Subject: RE: Why's the Laughing Man live in Tibet?
From: Zack Wyatt (zwyatt@stanford.edu)
Date: Sat May 19 2001 - 20:57:11 GMT
Ok, continuing on...(hope this makes sense, still under time restraints so
I'm writing this as quickly as I can).
So, now that you've read Cecilia's summary of LAUGHING BOY...let me explain
how it works into Laughing Man.
The Navajo/American conflict is key to LAUGHING BOY. It's a love story -
for sure - but the major stumbling block to Laughing Boy (LB) and Slim Girl
(SG) are their cultures and transforming between them. SG sees LB as "a
light with which to see her way back to her people, to the good things of
her people." (58) However, she isn't truly sincere in returning to all the
ways -- she doesn't want to herd sheep or grow old and ugly -- plus she's
sleeping with another man. Likewise, LB becomes enthralled by parts of the
American culture (like whiskey): "She observed to herself that this man, who
was to bind her to The People, seemed to be driving her yet farther apart
from them." (140) Eventually LB renounces the American ways (crushes a
bottle of Whiskey) and then finds out about SG's adultery. She also
renounces American ways...and they ride off into the sunset. SG's tragic
death is difficult for LB to accept but - unlike the Laughing Man - he
eventually makes it through.
Salinger translates the Navajo/American conflict in LAUGHING BOY to the
Salinger-esque clash between the 'nice' and 'phony' worlds (as French
simplifies it in his review of Salinger's works). Just as LB represented
the Navajo lifestyle, John Gedsudski represents the authentic, the true.
Cecilia noted that the Navajo lifestyle is similar to Eastern religions --
perhaps Salinger presents Gedsudski as an unwitting characterization of the
Eastern philosophies. Further, most Salinger characters that can relate to
and understand children are always the special, rare, 'nice' ones.
Similarly, Mary Hudson is obviously represented by SG in LAUGHING BOY.
They're both gorgeous. They are both educated. They are both rich. SG
must change to LB's Navajo lifestyle, Mary must change to John's lower class
life.
Now, the key to why the Laughing Man dies while Laughing Boy lives is which
culture prevails. In LAUGHING BOY, LB and SG both eventually turn towards
the Navajo way. In "The Laughing Man," I believe that Mary couldn't make
the change and John's (true, authentic, Zen-like) lifestyle...and further,
John even tries to unsuccessfully move to Mary's class but is rejected
there.
So, the support:
Salinger embeds a great deal of John and Mary's relationship within the
Laughing Man serials that John tells the children. LAUGHING BOY provides a
sort of Rosetta stone for interpreting the characters and the plots in the
context.
To start with: The Navajo/American conflict that Salinger translates to the
phony/nice conflict with John and Mary is once again translated as the
'paris/chinese' border in the Laughing Man serials.
- Just as LB is Navajo, LM is Chinese.
- LM's unrequited love interest, the 'Eurasian' girl, seems like a perfect
description for SG, who was Navajo (Asian) and educated American (euro).
That sticky attitude towards crime translates to SG/MH's reluctance to
accept the Navajo/Eastern ways.
- Black Wing, the glib timber wolf, is a characterization of LB's own horse:
"black, with a white star and a white sock." (Black Wing also has a white
foot, as we learn when the imposter replaces him.) LB refers to his mare as
'little-sister'...a term he eventually begins to use for SG when she is
living the Navajo lifestyle. With this connection, I'm going to try and
argue that Black Wing is a symbol of LM's Slim Girl when she is navajo --
the true asian (and in Mary's case, most similar to John's lifestyle).
- DuFarge's daughter represents the most American version of Slim Girl since
she is the most European. I am unsure who the father would be in LAUGHING
BOY...possibly the missionary that raised her or George, her lover and
provider.
- The 'rice and eagle's blood' is representative of LB's dependence on his
ancestors, translated to mean John's reliance on the eastern philosophy
(sorta ;-). 'Rice' is the stereotypical asian food, like corn or mutton to
LB. The 'eagle's blood' can be explained from LB's uncle, "Wounded Face"
who has an eagle tattoo. Wounded Face attempts to provide the Navajo sided
arguments against LB marrying SG -- the voice of the Navajo. LM
symbolically needs 'eagle's blood' because he needs his uncle and all that
he represents of the old Navajo ways.
Now that we have some of the characters in the Laughing Man serial
explained, we can attack the plot. The opening few bits of the Laughing Man
are only partly explainable currently. The line, "for sheer sport, the
Laughing Man usually went halfway with them [the DuFarges and their traps],
then vanished..." is reminiscent of the way that LB periodically tricked the
American tourists or the store owner. He even explains at one point that
although he is living in town, he and SG are just wearing masks and using
the Americans. I don't know how to explain the carpenter's vise or
mother-machete story...but I'll explain some possibilities at the end.
What is really interesting, of course, are the final two Laughing Man scenes
which reflect the events of John and Mary's relationship. Here is how I fit
them together using the character links from above.
In LAUGHING BOY, LB and SG are getting along fairly poorly because of the
influence of the empty American lifestyle. However, SG is certainly
becoming a 'good' Navajo...she can weave, she can cook, she's good. Mary
Hudson can play baseball and stick with the boys. THAT Slim Girl -- the
Navajo one -- is who LB loves. When SG does something great, LB is seen
"floating," - just like John does when Mary hits her first triple. The
other, manipulating Slim Girl -- who is using him and making sure he only
loves her -- isn't.
In the 'real world' of John and Mary, we see each one wavering between the
two worlds. Mary takes off her beaver coat to play baseball with the boys
(changing for John) while John also changes his jacket from the windbreak to
an overcoat (to be more like Mary). Each one is moving towards the others
lifestyle. This is somewhat similar to the way that LB and SG change for
the other but ends unhappy because the medium ground isn't fulfilling.
In the Laughing Man stories, LM finds himself in trouble as John and Mary's
relationship hits the rocks. We see that daughter-DuFarge (the
evil-americanized-SG/MH) has taken hostage Black Wing (good Slim Girl) and
forced Laughing Man to sacrifice himself to save her. That 'physical and
intellectual trap' which the LM finds himself in is 'love.'
Anyway, the DuFarges get rid of Black Wing and put an imposter in his place.
Essentially, the Americanized-Slim Girl (DuFarge) is overpowering the
Navajo-inclined-Slim Girl (Black Wing). Back in John and Mary's language:
Mary isn't lowering herself to John's level.
The scene when Laughing Man finds out that Black Wing (the good SG, the good
MH) has been replaced correlates to the scene where he finds Slim Girl with
the American man. The replacement wolf is named 'Armand' -- a very European
name. European is equated with American, which is equated with Mary's upper
class lifestyle. Essentially: John has somehow realized that Mary Hudson
is not truly as 'nice' as he thought: she is still in the bad, phony world.
How he actually realizes this isn't clear...perhaps she does not want to
have his children and is planning an abortion (LB and SG very much wanted
children)
When LB finds SG with the American man he is extremely hurt.
Father-duFarge's bullets shooting LM characterize this. LB converts this
rage into action by firing FOUR arrows back at the people who caused him the
pain (1 hits the american man, 1 he intentionally hits SG with). LM
regurgitates FOUR bullets and sends them back at the DuFarges (like hitting
the Bad Slim Girl and American man).
The story continues, however, as LM spends days dying without his eagle's
blood and rice (LB's family, voice of the navajo...ie: the eastern
philosophy). When Omba (unknown symbol) finally brings him the eagle's
blood, LM refuses to drink because he finds out that the good Slim Girl
(Black Wing) is dead. He crushes the vial of Eagle's blood (navajo symbol)
in manner fairly reminiscent of the way that LB crushed a bottle of whiskey
(american symbol).
This is why the LM dies while LB can recover from the death of Slim Girl.
Laughing Boy embraced his Navajo past to make it through Slim Girl's death.
Laughing Man does not. He crushes his Navajo past by crushing the vial of
eagle's blood. Without that to turn to, he dies. And likewise: I guess
we're left to assume that John didn't stop striving for Mary's phony
lifestyle.
- - - - - -
I'm running out of time again so I'll stop there. I am fairly confident
about most of my interpretation...up until the end. I've thrown around
several different variations of the meaning of the ending in my head. If
you include the 'unmasking' part, I wonder if John revealed his true self
(the eastern self) to Mary and she rebuked him (Instead of SG accepting LB's
mandate that they move out of the city, Mary (SG) refuses some sort of
similar mandate by John to move out of New York...?). There's also the
possibility that John's true self isn't what Mary wants anymore: he became
too like herself through their relationship.
Whatever the ending (I'm still working it out)...it's seems clear to me
(now) that "The Laughing Man" isn't so much a coming of age story...but
another phony/nice world comparsion...with the bad/phony/american lifestyle
winning.
- Zack
p.s. This will be long, but it's semi-supportive of some of the above.
In addition to LAUGHING BOY, "The Laughing Man"...specifically the serial
stories of the Laughing Man, have a second inspiration: "The Shadow." I
meant to include this in the first "establishing sources" email but didn't
have time. In short:
The Shadow was a popular 'pulp-fiction,' radio, and movie hero of the 30s
and 40s. He is the man 'who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men.'
It's difficult to prove that Salinger would have read the Shadow (as a child
or adult) -- but it was a widespread marketing scheme across the country so
he must've obviously read, seen, or heard about him a little. And the text
seems to indicate a possibly broader knowledge. Some quick, anecdotal
evidence:
- The Shadow is pictured with a very large nose on the front covers...AKA
John G.
- The Shadow has a hideous laugh that scares villains
- The Shadow wears a crimson lined mask over his mouth. Men that see his
face immediately die.
- The Shadow has a band of agents that help him (though not as disfigured as
the LM's)
- The Shadow can mysteriously calm dogs down and LM can speak with animals
I had hoped to find that plots or characters from the Shadow series of pulp
magazines accounted for the symbols which I could not account for. Sadly,
there are no Mother-Machete murders or lovable dwarfs named Omba. The Shadow
often fights with Mongolians, but none (to my knowledge*) were named Hong.
Also, The Shadow's female agents (AKA the Eurasian girl) often dress up and
disguise themselves as asian to infiltrate the bad guys' headquarters (The
Shadow very very often fought crimes in Chinatown). If Salinger was
familiar with that -- he could have intended Mary to be one of those girls
who can only 'disguise' themselves as being Asian (aka navajo aka John's
level).
* my knowledge pretty much comes from two short chapters from books about
pulps and correspondence with a reader of them who pointed me towards some
of the similarities. Also, to check for character names I downloaded a
hundred or so of the e-texts available and searched through them looking for
the words. Not as good as reading, but much faster.
One, reference, however, that seems obvious to me is Tibet.
Although the Shadow is a very mysterious character...his true identity is
constantly a mystery...one thing is known: where he got his powers.
And, you guessed it: Tibet.
Numerous Shadow stories note that The Shadow learned his special powers -
like the ability to be invisible by clouding men's minds - in a visit to
Tibet. Given Salinger's familiarity (to say the least) with eastern
religion it seems like a perfect little nugget that he would love to use.
So...hopefully you followed me through all that. It's difficult to explain
some of the ideas since I have to reference and dereference symbols that
stand for symbols that stand for symbols...gets me confused and I've been
thinking about it all for a week straight. I think I have some valid
points...and some gaping holes. Where the whole baby thing fits in is still
pretty unclear in my interpretation.
But if there's one thing I really am sure of...it's why the Laughing Man
lives in Tibet.
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