Identity and Race in The Sympathizer

“Was five thousand dollars the worth of my miserable life? Admittedly it was a considerable amount, more than I had ever seen at any one time. That was what they were counting on, but even in my dazed state, I knew better than to settle for the first offer. (…)

But as you may know, or maybe you do not (…) an Asian—here I paused and allowed a faraway look to come into my eyes, the better to give them time to imagine the vast genealogical banyan tree extending above me, overshadowing me with the oppressive weight of generations come to root on the top of my head—an Asian cannot think just about himself.

So I’ve heard, said the representative. The family is everything. Like us Italians.” (201)

The passage above is a satirical twist of universal (but not unhealthy) greed and askew racial prejudice. Unlike just pointing out that some prejudice might not be so accurate, Viet Thanh Nguyen allocates the protagonist to take advantage of the prejudice to fulfill a universal desire for money. Here, the protagonist’s identity is characterized as an unfortunate yet agile figure that takes advantage even of an accident that could have led to his possible death. The farcical irony in this passage is that although the corporate agent identifies the protagonist with an Asian stereotype, in fact they share not only the same desire for more money either earned or saved, but also their familiarity to their extended family members. Here, racial stereotype is employed in the identification, while the readers notice that the two are mostly same in human traits.

“I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.”

Perhaps one of the most famous quotes in sci-fi film, Roy’s soliloquy reveals the interiority of the artificial beings. A robot may be capable of achieving great feats, but what would differentiate it from human beings is not only that humans can feel emotions but also that they can identify themselves with memories and endow meaning to those memories. Until this part of the film, there are only indirect indications of how Nexuses are human-like. This soliloquy is the climax of the protagonist identifying with the Nexuses, the protagonist is also but a mortal being with limited time and only one truthful collective set of memories. The soliloquy shows that Nexuses are able to endow meaning to their personal memories, and that they recognize their mortal destiny. At the end of the day, the blade runner is left with a realization that human beings are no different from the Nexuses, not because they are born differently, but because both entities are bound to have similar perspectives in treating life. On another note, the phrase “tears in rain” does seem to indicate the mortality of dying beings but induces an especially sorrowful emotion, since their (and our) emotions associated with memories will also perish altogether. This expression is especially significant since the style and content make a congruence.

In Frow’s Interest, Frow explains that identification is done through an incorporation of an objectexternal to oneself, and that selfhood is remnants of what one had liked before. While having this notion in mind, it was interesting to read the part in which Pecola literally eats Mary Jane candies: “Smiling white face. Blond hair in gentle disarray, blue eyes looking at her out of a world of clean comfort. (…) She eats the candy, and its sweetness is good. To eat the candy is somehow to eat the eyes, eat Mary Jane. Love Mary Jane. Be Mary Jane. (…) nine lovely orgasms with Mary Jane. Lovely Mary Jane, for whom a candy is named” (50).

There are multiple layers of identity construction done in this short excerpt. Pecola identifies the stereotypical white beauty as “the” ideal beauty named as Mary Jane, decides to eat and swallow the candy, perceive sweetness in its taste, and proclaims that she not only wants to be like Mary Jane but loves it. The last part in loving Mary Jane seems to bear much meaning than simple admiration, since Pecola expresses eating the candies as “nine lovely orgasms.” Considering that Pecola was subjected to hostile white phallocentric gaze from the candy shop owner, it might be possible to infer that Pecola, by “eat[ing] the eyes” of Mary Jane, acquires her beauty, which is equivalent to neutralizing the hostile white phallocentric gaze. There is metonymical equivalence between avoiding this gaze and experiencing orgasm, being not only unrejected but actively wanted sexually and respected as a part of the society. This orgasm seems to line up with the sweetness aforementioned earlier in the passage, considering that Maureen is evidently more respected and sexually desired, which is emphasized by her capability of eating ice cream (a higher-quality sweet) while Pecola cannot.

Linking back to the Frow text, it seems that Pecola is socially molded into a self-abhorring subject that is induced to dislike others and look up to whites and colored people that resemble whites. It seems like Freud’s explanation of melancholia fits into this part of the book since Pecola is not what she desires to be. As this desire is essentially impossible to be fulfilled, it seems Pecola’s identity will most likely include self-hatred.

Two members of the family may happen to share homosexual tendencies. But it seems that for Alison, homosexuality was one of very few means of Alison identifying with the father. When explaining the father’s death, Alison allocates a Webster’s dictionary page of the word “queer.” Alison makes it very clear that although many definitions of the word may explain the father’s death, homosexuality was the one concept that most well-defined the existence of the father and his demise: “most compellingly at the time, his death was bound up for me with the one definition conspicuously missing from our mammoth Webster’s” (57). In the cuts in the same page, Alison holds up her sherry glass in a peculiar perpendicular way as if she were giving a toast, and then follows to drink it. The father in the later scenes draw a reminding parallel with Alison (of course in reality it would have been Alison replicating the father) as he also raises his glass in the same way (65). What is more implicit is that Alison drinks her sherry glass as if she were to enjoy her drink while a page of the word “queer” is forward-deployed towards the readers, while the father only raises the glass but not drinks it.

On the other hand, Roy, the father’s (supposed) sexual partner drinks it, as a possible counterpart for Alison’s Webster’s page of the word “queer.” The interpretation of the scene is that the two characters are both shown to be homosexuals, but while Alison openly admits her homosexuality and enjoys her pleasure, the father is portrayed and implied to have fragmented himself between his homosexuality identified by Roy in the cut and a father that not-so-successfully takes care of his family. This schizophrenic division of self is expressed when Roy goes onto drink and enjoy the sherry while the father does not, at least in front of others such as the mother. Considering that the father’s trial happened due to alcohol and the fact that he offered it to other teenage boys, the sherry scene is fairly foreshadowing. The father’s drinking and pleasure habits are deliberately concealed and kept in secret, unlike Alison; as those habits are exposed, the father is put in legal peril. Alison, as she comes out of the closet, does not meet a similar fate, at least not in the book.

Mucho and his relationship with Oedipa

What I thought was a defining feature of this novel was the alienation and lack of depth in relationships. One of the most conspicuous instance is when Oedipa discusses with Mucho regarding her ex-boyfriend’s death and Mucho, on the other hand, repeats complaining on his daily life. But the essence of the conversation here is not the interaction between the two characters; the existence of Mucho, at least in this scene, seems to be explanatory of Oedipa’s point of view. Through Oedipa’s narration on how Mucho detested his used-car jobs since the cars were an alibi for people of his kind were to live distressed, unimportant lives, Oedipa can be viewed as a cynical individual. Mucho then goes onto implying how he is interested in young girls and often makes confrontation with his boss on that issue. Again, Oedipa remains a cool state of mind and does not react to her husband’s moral flaw. Mucho’s occupation as either used car salesman or DJ at KCUF (reversely read as fuck) shows what kind of state both Mucho and Oedipa are in. Oedipa does not sympathize with Mucho, but their relationship seems to testify that they are both alienated and lost from others, including each other.

Physicality and Tod Clifton

Tod Clifton’s funeral scene is an interesting scene in which a character barely discovered and without much significance is endowed meaning by the protagonist in its absence. In a way, Tod Clifton as a character is an analogy to a corpse; a living human being, before insignificant and one of many and now dead and rotting, suddenly gains interest in form of grief or/and disgust from others. A corpse is significant and provoking because of its contradictory state: it shows the same form as a life but at the same time reveals the striking fact that it is very much dead and gone from this world.

The protagonist emphasizes the fact that Tod Clifton is now a goner, and he would have nothing to do with the audience’s lives if they were to ignore his absence. At the same time, he identifies the respective individuals in the audience as another Tod Clifton, living in “the box and [they’re] with him, and (…) it’s dark in this box and it’s crowded (…) cracked ceiling and a clogged-up toilet in the gall (…) rats and roaches” (458). In other words, every single African Americans in the audience are not only a non-existing goner, but they are corpses. They do not exist, but they are repulsive beings to other humans, which must refer to the whites.

Although I have not finished reading the entire book, it would be reasonable to assume that the vagueness in the identity of Tod Clifton is not unnecessary. He is a representative of the African Americans in the plot, only more superior and respectable than other laymen. Yet he was shot and killed. His being garners meaning to the whole community as the character loses physicality. Tod Clifton is a character more significant without presence.

RESPONSE (ADA)- “A corpse is significant and provoking because of its contradictory state…”

This posting does really well in highlighting the contradiction of Tod Clifton coming alive through his death but also the black community recognizing the own fragility of their individual/collective life through the taking of one of their own. The quote that you mention reflects the feeling of being collectively buried alive despite each individual being alive. The living corpse image that you’ve put forth is really apt because it encapsulates how the Invisible Man was conceptualizing the black experience as being a part of the walking dead. It takes physical death to realize all the various ways in which black life is suppressed and squashed even when black bodies are breathing. Rather than thinking of their walking dead as a sign of systemic non-existence, it seems that Ellison is proposing an existence that is very much tethered to the concept of death rather than death being the removal of existence. Tod Clifton came “to life” after “death.” The linearity of living as one lives then dies is dramatically complicated with how Clifton is used in the text.

Invisible Man’s “the vet” and relationship to other characters

It is not only dangerous but also inefficient for the rulers to control the subjugated only through brute force. It is much safer and more efficient to make the obedient and talented individuals of the controlled class to have a place in society, thus incentivizing them to fit into the established system and thereby letting them contribute to the hegemony.

In such sense, the early relationship between Mr. Norton and the protagonist is a symbiotic contract. In return of some degradation, the protagonist is ensured a position in society as a respected expert, thus functioning as a buffet class between the controlling and the controlled class. Mr. Norton is in a much better side of the deal: through a significant donation, he gains a social position as a philanthropist while still enjoying what is left of his fortune. The two characters are in a socially constructed mirage that serves to satisfies both, of course more for the likes of Mr. Norton.

The advent of “the vet” is what shatters this mirage. Taking the form as a Shakespearean fool, the vet exposes the hypocrisy contained in the aforementioned contract. The vet is a possible fate of the protagonist. “[He] performed a few brain surgeries that won [him] some small attention” as a successful brain surgeon (91). But then he “was forced to the utmost degradation because [he] possessed (…) the belief that [his] knowledge could bring [himself] dignity (…) and other men health” (93). He may be a shell-shocked mad veteran, yet he is capable of seeing the truth the protagonist and Mr. Norton fail to, or rather refuse to, see: this is no country for blacks.