Appomattox Court House

So I'm done with A Confederacy of Dunces.

 

In response to one of my previous blog posts, Himavath said something along the lines of "Since this takes place in the 1960s south, I'm guessing that this will have something to do with the issue of Civil Rights." For my initial reading, my response to that was basically "Not at all." However, upon closer inspection, it definitely seems like this book address racial issues, though not in a way you'd expect. Rather, this book addresses the idea of "Modern Slavery." The black citizens in Dunces are not legally slaves, they are forced to remain second class citizens through other methods. For example, the character of Burma Jones is arrested for stealing cashew nuts. Though it is heavily implied that he did nothing wrong, once he gets out of jail, he would have to get a job, or risk being arrested again. This would force him to the much worse jobs. This is featured again, with the fact that all of the workers in Levy Jeans are black. In fact, this theme is outright said by Ignatius, in a rare moment of brilliance.

 

"It is a scene which combines the worst of Uncle Tom's Cabin and Fritz LAng's Metropolis; it is mechanized Negro slavery; it represents the progress which the Negro has made from picking cotton to tailoring it. " (119)

In this quote, Ignatius out right says this theme, making it not that ambiguous.

 

There is also the nature of Ignatius himself. As I mentioned before, in many ways, he feels like a modern Don Quixote, with his incredibly out of place idealism. One of the things that he believes is that all of his sufferings are not because of him, but because fate is playing games with him. However, in an interesting twist, Ignatius is basically a walking karma deliverer. Because of him, Miss Trixie gets her retirement,  Manusco gets a promotion, and Liz, betty, and Freida ens up in prison, among other things.

 

I enjoyed this book. Sure, the humor was, subtle, but it was there. However,  I feel like I have to go back to what I said earlier, about how peopel consider this the funnist book ever written. So does it live up to that claim? Not really, as I still prefer the likes of Vonnegut and Catch-22. However, this was still an enjoyable book.

CoD Midway

So I'm now halfway through CoD

The style of Confederacy of Dunces is hard to place. It's definitely a far cry from the very simplistic craft of Vonnegut. It's use of complex sentences and difficult vocabulary make it give a very refined feel, reminding me of Joyce, in a way. This actually sort of misleads a reader's portrayal of Ignatius, making him out as a man who makes at least a little bit of sense.

This is where we get ignatius himself. Ignatius is a classic example of a caractère qui ne sait rien, or a character that knows nothing. All he does is sit around all day, expecting his mother to do everything from him. 

As most people reading this blog should have picked up, Ignatius frequently wears a green hunting hat. "But wait, John. Holden also wore a red hunting hat!"you say.  Congratulations, you looked up Catcher in the Rye on sparknotes. Give yourself a pat on the back. 

Of course, this choice of hunting hat is important. For one, Holden and Ignatius are common in that their sense of the world is different from the world around them. Holden is an idealist, while Ignatius is such a pessimist that he ends up wrapping around the earth and becoming an idealist again. Like the color, there is a significant difference between these two individuals: while Holden experiences change in his idealism (Helped by him going to New York), Ignatius is contempt with just sitting in his mother's house, doing nothing, except for occasionally watching movies. 

"When the credits had ended and Ignatius had noted that several of the actors, the composer, the director, the hair designer, and the assistant producer were all people whose efforts had offended him at various times in the past" (36)

This quote exemplifies Ignatius' shallow views. Despite that fact that he has very likely never met any of the people that he mentioned here, he believes that they have "offended him," which, you know, usually requires deliberate action on the offending person part. So, what offended him?

"On the second chorus the entire ensemble joined in the song, smiling and singing lustily about ultimate success while they swung, dangled, flipped, and soared. “Oh, good heavens!” Ignatius shouted, unable to contain himself any longer. Popcorn spilled down his shirt and gathered in the folds of his trousers. “What degenerate produced this abortion?”" (37)

Singing and dancing! Ignatius must be fun at parties. 

Overall, though it might have started cold, I'm starting to find myself warming up to this book. Though the humor is very subtle it's usually hilarious. I am excited to keep reading this book.