A New Perspective on Papi

            “Negocios,” the last story in Drown by Junot Diaz, gives us a new perspective on a character that has been influential in stories throughout the book. This last story gives us Yunior’s view of Ramon, who he had previously always referred to as Papi, looking back from a much later time in his life. Yunior considers his father’s past and finds details of about his time in America that show him as a very different man than the glimpses we had seen in other stories. In the first story, “Ysrael,” Papi is idealized by Yunior and Rafa as they have few memories of him and expect that he still loves them and will return for them. This view is also evident in “Aguantando” when we see the different versions of his return that Yunior and Rafa imagine. In “Fiesta, 1980” we get a different view when we see Papi cheating on his wife and see the tension in the household after they are reunited. This is a very different picture of Papi, who Yunior is afraid of and who is an authoritarian figure in the family.

            “Negocios” describes a very different version of Papi than either of these two earlier images, though it still incorporates elements of both narratives. “Negocios” shows much more of an understanding of Papi himself than any of the earlier stories as it is focused directly on him as the main character and takes a more direct look at the time he was away from the rest of the family. In this narrative, we see Papi making bad decisions and there is an element of criticism in the way Yunior, who we find out is the narrator, depicts some of these scenes. However, there are also elements of idealism as Papi is depicted to be on an almost heroic journey.

            Yunior’s depiction of Papi in this story gives us a new perspective on Papi that helps us understand him better than in any of the previous stories. But at the same time, it shows us another version of Yunior. Through Yunior’s depictions of Papi from the various stages of his life we can see his own development and understanding of the situation. In previous stories, we see him as a kid, not fully understanding the situation but with a profound trust in Papi and the fact that he will return. Then we see the utter disappointment and betrayal that Yunior feels when Papi doesn’t live up to his expectations in America. Finally, in this story, we can see that Yunior has matured enough to take a step back from both of these highly emotional views and take a fairer view of Papi. While he can’t get rid of all his criticism of some of Papi’s actions or all his idealization of others, he does begin to understand Papi in a new way that is much more balanced than any of his earlier views.

Yunior

            Yunior is the main character in both of Junot Díaz’s stories, “Ysrael” and “Fiesta, 1980.” In the story “Ysrael,” Yunior is nine and his older brother, Rafa, is twelve. In this story, Yunior looks up to Rafa and sees him as a source of knowledge about the things he has not yet been exposed to. There are multiple instances of Rafa telling Yunior stories, although probably exaggerated, about what he has done and even directly instructing Yunior about how to act. This is shown most clearly when Yunior cries when they get off the bus and Rafa chides him and tells him he needs to act tougher. Rafa doesn’t understand what Yunior is crying about, but he does give him advice based on his experiences and his view of Yunior as not tough enough. Throughout this story there is also a sense of camaraderie between them, at least from Yunior’s perspective. Yunior is excited that he is able to come along with Rafa and take part in the excitement that he would usually be left out of. There is a sense, especially at the end when they are about to run from the bus as they get off, that they are in this together.

This relationship between Yunior and Rafa changes in “Fiesta, 1980.” In this story Yunior seems less engaged with his brother and there is much less of a dynamic of camaraderie between them. Part of this is that they are no longer in the campo in the second story. Yunior notes that in the campo they were friends but that this was not always the case. But there are also other differences in their relationship. Rafa knows when to move away from Yunior when their father is angry and doesn’t have the same instructional vibe that he gives off in “Ysrael.” Rafa still maintains higher authority and a higher level of knowledge that Yunior, this time about the affair their father is having, but he is less inclined to share this knowledge and Yunior has to figure it out on his own. Yunior seems much less a part of Rafa’s life in this environment. Rafa prefers to stay with his friends and doesn’t seem like he is on Yunior’s side anymore.

The difference in Yunior and Rafa’s relationship is also highlighted by the fact that they are now with their father. In “Ysrael,” their father was in New York and only occasionally sent things back to them. Rafa used their father as an example when Yunior was crying to tell him to get tougher. This knowledge about their father, who Rafa had more experience was part of what gave him authority over Yunior who had few memories of his father. In “Fiesta, 1980” they are now with their father and Rafa no longer has this knowledge that Yunior doesn’t. In fact, the abuse of their father negates some of their idealized view of him and stresses tensions in the house even further. Their father specifically forbids Rafa from giving Yunior food, and Rafa complies fearing the consequences. Because Rafa is unable to help him and because Yunior doesn’t feel like Rafa is confiding in him the way he used to, especially with their father’s affair, they lose the camaraderie that they had in the first story. “Fiesta, 1980” portrays Yunior as much more alone and isolated, without even the possibility of tagging along with his brother that he had in “Ysrael.”

A New Perspective

            The use of second person in the story “How” by Lorrie Moore forces us to align ourselves with the protagonist and understand their perspective in the story. The story “How” portrays a very different main character than the other stories so far in the collection. This character feels like she is the one that is trapped in a relationship that she doesn’t want to be in and she can’t find her way out. The man in the story is trying to do what he can to make the relationship work in every way he can. He learns about the things she likes, reads the same books as her, and does all the dishes and laundry for her while she is gone. He really tries to make the relationship work but all his efforts just make her feel worse and cause her to pull away from him even more.

            In the story “What is Seized” the husband is characterized as “cold” and seems emotionally removed from his wife. In that story it is extremely easy to judge him and condemn him for his coldness and his inability to connect with his wife and make her happy. But that understanding of a cold man is complicated when the story “How” portrays the main character in much the same way. She shares the same detachment from the man in the story and could also be characterized as being “cold” in many ways. If you see the story “How” from the man’s perspective it would look a lot more like “What is Seized” because from his perspective he is trying to make their relationship work but isn’t getting a useful response. He is trying to do what he can but is faced with a cold partner who is unable to connect with him anymore.

            Given the new perspective in “How” we have to question out perspective in the other stories. The story “How” alerts us to that fact that we are always only getting one side of the story and that it looks very different from the other side. Although these are two unique stories and the relationships portrayed in each of them are very different in a lot of ways, there are similarities in that each of these stories has a character that is emotionally removed and a character that is trying to make the relationship work. In “What is Seized” we see the perspective of someone trying to make it work and being frustrated by the lack of understanding in her husband. And in “How” we see someone who is stuck in a relationship that she wants out of but cannot figure out how to get out, therefore closing herself off more and more from the relationship.

Gabriel

Johnnie and Roy both seem very scared of Gabriel at the beginning of “The Rockpile.” When the two boys are sitting on the fire escape and oy decides to go down to the street, Johnnie’s response is that “Daddy’s going to be home soon” (Baldwin 17). Later on in the story, we see Gabriel coming home from work, all we know at this point is that it is somewhere high up in the church, and how fearful Johnnie is about telling him how Roy got injured. When Gabriel enters he is comforting to Roy, and we begin to see that he favors Roy, and is immediately critical of both Johnnie and Elizabeth for letting this happen. At the very end we find out that some of the tension between Gabriel and Elizabeth is over her sinful past and that Johnnie is her child but not his. In her last look at Gabriel Elizabeth sees a “hatred so deep as to become insupportable in its lack of personality” (Baldwin 25). And we are left with an ambiguous ending with Johnnie leaning down towards Gabriel’s foot to pick up a lunchbox.

            By the end of “The Rockpile” our image of Gabriel is not a good one. He seems like an overbearing father figure who enjoys holing his authority over the rest of the family. He seems to like Roy much more than Johnnie because Johnnie is not actually his child and uses Elizabeth’s past against her. In the private sphere of their home there is a lot of tension and distance between them as the boys always fear their father coming home. There is also constant language of religion to qualify the world around them, adding to the fear that anything they do wrong will cause them to be condemned.

            Our view of Gabriel is complicated in “The Outing” where we see more interactions between Gabriel and his sons, this time in the public sphere. Because they are now in public, Gabriel can do less to discipline Roy and Johnnie than he could at home. There is a conversation between Gabriel and Johnnie where Johnnie can be more outspoken and obvious about his hatred for Gabriel without immediate consequences. However, Gabriel does threaten that there will be punishment at home when they are alone. We also see that the favoritism that Gabriel has for Roy is more pronounced and is now resented by both Roy and Johnnie. Gabriel says that David was brought to church by Roy when the boys all know that it was Johnnie. When David looks at Roy and Johnnie their faces show how much this affects them, “Roy, who considered his father with an expression at once contemptuous, ironic and resigned and at Johnnie, whose face was a mask of rage” (Baldwin 34). They all know that Gabriel has a favorite and they all resent him for it.

            However, we also see a different side of Gabriel when he is talking with Father James. We see here that he is a Deacon in the church, not as high as it had seemed in “The Rockpile” and that he is hoping to preach sometime. In this scene he seems much less powerful and less domineering as he speaks humbly with Father James. Father James tells him not to try to advance to quickly and that he should “Try to get just a little closer to the people” (Baldwin 42). In this scene we see that he is not always as overbearing as it seems, but Father James’ last remark also fits with the effect that he had had on the conversation between Roy, Johnnie, and David’s parents. Gabriel just doesn’t seem to be able to have a normal conversation that shows understanding to the people he is talking to.

Teddy

            The story “Teddy” by J.D. Salinger ends with “an all-piercing, sustained scream--clearly coming from a small, female child” (Salinger 198). This scream is never explained and we never find out for sure what has happened to end the story. However, there are clues to a possible ending where Teddy is pushed into the empty pool by his sister and fractures his skull on the bottom of the pool, dying instantly. While there is no way to tell for sure whether this is the correct interpretation of the final scene, Teddy himself describes a similar scene and this is likely what Nicholson is thinking.

            Teddy explains to Nicholson that he thinks everyone takes death too seriously and that they shouldn’t be worried because they have all done it thousands of times before. He says,

“It's so silly," Teddy said again. "For example, I have a swimming lesson in about five minutes. I could go downstairs to the pool, and there might not be any water in it. This might be the day they change the water or something. What might happen, though, I might walk up to the edge of it, just to have a look at the bottom, for instance, and my sister might come up and sort of push me in. I could fracture my skull and die instantaneously." Teddy looked at Nicholson. "That could happen," he said. "My sister's only six, and she hasn't been a human being for very many lives, and she doesn't like me very much. That could happen, all right. What would be so tragic about it, though? What's there to be afraid of, I mean? I'd just be doing what I was supposed to do, that's all, wouldn't I?"

            Teddy lays out an elaborate scene of his own death and explains how it wouldn’t be tragic if it actually happened. Teddy has just explained to Nicholson that he could’ve told the professors when and how they were going to die, but hadn’t because he knew that it would upset them. Instead, he just told them some possibilities and times when they should be careful. Similarly, he never tells anyone when he is going to die, but says that he knows. This detailed description of how he could die could actually be his prediction of how he will die disguised in a way that will not alarm Nicholson. Teddy wants to tell Nicholson something but not actually reveal that he will probably die that day.

            In addition to this conversation with Nicholson, Teddy writes in his diary that “It will either happen today or February 14, 1955 when I am sixteen. It is ridiculous to mention even” (Salinger 182). This entry is not explained or elaborated in any way and we are not given any clues as to what it means. However, looking back, it is quite possible that this entry is referring to Teddy’s own death. We know from Teddy’s conversation with Nicholson that Teddy can predict his own death but that his prediction is not completely inevitable. We also know that he doesn’t think that death is very important. He only sees death as getting out of your body and moving on, something that everyone has done thousands of times even though they don’t remember it. This indifference to death could help explain his last sentence in the entry that it is ridiculous to mention.

            While we don’t know for sure what happens in the pool at the very end of the story. It is quite possible that Teddy has predicted his own death and that this prediction has come true. Teddy mentions this prediction in a way that doesn’t make it seem especially important or true. But Teddy also says that he doesn’t tell people fully what will happen because it will upset people. His journal entry saying that something will probably happen today and his detailed explanation to Nicholson make it seem like he does know that he is going to die and that he has most likely been pushed into the empty pool by his sister.

Is Muriel’s Mother Right about Seymour?

            Muriel’s mother is very fearful that Seymour will “completely lose control of himself.” She says that Seymour shouldn’t have been released from the hospital he was at and is very worried for Muriel’s safety. Muriel is very defensive and understanding of Seymour, she understands why he won’t take his bathrobe off even though her mother doesn’t. She disregards much of her mother’s worry and says that the psychiatrist she had talked to hadn’t been able to say anything without more facts.

            Going into the second part of the story, with Seymour and Sybil, the conversation between Muriel and her mother colored my perception of Seymour. I was constantly waiting for Seymour to do something wrong and interpreted many of his actions to be more malicious than they may really have been. In some ways, it was easy to think that Muriel’s mother was being overly protective and there was nothing wrong with Seymour, but at the same time many of Seymour’s actions seemed a little shady. Although Seymour never did anything overtly wrong, the fact that we already knew that there may be something wrong with him made me constantly suspicious of his intentions every time he talked to Sybil.

            Overall, Seymour defied my expectations in the scene with Sybil. But then he immediately returned to the hotel and killed himself sitting on the other bed in the room with Muriel. Seymour’s suicide in some ways justifies Muriel’s mother’s fears, but not completely. Seymour doesn’t ever show any malicious intent for Muriel and her trust in him is justified. But he does commit suicide in her room, causing what will most likely be a very traumatic experience for her. Muriel’s mother is right that Seymour should be getting help and that everything is not right with him, but she is wrong to think that Muriel is in any direct danger from Seymour.

What is True?

            In the story “Good Form” Tim O’Brien says, “I’m forty-three years old, true, and I’m a writer now, and a long time ago I walked through Quang Ngai Province as a foot soldier. Almost everything else is invented.” O’Brien makes it clear in this story, and in others, that he sees a distinct difference between the “truth” he is trying to convey and what actually happened. But can we still see his “truth” if we know that he made everything up?

            O’Brien says that you can tell a true war story by “its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil.” He also says that “it’s difficult to separate what happened from what seemed to happen.” Many of his stories seem to be based, at least in part, on a factual event, but O’Brien is willing to stray far from reality in order to express the feelings he is trying to get across. He says, “I want you to feel what I felt.” He isn’t trying to write about the facts about what happened to him in Vietnam, he is writing about how it felt to be a soldier in Vietnam; A feeling that he says would be recognizable to other soldiers that were there. O’Brien gives us a view of the war filtered through his perception so that even if we don’t know what actually happened, we know how he felt.

           O’Brien makes these motivations, of trying to show us how it feels, clear. He tells us that certain stories are passed on from things he heard or saw in the war and not just things that happened to him. But it can hard to continue believing in any truth when every detail that he tells us is later said to be a lie. He tells us that he killed a man outside My Khe and describes the soldier’s appearance and backstory in intimate detail, but later he says that it wasn’t actually him that killed the man but that his presence was guilt enough. Then, when we get past that betrayal and accept that he hadn’t killed the man himself but was just trying to convey the guilt, he says that even that version is made up and lays out another.

           So how long can we continue to believe? O’Brien constantly undermines his own authority as a narrator by telling us that his stories have not been true. And yet, he continues to ask us to believe him and trust that there is a valuable feeling that he is trying to convey to us. I want to believe him, I can easily suspend my disbelief when reading a fiction story; but when the foundations of every story are pulled out from under them, it is hard to continue to believe the next story he has to tell.