Sunday, November 2, 2008
Erin's post: Maggie
In the novel Maggie: A Girl of the Streets the two main characters, Jim and Maggie, seem to feel a loss of identity within their own homes. Throughout the novel Crane’s description of the tenement homes, is not a flattering one. For example in the opening he describes the building saying it “quivered and creaked from the weight of humanity stepping about in its bowels”(7). When Jim is within his own home, the story becomes more and more blurred. For example his father becomes “the father,” “the husband” and even “the man." The same goes for his mother who becomes “the wife” and “the woman.” Jim himself becomes “the urchin”(15) within his own home. What is Crane's reason for doing this in the story? Is it to show that Jim’s real comfort lies in the outside world rather than in his own home? When describing Jim Crane states that, “On the corners he was in life and of life. The world was going on and he was there to perceive it?”(18). What can we make of this statement as readers?
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Crane does seem to refer each character in a variety of different ways as opposed to just using their names. At some points it can be a bit confusing trying to determine which character he is referring to because he switches back and fourth between the characters actual names and names like “the urchin.” As Erin mentioned, this occurs when Crane is describing the goings on of Jimmie and Mag’s home and it has the effect of blurring the story. Maybe this is to convey a kind of disconnectedness of these characters from their home and family members. For example instead of distinguishing the parents by referring to them as “mother” or “father” Crane refers to them within the home as “the woman” (15) and “the man” (9). The youngest brother is also continuously referred to as “the babe” (9). This may show how there is no strong relationship between the family members, it is almost as if they are all complete strangers living in the same home together.
I think that Jim definitely does feel more comfortable in the outside world than within his home. However, he still seems to be disconnected to the outside world as well. For example, Crane describes how “Jimmie’s occupation was for a long time was to stand on street corners and watch the world go by.”(18) Crane also describes how “the world was going on and he was there to perceive it.”(18). It is almost as if the world is going on without Jim. This does seem to change, though. Jim begins to interact more instead of just passively watching others.
Crane's technique of referring to character's as a variety of names can lead to some confusion within the reading, but the reason I think that he does this is because we all have different sides to us. Many of us hold nicknames and names by which people call us. When Crane changes Jimmie's father from from "father" to "husband" to "man" it is all varying on the different perspectives Crane is giving to the reader. Again, his interchanging of these names can leave the reader, like me, at a loss at some points in the story and make me reread passages a couple of times. I like Tara P's point that there is no strong relationship between the members of this family. We see Jimmie and his mother get into brawls in the kitchen, so loud that neighbors will come out into the hall and see what all the ruckus is about. I get the sense of a very dysfunctional family. After the brawl (page 40-42) we see the mother tell Maggie to leave. "Yer a disgrace teh yer people, damn yeh." (42) She later says "Go to hell an'good riddance." (43) Maggie's mother detested Pete and for that detested Maggie and her relationship. This scene highlights how dysfunctional and unloving this family is. The father seems at a disconnect as well.
The quote, “On the corners he was in life and of life. The world was going on and he was there to perceive it?”(18) shows how Jimmie had the world going by him. He had a morose look on the world. It states, "Jimmie's occupation for a long time was to stand on streetcorners and watch the world go by, dreaming blood-red dreams at the passing of pretty women." (18) This shows how he wanted for a good life, unlike the one he was living; with an unemotional, detached family life. Crane shows this unemotional, unloving family life with the one sentence at the beginning of Chapter IV, "The babe, Tommie, died." It seems so impersonal and abrupt, like an "oh, by the way..."
It seems to me that Maggie is a text in which the characters within are fraught with the damages caused by a severe feeling of isolation. In describing Jimmy in his adolescent years Crane makes many disturbing observations: Jimmy really seems to hold himself separate from the world around him. He notices “The world was going on around him, and he was there to perceive it,” (Crane 19), and that “he himself occupied a downtrodden position that had a private or distinct element of grandeur in its isolation,” (Crane 20). He never really reacts with or enters the reality around him. Maggie too is isolated, by both her previous family life and the surprising manner in which she becomes “a most rare and wonderful production of a tenement district; a pretty girl,” (Crane 22). Because she is not like other girls, is more beautiful than they, she can consider prospects like Pete, notices the better things she does not currently posses.
This separation the two children experience seems to manifest in an odd disjointedness when they consider places like ‘home’. Much of the focus is on individual objects, the “gruesome doorways,” “gloomy halls,” or various kitchen utensils imbued with violent qualities that allow them so ‘seethe’ and ‘hiss’, to let the sink be ‘unholy’ (Crane 7-9). Maggie too becomes fixated on inanimate objects and details- the dresses of other women, her gainfully acquired lambrequin. Products of ruined homes, Crane seems to say, cannot fully integrate the things that ought to make up a home, cannot become proper part of the humanity that has betrayed them- instead they become aloof, guarded as Jimmy, or as Maggie does, laughing at others folly as they prance about on stage, an enchanting parody of the life she’s never had.
I have to agree with the previous posts and say that the multiple names applied to the characters of the story serve to show a disconnectedness between them. Rather than giving them the distinction of a name or signifying some relation, the characters in the book wish to distance themselves from each other. They do this because to each other, they represent the terrible, squalid life they live. Like Eric pointed out, the mother claims that Maggie is "a disgrace teh yer people, damn yeh" (42). I found a parallel to this idea of naming in the naming of the kid gangs, like the "Devil's Row" kids and "Rum Alley" kids. It seems to be the culture of the time that names are less important, and it's your residence and social relationships to others that define who you are. As Maggie grows increasingly infatuated with Pete, she is afraid that were she comes from, a shambling building full of "gruesome doorways” and “gloomy halls” as Claire pointed out, will rub off on him. "Pete's aristocratic person looked as if it might soil" (25). So it seems as though Crane may have wanted to downplay the significance of names and rather highlight the experiences these characters are sharing. Then, contradictory to my first sentence, it seems that amidst the slew of names, there is some connectedness between characters.
Crane’s reasoning for labeling his characters as “the wife” and “the urchin” is to give them a universal feeling for that time period. That this was not the only family that was messed up. I agree with Tara’s comment on how no one cares about anybody in that family. It seems as if everyone if for themselves and does not try to do anything productive towards the family. Jimmie continues to fight which causes the parents to argue and Maggie is left to watch the younger children. Even when the baby dies it’s described in an awkward way: “The babe, Tommie died. He went away in a white, insignificant coffin; his small waxen hand clutching a flower that the girl, Maggie, had stole from an Italian. She and Jimmie lived.” (17) There is no account of how the parents felt about the death but you can infirm that it was just as if a burden was lifted in the way that they mention the other children survived. As if it was like that’s one less child they have to worry about. Maggie seems to be the only one that realizes that this lifestyle is not normal yet when she tries to explore new alternatives she is damned to hell by her mother.
Jim Crane’s statement, “On the corners he was in life and of life. The world was going on and he was there to perceive it?”(18) makes me think of two ideas. When it says that he was “in life” is conveys that his life has no major significance or purpose that he is just living as a means of survival. The other which references that he was “of life” references he fact that he was just a product of two people who were living the way he is now.
I think that Crane refers to the characters in a variety of ways because it is not the actual characters that are important, rather it is that they represent all of the people who live in the slums of New York. Anthony wrote, "It seems to be the culture of the time that names are less important, and it's your residence and social relationships to others that define who you are." I defiantly agree with Anthony's statement, but would have to extend on it to say that Crane fails to utilize the characters' names and instead uses general terms such as "father," "mother," and "husband," to show that if the reader entered another home in the slums of New York, he/she would most likely find the same or a similar situation. The specific names of the characters is only slightly relevant in the story so that the reader can connect with the specific characters, but by constantly referring to the characters in more generalized terms, Crane is demonstrating that the characters could easily be substituted with other similar characters and the message behind the story would remain the same.
I definately think the idea of being a "product of your environment" can be applied to both Jim and Maggie. Becasue their tenemnet house is not aplace of comfort they must see themselves with the outside world. However when Jimmie observes "the world was going on around him, and he was there to percieve it (19), it is becasue he is unable to identify himself with either his "home" or his environment. Everyone is identified by their title, the husband, the man, the urchin, to keep things impersonal, to not humanize them and their way of living. Like other people have said when the baby died there was no real emotional reaction. By detaching themselves they are able to stand thei life and perhaps make it a little less "real". I think the difference between living in a city and a secluded place like walden is it is easier to make things less real, or less personal in teh city. You can become jaded with human intereaction and totally inexperienced with interaction with nature. Whereas if a person lives in a small hut far from anyone like Thoreau, human intereaction is somewhat of a novelty, and of course natural interaaction becomes a habit. So I think the fact that Jimmie let the world pass him by and they all referred to each other by their title really shows how tey became different becasue of where they lived not who they were.
I would have to agree with all of the posts which state that the application of various names to the characters indicates a lack of identity. As both Tara L. and Anthony pointed out, the lack of a sense of identity is common in these awful conditions of the time period. The slums, described as “a dark region where… a dozen gruesome doorways gave up loads of babies to the street and the gutter” (6), allow for a disjointed sense of place which translates to the character’s disjointed sense of identity. In an effort to either ignore or satisfy this emptiness, Jimmie and his mother fall into a life of drinking, while Maggie leaves for extended periods of time with Pete. The fact that Crane chooses not to clearly distinguish the mother and father in the story proves that they are not seen as having (or upholding) these roles. The references to them as “the woman” (15) and “the man” (9) prove that they are seen by the other characters and the narrator as being just women and men in Maggie and Jimmie’s lives, rather than living up to their distinction as parents.
The death of the baby, whose name is only mentioned once, proves this point further. The nonchalant and matter-of-fact nature in which the news is conveyed to readers shows that this occurrence had no real effect on the family. I believe that their dysfunctional household (with an unclear sense of place) influenced the family’s emotions and blurred their identities, so that when a member of the family was lost it was truly not a big deal to them. If the younger brother was seen as nothing more than just another “bawling infant” (6), then its death would sadly have no affect on Maggie, Jimmie, and their parents.
It could be that Crane refers to Jimmie's and Maggie's father and mother as "the man" and "the women" to portray how detached the two siblings are from their family. They don't see them as parental figures and there is a serious lack of connection between them. As the story shifts from person to person, readers get to see how the characters see each other by his reference to a specific character. When the mother is scolding and punishing Jimmie, Crane calls him "the urchin" because that's all his mother sees him as. "Her operation on the urchin instantly increased in violence. At last she tossed him to a corner where he limply lay cursing and weeping" (9). He continues to generalize all the main characters and call them the babe, the ragged girl, etc. because they are live as individuals, not depending on each other. When the story shifts from Jimmie perspective to Maggie's, Crane refers to Jimmie as "the urchin" because he severed most of the ties that connected him to his sister. His brother status slowly eroded as he became the man of the family and started acting more and more like his father. As this transformation takes place, Maggie is forced to view him as she did her father, with no interpersonal connection or any sense of relation.
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