Helena, I'm forwarding a lovely post that Matt wrote to me when I asked him about "The Laughing Man". It really shed some light on the story for me and maybe it will do the same for you. Peggy ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 30 Jan 1998 11:06:06 -0500 (EST) From: Matt Kozusko <mkozusko@virtual.park.uga.edu> To: "Peggy F. Jean-Louis" <pfj6868@is.nyu.edu> Subject: Re: Genial Fish theory Peggy-- I haven't much to say about the story in LM...I never have. I figure it's filled mostly with young-boy-mentatlity things mingled with things derived from the Chief's problems with Mary. Mary comes from wealthy, cultured Long Island and has gone to Wellesly; the chief's ethnic background and crappy jacket (not to mention his job) suggest something less affluent. The Chief is Other in the world of Mary/Dufarge; The Dufarges live in Paris; LM lives in China. There is, of course, a huge geographical distance between them, but the story moves them such that they border each other. The Chief is bridging gaps that can't really be bridged. I've always read Dufarge as Mary's Father, who objects to their seeing each other. Their love is Black Wing? There is no corrcorrelation for pregnancy in the story, though there certainly are a lot of baby carriages in LM to bump into (my, how those babies do get in the way!). I figure the most important aspect of the story is the emotional impact of the last installment, which corresponds to the ugly incident on the field the same day. the story is full of otherness, full of the exotic and the bizzare. The Laghing Man's own deformity--a projection of the Chief's awkwardness in the world of Mary Hudson--is terrible, yet it is the source of laughter. There is nobility in otherness. Being the underdog is heroic; the animals in the story--like the boys, like all *real* people--don't think him ugly. The ethics of the LM are noble but firm (killing when necessary, etc). The story re-writes reality in such a way as to privilege powerless people. But why the poppy-seed mask? Why the opium? American Indians, Chinese bandits, French detectives (I *know* this has something to do with Poe!), immigrant parents...none of them fits. They are thrown together in a mess of imagination. I don't really know. I *am* going to think further about it, though. As for the list...I rmemeber your initial post. Sometimes I go for days without posting anything there--sometimes for months. It's gotten ugly before (as you probably know), but those who make it ugly usually leave, and things return to normal. It's usually a relatively new person picking fights with someone who considers himself/herself a list Godfather. Do you notice how people tend to subscribe, post six messages a day for two weeks, then leave? But that's a different subject, I suppose. Let me know what you've come up with for LM... ------------------------------------------- mkozusko@virtual.park.uga.edu