Blindness in Literature

I will be examining the role of blindness in literature. Blindness in literature is usually figurative and not literal. Most characters that are afflicted with blindness suffer from not literal blindness where they can’t see anything but figurative blindness. Figurative blindness refers to blindness that is not literal. For example, Willie Starks in All the Kings Men is figuratively blind as he is blinded by his political ambitions. Figurative blindness is usually caused by some aspect of a character’s life that is so overwhelming and important that it blocks out everything else. Figurative blindness usually leads to the downfall of the characters who are afflicted with it. Because this figurative blindness is overwhelming and causes a character to block out everything else, it is usually very destructive. The destructive nature of figurative blindness is a direct consequence of the fact that a character afflicted with blindness can only think and “see” the overwhelming thing whatever it is. Because of this, the character will ignore all other important aspects of his life. Let’s examine the case with Angel Clare. Angel’s blindness was brought on by Tess’s revelation of her past with Alec and her child Sorrow. Her past is so devastating to Angel that he becomes blinded to her love towards him. Prior to Tess’s confession, Angel and Tess are madly in love with each other. Thinking that love is blind, Angel rejects Tess’s attempts to reveal her past before they became married. However, Tess’s confession disrupts the picture-perfect love between Angel and Tess by forming a barrier that blinds Angel from realizing Tess’s love towards him. In his blind nature, he basically abandons Tess and travels to South America to try to set up a farm for three years. After three years of hard labor, he finally decides to return home. In the meantime, these three years were unbearably painful to Tess. Facing much hardship and not being able to communicate with Angel, she is convinced by Alec that Angel has abandoned her. With Alec’s constant temptations, Tess finally succumbs and reluctantly marries Alec. It is important to understand that it was Angel’s blindness that causes this. In his absence, Tess is too prideful to ask his family for help and her letters aren’t being replied by Alec. Her hardships and lack of communication with Angel are direct causes for Tess finally marrying Alec. Angel finally realizes how much Tess has gone through in his absence because he finds out that she never asked for help from his family. Angel’s realization effectively removes the blindness that has afflicted Angel. He sets out on a desperate search for Tess. Unfortunately, he finds out that she has married Alec and is distraught after their brief but emotional conversation. After Angel leaves with a heavy heart, Tess kills Alec out of pure hatred for deceiving her. Tess and Angel happily reunite. However, the figurative blindness has already ruined the love between Tess and Angel as Tess gets captured and hanged by the townspeople.

Loneliness

The story loneliness is about a man named Enoch Robinson. Enoch is mentally unstable and very unfortunate. Loneliness begins with a brief description of Enoch’s childhood. Although it is easy to pass over his childhood, his childhood must be carefully examined as it contains many clues about figuring out Enoch Robinson as a person. The earlier parts of the story stated that Robinson grew up in a barn that had windows that were never open. The windows serve as a medium for Enoch and the real world. Because the windows are shut, Enoch is lonely and cut off from the real world. He is not able to successfully develop his real world and people skills. This translated into his high school life as Enoch was described to be a very timid and silent high school student. As life went on, Enoch decided he wanted to pursue art so he enrolled in a French art school. He also started hanging out with the artist group. When the artists convened and discussed art, Enoch was unable to. The story says that Enoch was simply too excited to get his words out. But he had this burning desire to speak and voice his opinions to these artists. After awhile, Enoch became sick of the fact that he couldn’t talk and express his views. Perhaps this is the precise reason for Enoch creating imaginary people. He started to create imaginary friends who would be completely understanding of Enoch. Among his imaginary friends, Enoch had everything he wished for. He could now be his egotistical child self and boss all of his imaginary friends around. He would have this “absurd air of importance”. This air of importance is what he was missing all his life. From his childhood to his coming of age, he never experienced what it was like to be important and to be heard. This changed once Enoch started creating imaginary friends. He was genuinely happy and satisfied with them because he finally felt what it was like to be important. Satisfaction led him to believe that he didn’t need anyone else in his world so he stopped hanging out with the artists and inviting them over to have art discussions. In his own world, Enoch was the all-important figure he wanted to be in real life. But happiness can only be temporarily forced. Sooner or later, something had to shatter his world. One day, a woman comes to his apartment where Enoch decides to tell her everything. This obviously included his imaginary friends. He became extremely angry with her because he realized that she wasn’t like his imaginary friends where they could be controlled at will and she couldn’t. This must have been a harsh reminder for Enoch as all his imaginary friends followed the woman when she left his apartment. His imaginary friends never came back and that put an abrupt end to Enoch’s perfect world where he reigned supreme. He then went back to Winesburg as an old and defeated man.

Grotesques

Winesburg, Ohio can be classified as a collection of short stories. The novel takes place in the fictional town in Ohio called Winesburg. The story doesn’t really have a main character. The closest character that resembles a main character is George Willard. George Willard is a reporter for a local newspaper. The novel begins with a prologue where an unnamed man is obsessed with his theory of grotesques. As he is sleeping, he sees everyone that he has ever met as grotesques in his dreams. After waking up from this sleep, this man writes down everything he saw and rambles on for hundreds of pages in a book called The Book of Grotesques. The old man claims that there are numerous “beautiful” truths in this world and that all of them are valid. The problem arises when someone tries to live by only one truth. This makes them distorted and transforms them into grotesques. This prologue is what connects all the different stories in the novel even though the stories sometimes seem to have no relation to each other. Every single story in the novel revolves around a character who is a grotesque because they only believe in one truth. An example is the story revolving around Wash Williams. A fat and unattractive man, he tells George of his past. He claims that he was handsome and lean in the old days when he was married to his wife. But he found out that she was cheating on him so he left her and went to a different town. One day, his mother in law invited both him and her daughter to her house. Thinking that his wife was going to apologize, he reluctantly decided to go to his mother in law’s house. When he was there, he found out that his wife and her mother conceived a despicable plan of trying to make him forgive his wife by using sex as a tool. This made him infuriated as he then believed that all women were despicable. From that moment on, he referred to all women as “bitches”. This is the one “truth” that he decided to believe in and it made him into a grotesque as he became obese and anti social. But let’s examine the “truth” that the unnamed author talks about in the prologue. He claims that there are many different truths that are all legitimate and people only become grotesques if and only if they only believe in one truth.  Does that mean if Wash had believed in another truth in conjunction with the one that claims all women are despicable he would have been not become a grotesque? I think that the definition of truth that is described in the prologue is too vague to determine the answer to this question. What happens if Wash Williams believes in two completely different but both “negative” truths?  In my opinion, Wash Williams would have still become a grotesque even if the truths were completely different. 

Martin and Pangloss

Voltaire uses foil characters in Candide as a tool to emphasize his theme. I will take a look at the foil characters Pangloss and Martin in this novel. These two characters couldn’t be more different. If Pangloss was north, Martin would be south. They are polar opposites. Pangloss is so confident in his optimism theory which states that this world is the best of all possible worlds while Martin’s personal experiences convinced him that this world is only filled with evil. Their opposite philosophies can both be traced back to each character’s history. Pangloss was a mentor for the noble in a German castle. The nobles really did enjoy a sheltered life filled with luxury and lavishness. Enjoying the best foods, services, and respect, the nobles perhaps might have a life that is only possible in the best of all possible worlds. As a direct observer to this kind of lifestyle, Pangloss started to form his optimism theory stating that this is the best of all possible worlds. On the other hand, Martin’s tragic past shaped his pessimistic philosophy. His side of the story is understandable as well. He was robbed by his wife and even beaten by his own son. On top of all this, he was even persecuted by the church. Based on his life, he confidently confided in his pessimism theory. Unlike all the other characters in the novel, Martin is actually somewhat believable because he is highly doubtful of everything. This pessimism and doubtful-nature allows him to see through the Parisian con artists and help Candide out. He is also more intellectual and realistic than let’s say a character like Pangloss. However, he’s not completely believable either because his pessimism theory is too extreme. For example, he inaccurately predicts Cacambo’s nature and behavior. When Candide entrusts his loyal side kick Cacambo with the precious stones, Martin told Candide that Cacambo would run away with the money and never come back. His rationale can be justified by his past. If his own wife could rob him, then someone unrelated could definitely rob him as well. However, Martin had miscalculated Cacambo’s loyalty. Cacambo ends up returning to Candide with all the gold. Although the character Martin has flaws, his voice reflects that of Voltaire the most. Voltaire was known for his pessimistic nature. Thus, Voltaire uses Martin as a means to which he can state his own views and philosophies. Even though Martin acts as a voice medium for Voltaire, both Martin’s extreme pessimism and Pangloss’s extreme optimism are both flawed. When Pangloss and Martin are juxtaposed, the flaws of both philosophies come into light as one is too pessimistic and the other is too optimistic. In the conclusion of the novel, Candide realizes that wondering about which philosophy governs life is a waste and that people should “cultivate the garden” which means that they should ignore the philosophies and just live their lives.