Lee or Ruby?

The assassination of JFK is one of the most widely known-of events in modern history, but amazingly, the amount of concrete data about the event is really quite limited. This makes it perfect to be the start of a conspiracy theory, merging interest, new ideas, and a lack of evidence to disprove most things. That makes the entire subplot with Alpha 66, Win Everett, David Ferrie, TJ Mackey, and so on a very believable conspiracy. All the fictional characters that DeLillo describes are pretty mundane, often times reality being more far-fetched than the fiction. The creation of such a plausible conspiracy theory sometimes makes it hard to judge the line fabrication and fact, but the story still fits around all the known events. The result is one very well-planned plot that explores a few possibilities for the actual factual historical background to the assassination that we will likely never uncover. Instead of having a complete fantasy, DeLillo instead reasonably extrapolates the data between the missing points, forging a full manuscript that depicts start to finish everything that led up to November 22^nd, 1963 in Dallas, Texas.  

A vast portion of Libra has been spent by DeLillo to establish the character of Lee Harvey Oswald. The reader is in tune to every little nuance and thought that goes through his head. With a step-by-step analysis of the conspiracy plots that led to the Kennedy assassination, the reader gets a good feeling for the hopes and dreams of the most prominent character. The structure of Lee as a character and the comparisons we can draw between the fiction and whatever limited fact we have is a major part of what makes Libra such a realistic book. Lee mainly wants to stand out and to be publicly recognized for something. All his other actions seem a means to an end, spouting Communist literature at American men in the Marines, but becoming more of a laughingstock than a hero. Never quite able to fit in, he drifted the world failing to find some place that would recognize him for anything. His need for fame that drove the actions of his life is something that made him so susceptible to be quite easily talked into killing someone. His moral standing and goals in life can especially be seen after he realizes he was a patsy all along, but instead of confessing to that, imagines himself as the preeminent historian on himself, learning everything he can about “his” assassination of JFK, growing his fame and image all while living in a jail cell for the rest of his life for killing the President.

Unlike Lee, Jack Ruby as a human is pretty well defined, even if we only meet him rather briefly (compared to Lee’s text) at the end of the novel. A strong patriot, even in a city where there is plenty hate for Kennedy, he closes his club in mourning of the President’s assassination. He struggles to make ends meet but continues to uphold his morals and his beliefs. This makes him as dangerous as Lee ever was, albeit Lee also had military training. Just like Lee would do anything to attain the elusive glory he wanted, Jack would do anything to remove offense from America. Pushed over the brink of doubt by his creditors in the mafia with a promise of a waived loan, Ruby kills Lee point blank, crushing the latter’s fantasies of fame. Having built himself up to this moment, he had expected praise and adoration as thanks for killing the man who killed the President, killing the man all of Dallas hated. Instead, Jack Ruby learned the hard way that two wrongs don’t make a right, ending up being condemned just as much as Lee was even while both thought that they were bringing about change in the world and improving things for people.

Both men were obviously deeply flawed individuals that resulted in them being susceptible to become pawns in someone else’s games. In addition, neither had good planning or foresight. On multiple occasions, Lee dreamed of fantasy and finally finding what he looked for, and then time and time again only disappoints himself as events don’t pan out like he expected them to. In similar fashion, not only does Ruby not get the thanks he thought he deserved for the murder, he was sentenced to death for shooting Lee. The similarities between the two characters are then necessary for them to even undertake such idealistic assassinations and expect fame afterwards. Although they came from different backgrounds, have different goals, and are otherwise completely different people, Libra begins and ends with quite similar characters who have come to be defined by their actions directly correlating to the Kennedy assassination, showing the amount of possibilities open to other conspiracy theories since the private thoughts of either are just pure guesswork on the part of the author. 

The Multinational Superspy

A little trick DeLillo uses to make Libra interesting is the conflicting portrayal of historical and fictional characters. With timid and conservative fictional characters, the inventions in the book are all very understandable and believable. Although that does muddy the line between fiction and fact, in this particular case many of the facts are quite bizarre by themselves without any author's embellishment. By having this contrast between actual people and invented, but hyper-realistic characters, Libra calls into question all the previously understood facts. By bringing up and proving the possibility of this particular conspiracy theory, it leaves the history of the Kennedy assassination open to speculation and more theories. It also facilitates the narrative inside the narrative, since Libra itself acts a tell-all story about American undercover operations that Win Everett wants to reveal as part of his "Let's Almost Kill Kennedy" plot. The outline of the novel is properly convoluted, with many characters coming and going with different and often times secret interactions that make it hard to keep track of. This too only makes the conspiracy more real since it shows the difficulties with organizing such a complex scheme. In the end, the character writing results in making the fictional characters more believable than the actual historical figures.

One of the more unbelievable but real characters, George de Mohrenschildt is the best way to describe the CIA, representing the easy duplicity of the organization. On one hand, from Lee's perspective we see a kindly and intelligent father figure that fills a void in Lee's life. If that weren't enough, George also befriends Lee and his new wife and helps them settle in in the new area. But then we also see the same story from de Mohrenschildt's perspective, who sees Lee as the potential asset that he is to the CIA, having defected to and from the Soviet Union makes him a person of interest with potentially useful knowledge. Even beyond that there's also George's hint that Lee took the shot at General Walker under some influence from Mohrenschildt. In Lee's mind, the General was a fascist leader, but it is impossible to tell how much of that was his own ideas and how much was ingrained by the superspy. The end result is a very conflicted view of the character since his motives are so muddled. His affection towards Lee is obvious, but especially with his discussion with Parmenter, it puts Oswald closer to the center of a conspiracy theory where he is the scapegoat. Overall, I'm still impressed with the smooth skill and ability that Mohrenschmidt has, bringing many different underground connections to the table. Like the rest of the character writing, the final goal is to have a believable conspiracy theory invented by DeLillo, then described as the real thing to prove that not all the history is set in stone.

What's Wrong with People Anyway?

Although at first Dana is fine surviving in the past as a free black woman on a slave-holding plantation in the South, the real trouble starts after Kevin comes back with her. If in the first trip together they share a similar outlook on the atrocious by modern standards treatment in the slave-holding world, then Kevin becomes tempered to the life there. It is even more obvious how adjusted he became when he returned to 1976 and had trouble re-adjusting to everything that is now so new to him. The difference is all the more shocking to Dana after she comes back because Kevin had no choice to adjust and get used to the atrocities of the time but Dana was only gone a short while from Maryland so she basically met a completely different person from the one she married and knew.

In addition to the problems with Kevin and the tensions created in that relationship by such an arrangement, it is obviously disturbing to Dana that efforts to raise Rufus as a well-mannered and normal (by 1976 standards) individual completely fall through. Without her guidance, Rufus quickly turns into the spoiled child who emulates the father he hates but without any of the restrictions or morals his father had but hid. I hate to say it, but Tom Weylin seemed rather fair to his slaves but hides his own sentiments so as to hide weakness. Tom is almost as business-minded with his family as he is with his children, instilling fear in Rufus from an early age. The boy ends up with a life-time fear of blame and justifies his actions with completely inverted logic. This way he can do what he wants and keep the people he wants while blaming his victims for putting themselves in such a situation

In the end, the story is from Dana's perspective. Dana is also not without fault, so although her outlook hasn't tempered to the time's like Kevin's has and she still manages to be a caring individual unlike the grown Rufus, she also has her own dilemma. The circumstances of her time travel have led her to believe that her actions are essential to her own survival. She believes that she needs to be Rufus' and Alice's matchmaker, forcing Alice to comply against her wishes. It truly is messed up that Dana forces a girl in a similar position to herself to have sex with the master just because Dana is worried that otherwise she will never be born, something she has no proof of. What if Dana just did nothing, would she just disappear off the face of the Earth? Butler never gives enough detail as to the specifics of the time travel to be able to justify Dana's quite terrible actions, as much as she hates to admit it. Perhaps something will be revealed later in the book to provide explanation for the first scene in the book, and maybe that'll explain the weird time travel that otherwise leaves me completely unsatisfied with the character's motives.

Same, But Different

Slaughterhouse-Five manages to leave quite a bit to the imagination of the reader, an impressive feat with such a well-defined novel. Even though Vonnegut has given clear explanations of the events of the novel, the various unique aspects of the genius storytelling results in a story that varies wildly with interpretation. For me it is an interesting reversal of the effect of the novel. In Ragtime, the events were hard fact as defined by the book, but the author's meaning was left up to the interpretation of the reader. In Mumbo Jumbo, although the events were rather messy, you can't say that the Mu'tafikah didn't repatriate cultural relics or that Osiris wasn't chopped up into 13 pieces by Set. Even though you could have many different interpretations of the novel's meaning, you can't argue with the novel's facts. In both cases you can submerge yourself into a state of slight disbelief to make the plot seem believable, even perhaps just assuming that the novel takes place in a parallel universe where the entire book is hard fact, not a merger of history and fact as we had analyzed them. In Slaughterhouse-Five, Vonnegut doesn't leave much wiggle room for interpretation.

So I held up my right hand and I made her a promise. “Mary,” I said, “I don’t think this book is ever going to be finished. I must have written five thousand pages by now, and thrown them all away. If I ever do finish it, though, I give you my word of honor: there won’t be a part for Frank Sinatra or John Wayne.
“I tell you what,” I said, “I’ll call it The Children’s Crusade.”
She was my friend after that. (Chapter 1)

Right off the bat, right in the first chapter, he reveals his outline and climax to the reader, completely different from the standard set by any classical novel. There should be no doubt in the readers mind as to the overarching goal of the book, pointing towards the futility and terror of destruction and war. The plot, on the other hand, can be viewed in many different lights. Depending on how you interpret the depiction of the characters, mainly Billy Pilgrim, the plot of the story can become completely different. For example, one view is that the entire novel is a autobiographical retelling altered by the delusions of brain injury or old age. Another possibility is to take the novel true to its word and accept everything for a total truth, resulting in a completely different read and perception of the characters. Either way, the reader has to mold their interpretation under the overarching idea of the novel already set by Vonnegut. The beauty of the novel is that you can read it many times and each time find a different story, but still receive the same message.

Reason to the Madness

Mumbo Jumbo really lived up to its name. It was a wild ride of lingo and jive, exploring the deep secrets of our world. For the longest time, I had a lot of trouble understanding anything I was reading. It was like reading something backwards, nothing making sense until the basic plot points are explained. In classical literature, the foundation of the text would come first and support the rest of the novel, but in this postmodernist book everything is flipped.

At the end of the novel, Reed does explain the origins of "Jes Grew" and ties PaPa LaBas into the present world, bring some much-absent sense into the novel. Just like the epidemic, the book seems to be searching for it's own meaning. Amidst a rocky start (the first 50 chapters or so), it all starts to make sense as Reed brings the novel to a close. In that sense, his writing mirrors his words, reinforcing all the points he makes. Having found its soul and meaning, both the novel and the epidemic started to become understandable, and, by extension, less dangerous to the reader and the world. The epilogue successfully un-alienated the book, proving the necessity of a second read with the knowledge of the first in mind for a completely different read.

Although a tough read, looking back, it was much less like a book that I'm accustomed to and much more of an overall deep experience (like treatment at the Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral). In class we discussed similarities to a movie script, perhaps insinuating that Reed chose the wrong medium for his story, but I feel that Mumbo Jumbo only works as a novel; providing the author ultimate control over the reader's understanding. Reed managed to take thins a step further than most books, thinking ahead like a chess player. He wrote the book around the reader's perception of the novel, altering completely the experience we had when reading his story. A movie would have been extremely difficult to craft to encompass all the hidden meaning, keeping the reader in the dark until the final scene. For better or worse, the final moments turned a weird disjointed narrative into a truly memorable text.

Lost in Translation

Mumbo Jumbo really lives up to its name. Everything seems to make sense on its own, but put all together it becomes a bunch of gibberish. The weird formatting of the book is a good place to start my list of issues. Usually, when I read a book, I have some expectations of what I will get out of it. There are some standards that have been established by years of published word, and Mumbo Jumbo manages to break all of them. I can see the point of starting the book at the cover, as we discussed in class, forcing the reader to go back and truly attempt to comprehend the meaning of the string of words. It feels weird at first because of out expectations, but I think that it does end up serving an interesting purpose for the experience of the reader. It really makes the book stand out the moment you open it, even before you start reading.

Once you do start reading though, things go a bit crazy. Right off the bat, the reader is lost. With "a Creeping Thing" and "Judas Eye" and "HooDoo Queen", I was already puzzled and confused. A complete lack of explanation for these things leaves the reader longing for some justification for an already crazed ramble. Reading like a first draft, the text has the style of no style. Sentences are abrupt and short, but then spout into page-wide explanations and descriptions. People speak in jive, and writing anything in slang is complicated and requires forethought and planning. That aspect really contradicts with the rest of the text, riddled with errors and typos. The text doesn't flow; it jumps from place to place. Half the meaning is completely disguised by unknown words that sound Creole and describe hidden topics. At this point, I'm intrigued, but I also feel extremely lost, counting on the continuation to bring some reason to the craziness of this book. It can only be written like this completely on purpose or totally out of neglect, but since the book seems constructed, I tend to lean to the former. At this point, I'm even inclined to think that the weird writing and confusing text is completely on purpose, but perhaps the train of thought is incomprehensible when incomplete. For now though, I'm lost, but hooked with high hopes for the rest of the book.

And that's only the first chapter.

The Fall of Coalhouse Walker

Coalhouse Walker has proven to be a very volatile character. Over the months of his courtship of Sarah, it was proven to us how persistent a man he is. He kept coming to visit the house in New Rochelle every Sunday until the day Sarah agreed to marry him. Father’s view on his stubborn pride is depicted on page 162, “It occurred to Father one day that Coalhouse Walker didn’t know he was a Negro.” This quote shows that Coalhouse, whether consciously or not, refuses to accept what the societal norm says his position in life should be. Although at first this might be interpreted as naiveness on the man’s part, perhaps being a man born a century or more too early. His stubbornness made him stand out among those too scared to stand up for their rights, like the two boys who witnessed all that transpired and could say nothing. All guises fall away when he is confronted by the Emerald Isle fireman team, where it is evident that he just refuses to accept that he can be discriminated against. He even may have recognized that he can't expect an apology on page 177, "Walker may have realized this was probably the maximum support he could expect from a policeman. At the same time he may have wondered if he'd been oversensitive to what was intended as no more than a prank." As the Coalhouse situation develops, he becomes exasperated at the complete lack of support for his plight. Lawyers turn him down, many question his reaction just like he may have questioned himself in the above quote. Many tell him to just cut his losses while he still can, which seems like reasonable advice as the stakes grow ever higher. If at first Coalhouse could have made off with a total loss of $25, the more damage is incurred to his property. First it is just slight damage to his car, but as he refuses to pay up and leave, his Model T is summarily disassembled, representing a total loss of at least $600, a massive sum by any means. The most dangerous progression of events lies in his losses. The more he sacrifices, the less he has left to care for. When Sarah dies. Coalhouse Walker loses the most important thing in his life. After spending most of his remaining holdings on his fiancée's funeral, all he has left is his beliefs. After this downwards spiral of events, I believe that in his mind, Coalhouse had no choice of actions. His pigheaded actions lost him all he held dear except his pride, so for his pride he took to solving his problems through more violent means. After diplomacy fails, all that remains is war, and Coalhouse Walker Jr., President, Provisional American Government, aims to defend his pride and fight for justice at any cost.