The Other, Post 6

The last few chapters of novel The Other, written by David Guterson, tell the reader about Neil’s quest to bring closure to his relationship with his late friend John William. Since John William died in his backcountry cave, Neil has had many mixed emotions about John William and Neil’s role in his life. On one hand, Neil knows that he was John William’s only friend. Neil probably did John William lot of good by visiting him frequently, bringing him food and necessities in his cave, and staying in touch with John William even when John William became a social pariah. However, Neil also has a nagging and deep-rooted guilt that he let John William down by allowing him to die in his cave. Neil feels that he should have checked on John William more, encouraged John William to live somewhere safer than a cave, or even turned John William in to park authorities in order to keep him alive. Finally, Neil feels like he has betrayed the ever-private John William by spilling his story across newspaper, magazine and television headlines. Overall, the conflict that John William’s life posed is something that Neil is having a very hard time resolving for himself.

Neil decides to contact John William’s divorced parents, Rand and Ginny, to talk about John William with them. He wants to apologize to them for keeping John William’s life in a cave secret. Also, Neil seems to be looking for more understanding about John William and what caused him to lead such an extreme lifestyle. While talking to Rand, Neil learns a lot about John William’s childhood. Rand, who has been holding in a lot of emotion about his divorce and failed family, divulges quite a bit of information. Rand tells Neil that John William’s mother refused to comfort the baby John William when he cried, and physically abused her son. Rand also emphasizes that John William was a very intense person from childhood. He recollects a time when John William stayed up all night working on a telescope instead of doing his homework, because John William felt that “The stuff they teach you at school is just so they can own you” (242). Rand believes that the bad parenting that John William received caused him to express ideas such as the one in this quote, and insists that John William’s death was not Neil’s responsibility. Ginnie, on the other hand, doesn’t have much to say to Neil because she has become senile with old age. However, Ginnie does express her deep regret and loathing for the way her life turned out. She yells to Neil, “I was born in the wrong place and time! I was trapped!” (253). Clearly, the unhappiness and cruelty of his mother, and the ineffectiveness of his detached father had negative effects on John William. However, it wouldn’t be accurate to say that his parents and childhood were the sole causes of John William’s withdrawal from society. John William was someone who had strong beliefs and refused to budge from them, and these traits were intrinsic to him. They were not caused by his childhood—many children are abused in similar ways to John William, and almost none end up leading a life like John William’s. Neil feels, and I agree, that John William was born with characteristics that caused him to retreat to a cave later in life. Therefore, Neil gains more knowledge about John William from his conversations with Rand and Ginnie, but not more understanding of why John William was the way he was.

As for Neil—he carries on his comparatively average life as a school teacher until he accepts the $440,000,000 that John William left Neil in his will. After receiving this money, Neil quits his job, but continues living in the same way that he did before his windfall. Neil understands that he is a compromiser and a hypocrite—like John William, Neil also has strong beliefs, but unlike John William, Neil bends these beliefs to make them fit into the parameters of his life. Neil explains this decision by telling readers, “When I think about John William now, I think about someone who followed through, and then I’m glad not to have followed through, to still be breathing, to still be here with people, to still be walking in the mountains…I’m a hypocrite, of course, and I live with that, but I live” (254). Neil’s relationship with John William has taught Neil to examine his life and make sure that he is comfortable with the choices that he is making. I think this is an important theme of the book: it is okay to make hypocritical choices if you understand why you are making them and can reconcile yourself with them.

Throughout the book, I really enjoyed the writing. One aspect of the writing that I especially liked was the accuracy to the eras that the author, Guterson, was writing about. For example, when writing about the 1970s and 1980s, Guterson brought up popular music and fads from those periods as he wrote. Additionally, Guterson referenced current events and movements when he was writing about the present time period. The book and characters seemed very life-like when they mentioned George Bush or Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth in their conversations. Another interesting characteristic of Guterson’s writing was that the main character, Neil, seems to have a lot in common with Guterson himself. Although I don’t know much about Guterson, I do know that he lives in Washington, like Neil. Also, Neil is an English teacher and an aspiring writer—two things that could easily be true of Guterson as well. Finally, at the end of the book, Neil tells of his intentions to write a book about his friend John William. Neil’s book would undoubtedly be similar to Guterson’s book, The Other, and it’s easy to imagine that The Other is indeed Neil’s account of John William. While I know that The Other is a work of fiction, these similarities serve to bring Neil and his story to life.

Work Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

The Other, Post 5

In the latest section of The Other, by David Guterson, John William’s lifestyle in the backcountry of Washington state becomes even more extreme. He insists on staying in his cave through the harsh Washington winters, and only accepts food and other necessities from his friend Neil because he needs them to survive. As he spends more time away from society, John William also begins to seem more incredible and far-fetched in his beliefs. When Neil is visiting him one night, John William tells Neil that he is going to continue living in the woods because “Life’s short. Eternity’s long. I’m going to slip past God—he can’t get me” (159). This pronouncement shows that John William believes he is escaping some kind of curse that society has upon it. John William has always thought that he will be rewarded for following his beliefs instead of society’s ideals. Initially, he thought that living in his cave would be gratifying in and of itself, but this hasn’t proved to be the case. Therefore, he seems to have convinced himself that he will be rewarded in an afterlife. The evolution of John William’s reasoning for living in a cave hints that he is beginning to run out of motivation for his hermit-like lifestyle. This idea is also supported by Neil’s impressions of John William from Neil’s occasional visits to John William’s cave. Increasingly, Neil finds John William in a bad mood, and notes on one visit that John William seemed “just depressed” (173).

Neil is prone to making up excuses for John William’s radical ideas, and says that he hopes that John William is just going through an odd stage. Neil probably tends to justify John William’s strange beliefs because he is still nursing a hope that John William will rejoin society and prove himself to be a normal human. Whether or not John William is normal was a question that Neil grapples with constantly. After finding a story with a character similar to John William in it, Neil discusses this character with his high school English students to try to find insight into John William. Neil says, “I could discuss ‘The Miracle of Purun Bhagat’ with my students as if our discussion was an exercise in literary history, instead of a veiled way for me to ask myself if John William made sense” (167). However, both the readers and Neil know that this story is just one of many things that Neil uses to try to reconcile his friend’s strange behavior. Neil wants to see John William recover from his cave-dwelling phase because he is a loyal friend, and still he likes and respects John William. This is also why Neil continues to bring John William food and to visit him. Furthermore, Neil seems to feel a sense of responsibility to John William, because he knows that John William would die in his cave without Neil’s help. Since Neil is the only person aware of John William’s existence in the forest, Neil considers turning John William in to the park service or to John William’s father. However, Neil feels it would be disloyal to John William to do so, and even convinces himself that John William would rather die in his cave than be forced back into society by the park service or by his father.

The decision to keep John William’s cave-dwelling existence secret is one that Neil questions heavily after John William finally does die in the woods. Neil is heartbroken and distraught when he finds his friend, who probably starved, dead near his cave one day. The burden that John William’s death brings to Neil’s conscience is significant, because Neil was the only person (other than John William) who had the power to save John William from his death. Even after John William dies, however, Neil doesn’t tell anyone that John William used to live in the woods and has now died. I think that Neil’s decision to keep John William’s death secret is in part caused by his guilty conscience, and in part caused by his desire to honor John William’s wish to be completely separate from society. Eventually, however, John William’s cave and remains are discovered in the backcountry. Neil is interviewed by a newspaper, and the story is made into a huge production in the paper. Knowing that he has helped to turn John William into a gripping newspaper headline only adds to Neil’s remorse about the situation.

Work Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

The Other, Post 4

Upon reading the fourth section of The Other, by David Guterson, I have come to realize that the main topic of the book is compromises. More specifically, the book explores the idea that most people make compromises in their lives in order to assimilate to society. People have to deviate from their ideal vision of how they should live their lives if they want to enter mainstream culture. Neil Countryman is the character in The Other who makes these compromises—he is finding the middle ground between doing what he believes in and doing what is convenient. John William, of course, represents the opposite of this. John William has decided that he is going to avoid compromising his beliefs and ideals at all costs. This choice has led him to live in a cave, isolated from society.

Neil’s decision to let society’s standards overrule his own beliefs may initially make him seem like a hypocrite. For example, when Neil receives the first $70,000 from John William, he is originally repulsed by the idea of having so much money. He realized that, because of the money, his “life was changed, and this understanding was not only poignant, but tinged by…corruption” (135). Even though at first, he hated the idea of being rich and wanted to give all the money to charity, he eventually decided to use some of the money to stay in a fancy hotel with his girlfriend in San Francisco. On one level, this decision reveals a double-standard held by Neil. But on the other hand, who wouldn’t use a fraction of the windfall for enjoyment? Wanting to have fun in life is a natural human desire, and Neil is simply acting the way that almost all other people would act in his situation. Furthermore, Neil split the difference between his idealistic aspirations of giving the money to charity and his greedy desire to use it all for himself. He didn’t move out of his ratty basement apartment and he didn’t take a month-long vacation to Italy—in other words, he didn’t entirely abandon his morals. Therefore, I think it would be a mistake to label Neil as a hypocrite, because of his conscious decision to maintain some of his ideals.

John William, however, refuses to budge from his lofty ideals and criticisms of society. He is fiercely opposed to materialism, to society’s emphasis on money and status, and to almost anything that is celebrated by the bulk of society. He criticizes Neil incessantly for Neil’s assimilation into mainstream culture. For example, at one point Neil asks John William how he plans to survive the winter in his cave, without a source of food or heat. Neil asserts that John William will “go up to Forks for bacon and eggs” instead of sticking to his disciplined life confined to the forest (149). John William fires back that this is only something Neil would do. John William tells Neil, “You’re thinking of yourself. You’re a loyal citizen of hamburger world” (149). John William prides himself on being separate from civilization and its flaws. His goal in life has become to live without stooping to society in any way, and that is what motivated him to retreat into his cave. However, even John William has a certain dependence on civilization because of his reliance on the food and supplies that Neil brings him periodically in his cave. Therefore, not even John William, in his extreme way of life, is free of hypocrisy.

In writing about Neil and John William, author David Guterson seems to draw no conclusions about which character’s way of life is correct. His purpose in writing the book isn’t to persuade readers to adopt John William’s hermit lifestyle, or to follow Neil’s path. He is simply examining the compromises that our society forces us to make, and the way people react to this societal force. An interesting exception to this neutral stance, however, is that Guterson portrays Neil as being happier than John William. Neil has a girlfriend, takes vacations, and enjoys his studies in college; John William leads a lonely existence weaving baskets from bark. The only thing that John William has that Neil lacks is the knowledge that he is doing only what he believes in. As a reader, this difference between the two characters makes me want to lead a life like Neil’s as opposed to one like John William’s.

Work Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

The Other, Post 3

In the third section of The Other, by David Guterson, a new character is introduced: Cindy Saperstein, who was John William’s girlfriend at Reed college. Cindy enters the story when Guterson fast-forwards to Neil’s adult life as a high school English teacher. Neil had been helping his friend John William survive in an unusual lifestyle of living in a cave in the backcountry of Washington. Eventually, John William had bequeathed Neil $440,000,000. Neil’s unusual story is featured in the newspaper, and it motivates Cindy to introduce herself to Neil. She wants to talk to Neil about John William, but Neil is at first hesitant to do so. I think that Neil is uneager to talk about John William with Cindy because he feels that it would be disloyal to John William. John William was never a very outgoing person, and turned into a recluse when he lived in his cave. Therefore, Neil, who comes across as an honest person, probably feels that gossiping about John William with his former girlfriend is two-faced. Nonetheless, Neil eventually agrees to meet and chat with Cindy.

Cindy tells Neil all about her relationship with John William in college. She describes John William as being very intense in everything he did. This trait was one reason for Cindy’s unhappiness in the relationship and her eventual break-up with John William—Cindy was not as severely passionate about their relationship. For example, John William asked Cindy at one point whether she would be willing to kill herself for him. Cindy explains to Neil that she “said yes, I’d kill myself, but it was strictly an act—…ninety percent [of me] was just this normal college girl who was hanging out and having fun” (72). This discord between the couple was not the only source of trouble for them. Cindy also tells Neil that John William was generally anti-social around other people, but was very clingy around her. Over winter break, he was even calling her three times a day. It seems as though John William was getting all of his social satisfaction from his relationship with Cindy, instead of having many friends and acquaintances.

As she describes John William, Cindy paints a picture of someone whose social habits are decidedly unusual. Although by college, John William hasn’t reached the point of being dysfunctional in society, he seems to be heading in that direction. Undoubtedly, his mother’s mental breakdown and his lack of nurturing care as a child contributed to his unorthodox behavior. However, it seems like John William’s upbringing does not fully account for his bizarre social skills. This is because a lot of the strange social tendencies that John William has stem from his adamant and unwavering beliefs in how one should live. For example, John William believed that bathing “required no more than two quarts of water every forty-eight hours if the bather was wise and responsible, whereas the cultural norm in the modern world was to send gallons down the drain daily for no sanctionable reason” (74). While many people would agree that taking a shower every day when you aren’t really dirty is a waste of water, John William’s life is drastically impacted because of this belief. Being uncompromising in one’s beliefs isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it can make someone into a social pariah.

Meanwhile, Neil tells us about his relationship with Jamie, a girl he met backpacking in Europe the summer after his senior year in high school. Jamie and Neil are very happy together, and have none of the complicated problems that Cindy and John William encounter. Neil has told the reader that he and Jamie eventually get married, and when he talks about his adult life, he often mentions the adult Jamie. Through these descriptions, it’s clear that, as adults, Neil and Jamie are not nearly as enamored with each other as they were in college. They don’t fight or have violent disagreements, but the passion that was once in their relationship is gone by the time they reach their fifties. It is interesting to compare John William’s relationship—which was short but filled with passion—with Neil’s relationship—which has lost some of its fervor but has lasted a long time. Perhaps the author is suggesting that it is impossible to sustain a passionate relationship.

Work Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

The Other, Post 2

John William and Neil Countryman become more developed as characters in the latest section of The Other, by David Guterson. Neil tells readers about his mother’s death, which occurred when he was twelve. His mother had brain cancer, and Neil describes her painful and slowly-deteriorating condition. Neil’s mother’s death most acutely affected him in an unusual way: because of her death, Neil was left $5,000 from her funds in life insurance money. This money came to symbolize his mother for Neil, because it was all he had left of her. He wanted to use it in a meaningful way, and do something significant with the funds. Eventually, Neil decides to spend the money on a trip to Europe after his senior year in high school. Even this use for the money didn’t satisfy Neil, however. He felt that he was wasting his mother’s money, because nothing he bought could ever replace his mother or bring her back. Neil describes this by saying, “…I sat by the Herengracht with a packet of frites in my hand, crying, because this is what had become of my mother. She’d been transmuted into an experience I was having…” (45). Though Neil knows his trip can’t replace his mother, he does have big dreams for it. He envisions himself gaining the experiences and worldly knowledge on the trip that he feels he needs to become a good writer. To that end, he spent an incessant amount of time during the trip jotting notes about his time in Europe. In the end, though, Neil’s self-conscious desire to become familiar with exotic scenes and to discover more about himself makes him lonely. He doesn’t have a destination or a purpose on his trip, and he meanders though Europe without much motivation.

John William has chosen to stay in the United States during the summer after his senior year, and spends his time camping and living a nomadic lifestyle in Washington state. John William gets many of his meals out of dumpsters, and is even arrested for being a vagrant at one point. He seems to take a strange delight in living as cheaply as possible. For example, he even “ate a dead carp washed up in a side water and got the runs and a fever” (49). It is ironic that John William, who is much more affluent than Neil, chooses to spend almost no money on even basic necessities such as food. Contrastingly, Neil has less money, and spends a large portion of it in Europe. Perhaps John William’s desire to live on less than bare necessities stems from the overabundance of money and luxuries that were available to him throughout his childhood. It seems likely that John William is searching for a better understanding of himself and of life through his rough lifestyle. Although John William always had enough material goods in his childhood, he never had much love and lacked a coherent family as a child. To me, John William personifies a classic example of someone who has everything that money can buy him, but needs something more to become content with his life.

Guterson continues with his fascinating habit of flashing forward to his current life as an adult throughout the story. From this technique, we have learned that John William eventually becomes a recluse who lives in the backcountry of Washington, and that Neil helps John William survive as he lives in the backcountry. We also know that, sometime in their adult lives, John William bequeaths Neil $440,000,000. Finally, Neil tells us that he meets a woman also traveling in Europe who he will marry, and that he will work as an English teacher. I think these tidbits of information from the future are a successful technique for Guterson to use to keep the story engaging. It makes me wonder what leads the characters to these fates.

Works Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

The Other, Post 1

I am reading a book titled The Other, written by David Guterson. The basic premise of the story is that two high school boys have formed an unusual friendship. The boys, John William Barry and Neil Countryman, are from very different backgrounds, and the first chapter of the book describes how these differences affect them and their friendship. Neil Countryman is from an average Seattle family. As the narrator of the book, he portrays himself as rather ordinary in the book’s first chapter. Neil describes his role on his high school’s track team by telling readers that he is “someone intimate with the middle of the pack,” and this description seems to fit other areas in his life, too (3). Neil doesn’t seem bitter or unhappy with his commonplace background and life. Instead, he focuses more his friend John William’s atypical life. John Williams is the opposite of Neil in high school: Neil goes to a public school, while John Williams attends an elite prep school in Seattle. Neil’s family is big and traditional, but not college-educated. John William, on the other hand, comes from a family of prosperous and famous Seattle businessmen. John William is the only child in a broken family: his mother has moved away after going insane, and his father is often away on business trips. Neil’s nuclear family, however, seems to be caring towards him and his younger sister.

One thing that these polar opposite boys have in common is a love of adventure. They meet during a track meet, when they race neck-and-neck during their 800 meter run. Although neither Neil and John William have any chance of winning the race, they share a drive to push themselves to their physical limits. Neil explains that half mile runners are “in search of deeper agony than they can find elsewhere (5).” This common search also leads John William and Neil to extended and rugged camping trips in the backcountry areas of the North Cascades. John William and Neil become reckless during this trip and get lost, spending a long time without food and with no knowledge of how to get out of the backcountry. This, combined with their experimental drug use, makes the pair seem like stereotypical rebellious teens. However, the author uses an interesting technique to keep readers from dismissing the book as boring because of this: he writes the story from Neil’s perspective as an adult. This doesn’t make much difference in a lot of the telling of the story, but Neil does add occasional observations from his point of view as an adult. For instance, Neil and John William decide to steal coins from a fountain in a park in Seattle one night while they are high. This scene isn’t very original, but Neil’s bewildered comments on it as an adult make it more unique. Neil says, “But I can’t explain why we were stealing coins at the Seattle Center. It makes no sense to me now, though it must have made sense to me then. I just don’t recall what the logic was…” (12). These observations add depth and interest to the story, and give the reader clues about what kind of a person Neil is as an adult. I am excited to continue reading about the intriguing characters and their adventures in The Other.

Work Cited:

Guterson, David. The Other. New York: Random House, 2008.

Angela's Ashes: Post 6

In the last section of Angela’s Ashes, Frankie is now a teenager, and spends most of his time holding down jobs and saving for his fare to go to America. His extreme determination, discipline, and ethics became more apparent than they were when Frankie was younger.

Frankie’s family continues to be very poor, and Frankie is left to fend for himself as he has had to do his entire life. As he grows older, however, Frankie becomes more assertive in standing up for himself. He gets a job first at the post office delivering telegrams and then as a magazine delivery boy, and he saves up money from these jobs for his trip to America. He also has a job writing letters for an old lady named Mrs. Finucane, and takes the liberty of stealing some of her money for himself. He knows that Mrs. Finucane doesn’t need the money herself, and that she is only going to donate it to the church anyhow, so he justifies his actions to himself with these thoughts. Frankie also reminds himself of the ways that others have kept him from succeeding and getting ahead in life as he takes money from the Mrs. Finucane. He explains, “There will be less money for the priests and their Masses but how many Masses does a soul need and surely I’m entitled to a few pounds after the way the Church slammed doors in my face?” (332). Although by common standards, Frankie’s action would be classified as unethical stealing, I don’t think that it can be dismissed as this quite so easily. Frankie knows that what he is doing is wrong, and he regrets having to do it. However, he has also learned over the years that he will not be able to pay for food or save money for his future if he doesn’t steal. In a way, Frankie is forced to fight fire with fire.

Frankie’s ethics are also demonstrated when he works as a telegram delivery boy. He has been strictly instructed by his bosses not to stop delivering telegrams for any reason, and not to do favors for the people that he delivers telegrams to. However, his conscience forces him to help some of the people he encounters. Frankie tells of coming upon people who receive money orders, but are too sick to get out of bed and cash them, or buy themselves food. In these circumstances, Frankie breaks the rules of the post office and helps out the needy people. Frankie describes his situation by saying, “…and there’s a pile of rags on a bed in a corner the pile saying who is it and you say telegram and the pile of rags tells you would you ever go to the shop for me I’m starving with the hunger…”(316). I think that Frankie’s reaction to people in need demonstrates his strong ethics and his compassion for helping others.

By the end of the book, Frankie has accumulated enough money to take a ship to America. He chooses to do this because he believes that he will find a future in America and will be able to move beyond the way of life in Limerick, Ireland. However, he has mixed feelings about his decision. As much as he hated things about Limerick, he knows that he will miss it, simply for its familiarity. Additionally, he sometimes feels like he should have helped out his mother and brothers more, instead of saving his money only for his future. Frankie perseveres with his plan to go to America because he possesses a very determined will to succeed in his life. He has never let anyone, from the discouraging priests at church to his cruel bosses, convince him that he can’t achieve what he wants to in life. The book ends as his boat is arriving in America, and readers feel assured that he will not let any challenge in America get the better of him.

Works Cited:

McCourt, Frank. Angela’s Ashes. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.