that it is foolish in his opinion. But Will is a fool for attention. In this way, Will and Taleesha are the perfect couple.
They seem to accept the attention they receive as tribute. Both would have been conspicuous no matter how they dressed or comported themselves, and so they decide to push it to the limit. �It was partly the times, I suppose, and partly Will. He would have hated not to be noticed, and Taleesha, after all, was a performer�(128). She and Will were making footprints of their own in the dust covered ways of the world.
Another issue that caused friction between generations was fashion. Showing again an �almost pathological disrespect of authority,� Will�s fashion tastes parallel those of his era, and consequently, he influenced even the top celebrities of the time (20). Patrick recalls a party in which Mick Jagger�s only interest was meeting Will. This respect was won no doubt because of Will�s complete and thorough rebellion. �He seized on small points of discipline against which to rebel�(20). His clothing is a telltale sign for the structuralist reader.
Fashion can certainly be read like a language. �Separate items or features are added up into a complete �outfit� or �look� with complex grammatical rules of combination�(Barry 47). The statement is made when a precise attempt is made to conspicuously threaten the existence of a convention. The school administration threatens Will and so does his father. Both parties show forceful opinions when �suggesting� that he get his shaggy hair cut. Arriving on the scene as a freshman in college, Will wore his clothes �the way you might inhabit an old summer cottage,� and then he starts �dressing in rainbow hues and later, after that psychedelic decade of our youth, in black�(14). This projection of attitude continues even until the later years when Patrick plans his wedding.
Even then, Will surprises Patrick�s father-in-law, a man who closely resembles Cordell Savage, in demeanor, attitude, and seemingly even his opinion of Will. Patrick himself is, again, the opposite. He does not have to worry about his wife�s father disapproving of his choice of clothing, even though he does anyway. His new clothes are typical �preppy� garment.
Yet, as normal as this young chap, Patrick may seem, he too confronted outlandish attitudes for the time. However, Patrick�s� secrets are not as openly displayed as his good friend Will�s are. McInerney gives the reader some subtle clues as to Will�s sexual preference but it is when Will accuses Patrick of being gay that any conversation appears. McInerney subtly keeps his echo of suspicion except that this time it is a sexual matter.
Given Patrick�s initiation into sexual behavior, it is understandable that he prefers his best friend Will to any of the girls to which Will introduces him. Patrick is often aggressive �handled� in the presence of southern women. Lollie Baker, a friend of Will�s impatiently guided Patrick to the �object of attention�, but he was left wondering after he woke up in her absence. Another southern belle, Will�s sister-in-law by Elbridge, Cheryl Dobbs, asked Patrick to hold her at her husband�s funeral. Then �all at once she was kissing [him] wildly, probing [his] mouth with a furious tongue�(141). This incredible encounter ended horribly when Will�s mother sharply asked Patrick to leave. Ashamed, he is unable to look this stern woman in the face. McInerney does not reveal Patrick�s homosexual encounters until later in the novel when Patrick engages in an abnormal experience with a college friend, Matson, and is once more, unable to look his companion in the face. Patrick �allowed himself to be swayed,� and recoiled from the sight of Matson the next morning, �full of remorse and self-loathing�(233). So even though Patrick Keane seems to portray the clean-cut ambitious type, he struggles with an identity that is even more taboo than being a hippie. For generations to come, the idea of homosexuality is questioned in the structure of society.
Despite this preference, Patrick is able to raise a family and complete the cycle of life by having children of his own. McInerney shows repeated structure of generation as Patrick describes his daughter. Going on a date, she appeared �wearing faded denim shirt over what appeared to be a tie-dyed T-shirt, her wrists adorned with colorful string bracelets she�d woven at camp last summer�she looked like one of the groupie chicks that used to attach themselves to Will�. �She was vegetarian prove to lecture me about health and ecology�(121). Her date was a young man much like the model that Patrick admired in his own youth. He was a �handsome boy who arrived at [the] front door in his blue blazer and chinos. Except for the annoying backwards baseball cap, he was the very image of the boy I�d always wanted to be: and the cap was itself testament to his insouciance, his easy certainty of his place in the world, which allowed him to affect the generational flourish�(120). So Patrick�s success allowed his daughter to acquire a status that he yearned. Plus, Patrick�s generation opened up doors for coming generations that allowed them to freely express themselves without being accused of unruly behavior. McInerney shows that there are indisputable parallels between generations, that one leads way for the other.
As the story goes on, a surprising revelation is shaped around Will and his great-great-grandfather, John Savage. Reading about Will�s heritage, Patrick discovers that John was raised for the most part by the slaves. His father scolds him for his manners and sullen attitude. But John disagrees with his father�s opinions because Clarence, John�s man influence, has been the boy�s constant companion for years and is no doubt an authority figure. In the times of the American Revolution, this was a big concern. Patrick envisions John in Will�s precise image. Both Savage boys are victims of southern principles because they sympathize with the victims of the plantations. Their fathers are presumable the same in their efforts to coerce the boys in a �superior� point of view.
Will clashes with his father in his opinion of the hierarchy. However, seemingly in completion of the cycle of generations, Will�s brothers were also victims of their father�s views and traditions. The eldest died tragically in a customary hunting trip. Elbridge, the second born, died in a surprising attempt to break from his so-far conformist attitudes. Another (not-so surprising) revelation about the Savage family is that Cordell himself was a victim of his own father�s abuse. This family has gone through many generations of cyclical tragedies until Will is able to confront them all in an overblown exposure of himself and his family to anyone who asks. He exhibits his beliefs and the history of his family�s beliefs, no matter how condemning or secretive they may be. This is his true infatuation with the blues; the honesty and sadness they portray. They embody grievances that are expressed rather than repressed.
Finally, near the end of the novel, Patrick speaks of his wedding and remains Will�s binary opposite as he consummates his marriage. Rather than express his true sexual feelings, he strives toward being a traditional, successful lawyer within the �law� of convention and conformity. But on the other hand, Will is also too willful, too anarchic, and too �savage�. Perhaps in his childhood Patrick was not only ashamed of his lifestyle and his father�s place in society but also his unrealized sexual tendencies. This mortification would have served as his motivation to attain the highest status he was able. This is a status in which he can feel secure. The kind of status that Will�s great-great-grandfather�s father could have men killed under only accusation of rebellion.
Ironically, Patrick attains this reputation yet remains friends with the most rebellious prodigy of the times. He loves Will. This passionate vulnerability prevails over the immense mastery of the social system he achieves. So, though he disagrees with many of Will�s social statements, Patrick remains his friend because beneath his exterior, they both have social statements to make. McInerney presents this twist of character motive through high society beliefs; like Will�s ancestors, Patrick hides behind corporate and social success, and Will seems to be the very cure of this pretension. These two friends even equalize and in some ways �heal� each other�s compulsive behavior.
So, McInerney uses contrast of plot to further distinguish their friendship. He uses the shady character Felson to provide a clean palette, so to speak, for comparison. If Patrick and Will had not met, Will would have been as vague and notorious as Felson. Likewise, McInerney weaves many pieces of plot together without sequence that seems like an indeterminate memory. But the structuralist could interpret this disorder as the chaos of everyday life; the confused way difficulties can become magnified when looked at with a clouded mind. Simply, problems arise with pre-fabricated notions or stereotypes. A lot of these stereotypes were questioned in this era. Moreover, this same jumble of experiences could go further than the one era and combine all eras being that the same confusing is repeated throughout all time. Yet one thing that is constant is friendship.
As companions, opposites, advocates, and professionals, Will and Patrick are intertwining characters that supply the structuralist reader with an unforgettable tale of repeated plot, echoes of suspicion, parallels of generation and contrasts in situation and motive. It is such that the reader foresees upcoming repetitions of society in continuance of tradition. But more importantly, this novel explored in the scope of structuralism sets text to the cultural meaning of the free-love revolution where there is no generational conflict and having friends overrules the need to establish become established in society.
Living Fate or Choice
In Paul Auster�s Moon Palace, the main character, Marco Stanley Fogg (M.S.), is presented with such intriguing trials and tribulations that the reader is often led to ask, �Does life follow choice or fate?� Are people themselves wholly responsible and totally in control of their lives, dictating events, or do we blindly stumble upon certain mapped-out paths only to title this blind blunder as �fate�? The only certainty is that possibilities mirror opinions. There is no real substantial evidence leading one way or the other. All that any argument can be based on is personal interpretation of events. Auster provides such a case of events in Moon Palace that it is hard to ignore either choice or fate. The dynamic variable of interest is his plot makes an impression that impels the reader to evaluate his or her own life. Fogg�s situations seem to be woven in conscious effort to combine both ends of the fate-choice spectrum.
This character�s life is similar to an increasing majority of people today in the way that M.S. Fogg struggles with loneliness, identity, and pride. However, unlike the description of ordinary lifestyles, Auster pushes the credibility of the occurrences in M.S. Fogg�s life as this reflective character deals with these issues, some of which were produced by his childhood. Suppose we did combine the two extremes-fate and choice-in regards to Fogg�s life.
Symbolically, it would seem that Fogg, or people in general, have a map that their life follows. The events of anyone�s life could be determined by many variables like childhood experiences or other people. M.S. Fogg works through despairing events early on in his life, such as the death of his mother. Death is often viewed as fate. Auster provides an abrupt example, wherein his character has few memories of his mother. In his brief description of her, he says, �more often than not she was dreamy, given to mild sulks�. He continues to say, �there were times when I felt a true sadness emulating from her, a sense that she was battling against some vast and internal disarray.�(4) The reader learns later that this disarray could quite possibly have been the yearning for the man she loved, if only for one night, but her death causes profound effects on her son.
One could argue that had his mother not passed away, M.S. would have had a fairly comfortable childhood. This argument could be taken further to say that had his mother lived and been able to marry the man she loved, rearing M.S. as most families do, M.S. might have en oblivious to issues such as �fate vs. choice�. Fate, or destiny, can be seen as a personal path, a finish to a personal story, a continuation of the everlasting story. Because M.S. does not have a strong connection to either his mother or father, it seems likely that he is concerned about his own fate because he does not know his history.
M.S. admits this altered reality when he recalls first living with his Uncle Victor. He compares himself to a �pathetic orphan hero in a nineteenth-century novel.� Despite this sadness, the move from his mother to a stronger father figure, again, seems destined. Their relationship is one of respect, care, and understanding. It is almost as if Auster provides, for a short time, the perfect companion for a boy this age. Spirited, caring and intelligent, Uncle Victor encourages Fogg to be creative and original. M.S. describes his uncle as a man who loved to concoct elaborate, nonsensical theories about things. He was a man who started a band and sand with humor and spirit mocking everything from politics to love. This relationship was important to Fogg; it was one that he could look back on to regain perspective or establish motivation. One could go on to say that this relationship supplies the young M.S. with tools for coping with his unusual future. However, this relationship is ended by another unexpected death.
Although Fogg remember his uncle�s health troubles in retrospect, he had previously failed to realize their importance. Fogg mourns his uncle while making the transition to college and the frustration of this move is emphasized by his loneliness. For the second time, Fogg endures profound events and his path seems predestined. Even though M.S. Fogg is now further isolated, his uncle�s behavior and knowledge gives background to their family. Whether or not it is concrete or imaginary, this background provides Fogg with a satisfying outlook of his history. Many instances lead the reader to believe that Fogg romanticized about his predecessors. Having been told that his grandfather�s original name was Fogelman and being informed that 'fogel' meant bird, he �imagined that some valiant ancestor of (his) had once actually been able to fly.�(5) He gives the reader the impression of a bird flying through fog, suggesting an unforeseen and undetermined goal. In another fantasy about his family name, Fogg fantasizes about his ancestors flying across the ocean, not stopping until they reached their faraway destination. He seems to collect suggestions that travel was in his blood, that �life would carry (him) to places where no man had ever been before.� (6) Armed with these notions, Fogg finishes school, barely stretching the money he has left after paying for his uncle�s funeral expenses. He gets so destitute that he has to sell his uncle�s books. Since he can not bear to part with them before at least reading them, he sets out to accomplish this feat. He compares it to �following the route of an explorer long ago.� It is similar to his habit of wearing his uncle�s jacket. Even though it is an old jacket, he feels comforted and secure when he wears it.
As expected with poverty, food and nourishment become a problem. While still in school, he did not starve completely but it became so hard that he dreamt about food and lost a lot of weight. Despite this risk to his health, he refuses to ask for help from his friends or get a job. When asked or confronted with a question concerning phone service or cable, he produces outlandish reasons for choosing not to have them. His pride interfered to the extent that he had convinced himself that he could live on the absolute smallest proportions of food. This dilemma is that which first introduced him to Kitty Woo. In search of an old friend named Zimmer, Fogg shows up at an apartment newly rented and finds a group of welcoming people having breakfast. Being led in on account of a tee shirt he was wearing that advertised a team he did not particularly care for, Fogg is introduced as Kitty Woo�s twin brother because of his likeness to her. It is she who graciously offers that he join their breakfast. After eating hastily and feeling somewhat abashed, Fogg launches into a series of stories, one of which describing Cyrano in a setting that could be interpreted as his own ideal life setting. It is an environment that is seemingly made of beauty and art. This description and several other speeches brought him to the end of the occasion and Kitty leads him to the door and surprises him with a kiss.
After this hospitality and potential love interest, Fogg continues to think nothing of employment or housing and is told to leave his apartment. At this point he says about his life, �Given the uncertainties that were waiting for me once I walked out of there, I had a remarkably firm grip on things�(53). Yet, this grip slips away in tears after he randomly wanders into a theater and sits down in front of �Around the World in 80 Days�, a film that his uncle had taken him to see when he was young. However, the movie did not inspire him to make any decisions concerning his position in life. He stayed on the same path, eating from trash, sleeping in parks, and spending his days wandering. If he was waiting for something to happen, it did. He slid further and further down into hopelessness. His life was in jeopardy and it seemed like nothing was going to interfere. �(He) had turned (himself) into a nothing, a dead man tumbling head first into hell�(53). But after searching everywhere, Kitty and Zimmer were his rescuers.
Zimmer took the task of accommodating and nursing him back to health. Fogg describes Zimmer as looking like a young rabbi with his newly grown beard, and he was the most brilliant and conscientious man of their Columbia class. On the other hand, he is also thorough and systematic, whereas many of the situation and choices in which M.S. deals with are tumultuous and drastic. Living with a man of such calculations and reasonability soon took effect on Fogg. He began to want to earn his keep. Whereas earlier he did not care for work, when staying with Zimmer he felt obligated to support his-self and repay his friend. This choice was based on hospitality and realizing his close encounter with fatality.
The next stage in his life was to look for a job that would utilize his intelligence and, more importantly, get him out from under his friend�s shelter. The first several attempts did not provide any response, so he decides to try the student employment at Columbia. Within in ten minutes he sees the answer to his problems in the form of a job opening offering room and board. His employer turns out to be a man named Thomas Effing. Fogg describes the man as a �minuscule little bird�, a hundred or more and remote (99). This comparison to a bird occurs again when Effing wears a pair of prescription glasses that make his eyes �look as large as bird eggs�(109). As Fogg works more and more around the old man, he learns that it is hard to predict anything about him. Effing seems to always have an underlying purpose to everything he does. His reasoning for this is that he is preparing Fogg for something he considers very important and to be the final composition of his full, long life. Employing Fogg to ultimately write his obituary and biography, Effing produces the proper reading material for his pupil�s preparation. It is as if in this tycoon�s empire, fate and choice are dwindled down to schedules and knowledge. He follows both routinely.
At the end of Effing�s life, the question of �fate or choice� again becomes prevalent. As he recounts his life story to Fogg, there seem to be many incidents that were spurred by either choice or fate. For instance, his friend�s death that was caused by the horse slipping on a rocky ledge; his survival in the desert; the strange occasion concerning three felons, saddlebags of money, and an injury that paid for a crime and released him from guilt. All of these things had profound effects on him. Moreover, Effing did not believe in coincidences. He was adamant in this remark to Fogg. His life was full of choices as well as occurrences that seemed to be either full of despair or marvel.
However, in terms of relation to Fogg, Effing�s life was marvelous in the way that it came to be revealed and was then so much a part of his own history. What he was been missing-father and family-was found by his dutiful, responsible loyalty to Effing by producing a biography and then delivering it to a man who turns out to be his father. Auster adds this ironic twist as the apex to the question of fate or choice. In his journey, M.S. Fogg searches for a solution to his puzzle fervently and passionately. The situations he faces give him personal insight to his character. By overcoming numerous obstacles, he finally reveals his initial and ultimate question, �Do I decide my own path?�
As I was led through his story, I reflected upon my own as well as universal similarities to Fogg�s struggle. I have come to believe that the combination of fate and choice determine life, and ultimately, we are left with an unpredictable story of events. Each event is dictated by choice, just as each event may very well be directed by fate. Looking at the path in retrospect, we see the smooth lines, the frayed, the missed, and we see the mistakes we could not or did not avoid. Most importantly, we see ourselves, and if the story of our travels makes us content and we share our revelations with others, then we have found success.
