Re: Antolini: Life Imprisonment
Camille Scaysbrook (verona_beach@geocities.com)
Mon, 01 Mar 1999 13:00:47 +1100
> That's a great interpretation--one I wish I could fully agree with. But
as
> of now I personally am just not convinced. The stroking of the hair
seems
> just a little *too* intimate to be categorically justified as sympathy
and
> concern. My own belief, for the moment, is that the Antolini passage was
> written intentionally ambiguous, and we are meant to sit here and argue
> about it.
>
> --Brendan
I've often wondered about child abuse or sexual assault in TCIR. I even
wonder if JDS might have been a victim of it himself, although I don't want
to view it as a facile attempt to explain away his various eccentricities.
However, to me, Holden and Jane Gallager seem to communicate in the mutual
unspoken language of the survivor - it's hinted at very strongly in the
passage where Jane begins crying as they play checkers. And when you think
about it, keeping her Kings in the back row is a perfect symbol of opting
out of society - `the game' - to protect oneself - with two solid rows of
`Kings' - Jane and Holden have thus stalemated themselves, unable to go
backward or forward, unable to utilise the power inherent in their Kings.
He is constantly on guard, which could be why he reacts so instantly and
violently to what may have been Antolini's innocent gestures. I mean, he
says `this has happened about twenty times since I was a kid' - that's
pretty unambiguous - but he seems reluctant to discuss it any further but
instead represses it from his narrative.
However, as you said, it's ultimately pretty obtuse, as are a lot of things
in
TCIR which is why we get such good mileage out of discussing it (:
Camille
verona_beach@geocities.com
@ THE ARTS HOLE http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Theater/6442
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