Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion of Walker Percy

[RHONDA MCDONNELL <rhonda_mcdonnell AT msn.com>]

Hello all!

I know Chuck sent this post out some time ago, but with the hiatus that 
followed, I lost track of it for a bit. However, I found it again, and I have 
some thoughts to share. I hope you’ll forgive my return to an earlier 
section. And Tom, I plan to respond to yours as well, but not until tomorrow. 

First, regarding the trip to the camp, I read it with Chuck’s question in 
mind. What might I be missing? In this scene Binx does what he has a knack 
for. He makes money. In fact he ends up with nearly twice what Mr 
Sartalamaccia initially offered him. How does he do this? By connecting with 
him on a human level, not by dickering with him. This way of making money is 
echoed in the scene when he and Sharon work late advising clients on the best 
ways to prepare for tax season. However, in spite of his talent, this is our 
first indication that being a stock broker isn’t the answer to Binx’s search. 
When he says “Our name is increase” it’s always pinged for me. I finally 
figured out why. It reminds me of Mark 5–Jesus asks the demons possessing the 
man “what is your name” and the answer is “my name is legion for we are
Many.”  Worship of the materialism is emphasized in this section, whether 
it’s Sharon’s golden thigh or the silver bird. But one can’t serve God and 
Mammon. 

As for his reaction to Chicago: When Uncle Jules dangles a promotion as a 
carrot to urge Binx to go to Chicago, Binx agrees externally but internally 
he is in despair. The material and the concrete are different apparently. The 
concrete details of a place ground Binx, but pursuit of the material wrenches 
him out of the world and into abstraction. This is a theme Percy picks up and 
deepens in later works when he discusses transcendence and immanence. 

And a final thought. For the first time I realized how much Binx and Kate are 
alike in this section. She can’t stand to be anyone anywhere and he is afraid 
of being no one nowhere. Or maybe it’s the reverse. I’m at the swimming pool 
and the book is elsewhere. As much as Kate needs to be told what to do, I 
think in the end perhaps Binx does too. So her questions to him at the end of 
this section don’t just open a way for him to tell her how it is — it’s also 
a way that she tells him what to do. 

Okay, on to Tom’s fine post tomorrow. Cheers to all in Percyland. 

Rhonda


Sent from my iPhone

> On Jul 13, 2024, at 12:57 PM, lowry.charles AT gmail.com wrote:
> Dear Friends,
>> 
>> I was pleased that Henry asked me to make the first posting of Chapter Two 
>> (pp. 64-116), because in this same chapter we find (a) the part of The 
>> Moviegoer I have generally found least interesting, the sale of the family 
>> fishing camp, and (b) the dialogue at the end of the chapter that I think 
>> gives us insight into the most significant aspect of the novel.  Let us 
>> begin, and to help us begin, I shall make just a couple observations, at 
>> which you may smile indulgently, jeer scornfully or nod enthusiastically.  
>> Please also, by the way, feel free to take up for our group’s benefit any 
>> part of Chapter Two that I have neglected.  It’s a group effort!
>> 
>> * I have said that this chapter contains the section of the novel I find 
>> least interesting.  That is the trip to sell the fishing camp to Mr. 
>> Sartalamaccia. (pp. 89-96)  I don’t see how it advances the action of the 
>> plot, which is not such a big deal, or draws out any of the important 
>> characters, which would indeed for this book be a big deal.  Help me: what 
>> am I missing?
>> 
>> * In several places in the novel, Binx insists that he has to get some 
>> down-to-earth detail about a place before it becomes real to him, or 
>> before he has a fighting chance to prevent the spirit genie of a place 
>> from overwhelming him utterly.  In our chapter, twice we see the necessity 
>> of approaching a new place in a very particular way to make it real.  We 
>> hear about this first in regard to the movie theater: “Yet it was here at 
>> the Tivoli that I first discovered place and time, tasted it like okra.  
>> It was during a rerelease of Red River a couple years ago that I became 
>> aware of the first faint stirrings of curiosity about the particular seat 
>> I sat in, the lady in the ticket booth…” (p. 75)  Binx is even more 
>> emphatic about the thought of just picking up and going to Chicago: 
>> “Chicago.  Misery misery son of a bitch of all miseries.  Not in a 
>> thousand years could I explain it to Uncle Jules, but it is no small thing 
>> for me to make a trip, travel hundreds of miles across the country by 
>> night to a strange place and come out where there is a different smell in 
>> the air and people have a different way of sticking themselves into the 
>> world.” (p. 98)  The perspicacious critic Jessica Hooten Wilson gives us 
>> an idea of Binx’s hesitation : “Binx sweats and curses over such an 
>> assignment because the journey removes him from the particularity of his 
>> place and time.”  What is the point of Binx’s necessity to form a 
>> connection with anyplace he stops at or travels to?
>> 
>> * The chapter concludes with Kate’s trip to Elysian Fields after the 
>> supper for former Neptune queens.  Binx has been alerted that she may be 
>> en route, so, clad in pajamas and a raincoat, he waits for her on a bus 
>> stop bench.  After she arrives, she speaks to Binx of her psychiatric 
>> breakthrough, that she is a free being required to meet no one’s 
>> expectations but her own.  Alas, Kate is, in Jay Tolson’s memorable 
>> phrase, “someone who has never found her footing in the world.”  As dawn 
>> approaches, then, the old fears and insecurities return:
> 
>> <<“Ooooh,” Kate groans, Kate herself now.  “I’m so afraid.”
>> “I know.”
>> “What am I going to do?”
>> “You mean right now?”
>> “Yes.”
>> “We’ll go to my car.  Then we’ll drive down to the French Market and get 
>> some coffee.  Then we’ll go home.”
>> “Is everything going to be all right?”
>> “Yes.”
>> “Tell me.  Say it.”
>> “Everything is going to be all right.”>> (p. 116)
> 
>> Borrowing now from my Goodreads review, I think this is a truly remarkable 
>> piece of dialogue. In a medieval romance, this would mean, “Your crops 
>> won’t fail, the tax collections will be good, your late husband’s evil 
>> brother will not kidnap your children and seize the crown.”  Of course 
>> this is a modern novel, not a medieval romance.  Binx cannot possibly 
>> promise Kate all of this.  Perhaps what he means here is, “Maybe things 
>> will be all right and maybe they won’t, but either way, I’ll be right here 
>> by your side.”  I am convinced that this is the equivalent of “I love 
>> you.”  And that should be enough.  This moment signifies Binx’s acceptance 
>> of his responsibilities toward Kate.  Am I wrong about this?  Do I 
>> overestimate the importance of this scene?
>> 
>> Lagniappe: the first two chapters make up about 45% of the book.  So far, 
>> so good?  Would the “average” reader keep reading?
>> 
>> Please feel free to comment on any of these paragraphs, or indeed any 
>> other material from this chapter.
>> 
>> Chuck Lowry
>> Brooklyn, NY
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