Jake the Reporter (In Two Ways)

            As we well know at this point, the narrator of The Sun Also Rises is Jake, who I greatly hesitate to call a reliable narrator as shown by his many biases. The first aspect of Jake’s narration I want to look at is his “reporter” narration. At times, Jake seems to be a vessel for the story as he recounts scenes where he was there but not really participating with him saying only one or two words. It’s like he is there to report to us who is doing what and what was said instead of actually being a part of the scene it’s. However, this reporting that he does not remain an unbiased one, as he can’t resist including some snide comments or letting a little bitterness show through (especially on the topic of Cohn). And so while he is kind of acting like a reporter at times, Jake does not seem successful in presenting them transparently.

We also see a different kind of reporter mode when he is alone like on page 38, where he reports in great detail his bank statements. There was a sort of emotionless feel to it, just stating the facts. I mean just reading it sounds very abrupt with the short observations:

            “One was a bank statement. It showed a balance of $2432.60. I got out my check-book and deducted four checks drawn since the first of the month, and discovered I had a balance of $1832.60. I wrote this on the back of the statement.”

            It feels like he is trying to force himself to focus on plain basic facts, anything that wouldn’t cause some sort of an emotional response. We see that he ends up failing when his train of thought on that same page arrives on the topic of Brett (“To hell with you, Lady Ashley”). It seems like from scenes like this one that Jake may have trouble not thinking about Brett, whether positively or negatively. Either way, his emotions always seem to be very strong. Is this reporter way of thinking Jake’s way of trying to avoid thinking about Brett? As shown in this scene, it doesn’t exactly work since his thoughts still made its way to her but it was a way to try and to at least postpone it. And from what we can tell from their very complex relationship, it probably really pains Jake that they can’t be together and so he has to deal with the situation of not being in a relationship with Brett while still (at least that I can tell) loves her. Because of this, it makes sense that he would try to not focus on Brett because that would take a toll on him emotionally.

            So those are the two reporter modes that I saw, with one being much more biased (not the best for being a reporter) but actually is recounting events and the other stating much simpler, basic facts as a way for Jake to cope. It will be interesting to see how Jake’s reporting changes over the course of the story. I have a feeling he will become much more involved in the story than just a reporter.

Sethe and Septimus: Making the Only Choice Possible

    I don’t know how many of you guys were in African American Literature but I know that ever since Nabeel compared Sethe to Septimus in out breakout room, I could not stop thinking about their similarities. Specifically, I’m thinking about the Four Horsemen chapter in comparison to Septimus’s suicide. In both cases, Septimus and Sethe are not wondering what they should do. Instead, they do what they see as the only option in that case. For Sethe, this means killing Beloved and attempting to kill her other children so that they do not have to return to Sweet Home and for Septimus, this means committing suicide as the only way to escape doctors. But at the same time, there is something bigger than the four horsemen and bigger than Holmes that has arrived at their doorsteps. For Sethe, it is really the whole system of oppression that has been present really for her lifetime. Her children were either going to be free or they were going to die because death has more freedom than going back to that slave plantation. For Septimus, it is the societal expectations of masculinity and soldiers that have also been present for most of his life. After experiencing these expectations in his past and being called a coward by these doctors in the present, there is also a sense of oppression in Septimus’s case.

    Something I find interesting that both Morrison and Woolf do it that they allow plenty of time before having these scenes in the novel. In Beloved, we get the sense about something really strange happening in Sethe’s past that made people act weird around her, but I think I can easily say that none of us were expecting her to have killed her child. Instead, Morrison allows us time to appreciate Sethe as a person and see her traumatic past at Sweet Home and to really understand these key things about her before finally showing us this scene. If Morrison had started with the Four Horsemen scene, I think that, at least for me, it would be a lot harder to understand her actions and to connect with her. I know that in class we still struggled with what Sethe did, but at the same time, I feel like we were able to see how she saw that as the only option instead of just writing her off as insane or anything like that.

    Likewise, Woolf allows us to see Septimus for quite a lot during the novel even though he is more of a side character. While we do see that he is suffering from PTSD, we get the sense that in the day that Woolf shows Septimus he is a little bit jumpier and more disconnected than usual from the car backfiring. And even though it is one of his worse days, we do get to see some of his “true self” with the hat scene between him and Lucrezia. We also get insights into his past, narrated by Woolf, which she really didn’t do for any other character. Woolf knew how crucial it was to understand his past to understand his present. We get the sense of how in the past he was seen as not masculine enough and even though he went through the war (which is generally seen as a way to make a man) Holmes and Bradshaw still look at him in the same way, seeing him act in a sort of “hysterical” manner that only women are supposed to act. With his traumatic experiences in the war as well as the experiences as being viewed as a coward and not masculine enough as well as the terror of Holmes shoving his way after Septimus, we can much better understand why he sees suicide as his only choice (even as he sees that "life was good" (146)).

    I’m now realizing how long this is so I think I will stop my blog here. Do you guys see these connections? Do you see more connections between Sethe and Septimus and how Woolf and Morrison set these scenes up? These were just some of the first things that came to my mind and I think there is still plenty more parallels there.