Humans tend to cope with their flaws using denial. We look at our own flaws in a distorted, fantasy-like lens, usually ending in an inflated perception of ourselves, either negative or positive. In "Al Roosten" by George Saunders, the reader sees that Al Roosten is a homely, failing business owner who constantly competes with another member of the business community, Larry Donfery, who is everything Al is not. Despite this reality, Roosten makes up fantasy scenarios and interpretations in his head that hold him up as a superior figure to all. In "The Laughing Man" by J.D. Salinger, we see a similar fantasy based denial, but for a different purpose. The narrator describes adventures with his group leader: The Chief. The Chief is famous
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The purpose of the stories is to get the group of kids to admire The Chief. The Laughing Man was "the only son of a missionary couple that was kidnapped in infancy by Chinese bandits" (Salinger 58). When the parents refused to pay a ransom, the bandits "placed the little fellow’s head in a carpenter 's vice and gave the appropriate lever several turns to the right" (Salinger 58). The man that grew out of this experience had "a hairless, pea-shaped head that featured, instead of a mouth, an enormous oval cavity below the nose" (Salinger 59). Because of these disfigurements he was ostracized, which gave him alone time to learn the skills of thievery and combat that he used to outwit his foes. One makes the immediate connection between this heroic, but flawed, Laughing Man and The Chief. The Chief views himself as this disfigured human based on his small stature and homely facial features. Both ostracized from their peers because of physical flaws. The Chief creates this character whose only redeeming quality is heroism. This teaches the kids that people who may seem flawed can actually be objects of emulation. The stories are used to entrance these kids with the idea of the a flawed hero, that they then project onto The Chief, thus accounting for the dual perception of The Chief by the narrator. In this way, the story serves as a parallelism between The Chief and The Laughing …show more content…
Because of this, he uses the kids as an accepting audience. A group that will take in his stories and look to him as a hero. If he sees that others accept him despite his flaws, he may be able to accept himself and gain confidence. He finally does build this confidence later in the story when the narrator observes "[A]bove the rear-view mirror, over the windshield, there was a framed picture of a girl in an academic cap and gown" and remarks "I can remember seeing three girls in my life that struck me as having unclassifiably great beauty at first sight/and the third was Chief 's girl, Mary Hudson" (Salinger 62-63). Obviously, The Chief goes from an awkward looking guy he babysits kids most of his free time, to having an incredibly beautiful girlfriend. It was this confidence that he gained from his loyal Comanches hanging on every word of his heroic self-parallel that restores his faith in himself and gives him the courage to ask out Mary
The purpose of the stories is to get the group of kids to admire The Chief. The Laughing Man was "the only son of a missionary couple that was kidnapped in infancy by Chinese bandits" (Salinger 58). When the parents refused to pay a ransom, the bandits "placed the little fellow’s head in a carpenter 's vice and gave the appropriate lever several turns to the right" (Salinger 58). The man that grew out of this experience had "a hairless, pea-shaped head that featured, instead of a mouth, an enormous oval cavity below the nose" (Salinger 59). Because of these disfigurements he was ostracized, which gave him alone time to learn the skills of thievery and combat that he used to outwit his foes. One makes the immediate connection between this heroic, but flawed, Laughing Man and The Chief. The Chief views himself as this disfigured human based on his small stature and homely facial features. Both ostracized from their peers because of physical flaws. The Chief creates this character whose only redeeming quality is heroism. This teaches the kids that people who may seem flawed can actually be objects of emulation. The stories are used to entrance these kids with the idea of the a flawed hero, that they then project onto The Chief, thus accounting for the dual perception of The Chief by the narrator. In this way, the story serves as a parallelism between The Chief and The Laughing …show more content…
Because of this, he uses the kids as an accepting audience. A group that will take in his stories and look to him as a hero. If he sees that others accept him despite his flaws, he may be able to accept himself and gain confidence. He finally does build this confidence later in the story when the narrator observes "[A]bove the rear-view mirror, over the windshield, there was a framed picture of a girl in an academic cap and gown" and remarks "I can remember seeing three girls in my life that struck me as having unclassifiably great beauty at first sight/and the third was Chief 's girl, Mary Hudson" (Salinger 62-63). Obviously, The Chief goes from an awkward looking guy he babysits kids most of his free time, to having an incredibly beautiful girlfriend. It was this confidence that he gained from his loyal Comanches hanging on every word of his heroic self-parallel that restores his faith in himself and gives him the courage to ask out Mary