Thursday, September 21, 2017
The Case of Norman Bowker
I found the story Speaking of Courage a fascinating examination of a soldier that feels that his life is empty and worthless after the war. It juxtaposes well against Field Trip, the story where O'brein returns to the field where Kiowa died to bring closure to his war. Norman Bowker is incapable of closing his war story. He just keeps driving in circles, around the same lake, seeing the same sights and thinking many of the same thoughts. O'Brein writes the chapter in a way to parallel Bowker's wandering mind. The writing jumps around from one topic to another as Bowker's severely bored mind drags him deeper into depression. Bowker's thoughts go from remembering the war to observing a woman fishing along the lake's shore. Bowker has a strange conversation with a fast food worker over the intercom as Bowker wants to vent a war story to him, but then decides against it. At the end, when Bowker wades into the lake, it seems as if he might be trying to be at peace and is trying to readjust to civilian life. However, as it is revelead at the beginning of the next chapter, Bowker commits suicide as he can't deal with the damage that the war did to him. It is clear throughout the chapter that Bowker is spiraling into insanity and a deep depression. At the first hints of Bowker's strange behaviors and jumbled thoughts, I thought that he was going to commit suicide. I think O'Brein did a fantastic job of foreshadowing this as he builds upon it throughout the chapter. While I enjoyed the chapter and thought it was very well written, it is a sad and all too true story of a soldier driven to depression and eventually suicide by the war.
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Ryan, I think your observation of Bowker's circular path is really insightful.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I noticed many of the images you pulled out that indicated Bowker's unique form of depression as a product of the war. It really stuck with me that Bowker describes the feeling of having "already died" in Vietnam, and that his time at home may as well be time spent as a ghost. He feels as though no one actually hears the truth of his war experiences; his parents see his seven medals for "valor" and ignore his deepening personal frustration over his abandonment of Kiowa. Likewise, Bowker feels as though he somehow has no generation of equals: he isn't a kid, as he was when he left his home, hanging out at drive-in diners and flirting with a carhop. Yet, Bowker also feels alienated from adult society. He is unable to speak or see the benefit of interacting with a woman who he once cared deeply about because of her new life as a mother and a wife to someone else.
Bowker feels as though his whole life has been uprooted like a weed from his town, and all the places and people he knew and cared about, they're utterly indifferent to him. If you've seen the movie "It's a Wonderful Life," Bowker's alienation seems to me quite similar to the removal of the protagonist's life from the history of his home town: everything is generally the same, but nothing is truly as it is supposed to be. Except, for Bowker, his experience isn't a miracle or a demonstration made by angels, he is living the truth of his life wholly by himself and utterly separate from the thriving town who has no interest in the realities and history wrapped up in his past.
Yet, I have wondered what Bowker's satisfaction with the fireworks meant, especially after such a long day of wallowing depression. Perhaps his final swim in the lake and gaze at the sky was an affirmation, a reassuring nod from the world that it would carry on without him. Perhaps this celebration of the town was one last sign that Bowker really had died back in Vietnam, and none of the town's life had anything to do with him.