Shortcomings of a "Grotesque" 

While reading Winesburg Ohio, the idea of the “grotesques” was mirrored throughout every short story within the novel. The narrator defines grotesques for us in The Book of the Grotesque as follows: the “notion that the moment one of the people took one of the truths to himself, called it his truth, and tried to live his life by it, he became a grotesque and the truth he embraced became a falsehood” (Anderson 3). Although this gives us a sense of what makes the grotesques who they are, I noted that there were some other common elements that made the inhabitants of Winesburg, “grotesque” in essence. One of the more important aspects that I perceived to be characterizing of the grotesques was their personal inability to express their thoughts, highlighting their ineffectiveness in thought and their unsuccessful attempts at communication.

The ineffective and indecisive nature of human thought and communication is visible in Paper Pills. In this story, Doctor Reefy relieves his thoughts on “scraps of paper that became hard balls and were thrown away” (Anderson 11). These scraps of paper represent the thoughts, and the truths that Doctor Reefy is unable to communicate to someone else. Doctor Reefy continually shoves these scraps of paper into his pockets, which he later throws onto the ground – these actions indicate an unwillingness or conflict in Reefy’s demeanor involving the acceptance of his own thoughts and his own truths. Even the peculiar way in which Reefy throws the round hard balls at the owner of the tree nursery expose his futile attempts to communicate in response to the sense of dismemberment Doctor Reefy feels from society. Also strange was the timing of the death of Doctor Reefy’s wife, consequently dying after Reefy read his the thoughts on the scraps of paper to her. This may even indicate that Reefy was unable or incapable of allowing his thoughts to exist anywhere besides these seemingly insignificant round hard balls. Through this internal conflict, Reefy portrays the human thought aspect of a “grotesque”.

A character that experiences this same shortcoming is Enoch Robinson, described as a character that “wanted to talk but didn’t know how” (Anderson 101). Similar to Doctor Reefy, Enoch has coherent and developed thoughts and ideas within his mind, but he is unable to communicate these to people, remaining quiet and awkward within a crowd of talkative people. He yearned to understand people and to have them understand him. To fill this void, he created for himself a world of his own, existing within the walls of his room in New York. These “shadow people” were invented by the child like mind of Enoch Robinson, who found no other outlet in expressing his thoughts. When a woman visits Enoch, Enoch feels that the woman is too big for the room – that her presence is driving his invented ghosts away. Simultaneously, he holds a deep desire for her to understand his own position in the room and understand himself. This internal confliction reflects the same one that haunts Doctor Reefy – a yearning to outwardly express personal thoughts countered by the inability to express or communicate such ideas.

When reading Winesburg, Ohio, many character relationships, similarities and contrasts helped expose a deeper meaning of the text, and further illuminated the overarching theme of the constitution of a “grotesque”. The comment made on human thought and communication was a strong influence on this overall message. 

[love is more thicker than forget]

    By e.e. cummings 

love is more thicker than forget
more thinner than recall
more seldom than a wave is wet
more frequent than to fail

it is most mad and moonly 
and less it shall unbe
than all the sea which only 
is deeper than the sea

love is less always than to win 
less never than alive
less bigger than the least begin
less littler than forgive

it is most sane and sunly
and more is cannot die
than all the sky which only
is higher than the sky 

E. E. Cummings, famous for his tendency to stray from typically accepted grammatical rules, is by far one of my favorite poets. His 'rebellious' nature, in sort, brings about a clean cut, down to earth, feeling about his poetry. Although short and precise, his poems are eccentric and interesting, and I can't help but enjoy his distinct personal style. 

Here, here! We run into that fickle little question once again - the question that exists among toddlers and adolescents, old people and young people. What is love? And here, I allow [love is more thicker than words] to come into play...this poem is the best definition I have ever encountered. 

In this poem, Cummings employs and emphasizes the use of comparisons to depict the nature of love, its vitality and flexibility, and what it truly encompasses. He begins his first stanza by comparing love to forgetfulness, perhaps indicating the changeable and inconsistent nature by which is it exists. Similar to the "forgetfulness", he introduces the concept of "waves", both words having the connotation of being inconsistent, coming and going, almost being erratic and capricious. Oddly, at the same time he counters both of these statements with their opposites, evident in the apparent contrast in the phrases "love is more thicker than forget" being followed by "more thinner than recall." By utilizing this sharp contrast, Cummings goes on to portray the fickle nature of love, and the idea that it may not always truly be as it appears. These elements of what makes love 'fickle' is seen in Cumming's diction, another example seen in the use of the word "moonly" (as moon phases are not constant). With the short phrases and abrupt changes in topic, Cummings allows for the structure of the poem itself to be representative of the meaning it is attempting to deliver. 

The end of the second stanza offers a transition in the tone and meaning of the poem. Preceded by a more playful tone about the whimsical nature of love, the stanzas subsequent to the second begin to take a deeper and more poignant tone, emphasizing the power and depth of this emotion. He proceeds to compare love to the depth of the sea, the vitality of being alive, and the immortality of being unable to die. The last stanza is most significant: 

it is most sane and sunly
and more is cannot die
than all the sky which only
is higher than the sky 

By using the phrases "cannot die" and "higher than the sky" Cummings acknowledges that love is something beyond the scope of human abilities, and although humans can feel it, they are incapable of consciously putting it into words or sensing the transition into the transcendent state of being. In addition to the interpretation of his work, his syntax and diction is reflective of the idea of love. The grammatical flaws that characterize his style have a significance to them. Creating words such as "sunly" and "moonly", and using phrases like "more thicker" and "less bigger", not only emphasizes the intensity and sensitivity of emotion, but also highlights the unavoidable sense of confusion that love is entangled within.   

Above all, E. E. Cummings is able to convey that love is, in essence, incomparable. Nothing can compare to love – not forget, nor recall, not death, nor the sky. And that folks, is what I consider the best definition of love. 

A Blessing in Disguise or Disguised as a Blessing? 

Having been unable to further discuss the role of peculiar character, Doctor Reefy in Winesburg Ohio throughout our recent panel group discussions, I thought this was the perfect opportunity to expand and share my thoughts on this extremely captivating subject. Throughout his significant roles in the personal lives of “the tall dark girl” (Anderson 11) and Elizabeth Willard in the inner narratives of both Paper Pills and Death, there was but a fundamental question that emerged through the clouds of confusion and connection in my mind. What is it concerning this old and oddly reserved man that supposedly “soothed” these women? Was he sane or insane, good or bad, moral or immoral, honest or dishonest?  

As I further analyzed both stories involving Doctor Reefy, I was able to draw connections and similarities between his relationships – connections that I simply couldn’t accept as mere coincidences. A similarity was drawn due to the way by which the narrator refers to both of these women. In Death, Elizabeth Willard is called a “tall beautiful girl” (Anderson 137) which happened to be identical to the description of Doctor Reefy’s wife of one year, described “quiet, tall, and dark, and to many people she seemed very beautiful” (Anderson 10). Both women came to Doctor Reefy in times of need and contemplation, simply to relieve the endless thoughts and afflictions of their minds. But the primary event corresponding to the other lies in the death of both the “tall dark girl” and Elizabeth Willard. An increasingly ironic – even suspicious – feeling emerged inside me as I realized that Doctor Reefy was unable to save these two women. Both scared and helpless women that became romantically attached to Reefy fell to death, arousing the question – Was Doctor Reefy indeed the comforting man we all perceived him to be?

From the get-go, Doctor Reefy’s character possessed strange attributes as he loved “filling his pockets with scraps of paper that became hard balls and were thrown away” (Anderson 11). Connecting this to the title of this short narrative, these paper balls are referred to as paper pills. Perhaps they contained some sort of medicinal quality that allowed Doctor Reefy to comfort himself. The truths written upon these scraps of paper were Reefy’s escape – they were secret. In Paper Pills it is said that, “During the winter he read to her all of the odds and ends of thoughts he has scribbled on the bits of paper” (Anderson 12). It is also said that “the tall dark girl” dies in the following spring. Was Doctor Reefy actually the one responsible for her death? Could he not stand that another individual had invaded on these truths that plagued his scraps of paper and essentially consumed his mind?

Additionally, I found myself pondering how Doctor Reefy “did not see the women he had held in his arms again until after her death” (Anderson 140) in Death. Why did Elizabeth leave him at the point they were to become true lovers? It was told she descended the stairs and did not visit him again – the stairs seemed to represent that Elizabeth Willard was descending onto a different level – the stairs essentially became a passage to her alternate mode of existence that characterized the remainder of her life. After her affair with Doctor Reefy, she became intensely obsessed with the release of death, she hungered for death, and she became more ill than ever before. And the question remains – Was Doctor Reefy indeed the comforting man we all perceived him to be?

The answer may never be certain or fully discovered but it offers a completely new angle in the two short stories, and on the comprehension of the idea of what truly comprises the grotesques in this novel. This was among my favorite mystery that characterized the novel – and believe me, there are plenty!

Drawing Connections

Although it may not be noticeable at first, in her novel Frankenstein, Mary Shelley carefully crafts her novel through the inclusion of excerpts of other literary works in her own. By doing this she successfully creates a connection between the two literary works meanings, and a connection between the reader and comprehension of the novel as well.

One of her most significant displays of intertextuality is seen when she incorporates a part of Wordsworth’s Tintern Abbey in her own novel, simply changing it to the third person. This is included towards the close of chapter 18, when Victor is describing his beloved friend Henry Clerval as Clerval accompanies him on a trip to England. The excerpt included reads:

“The sounding cataract

Haunted him like a passion: the tall rock,

The mountain, and the deep gloomy wood,

Their colours and their forms, were then to him

And appetite; a feeling and a love,

That had no need of a remoter charm,

By thought supplied, nor any interest

Unborrow’d from the eye.”

In Tintern Abbey, Wordsworth is essentially in the process of relating two different aspects of himself: his past self and his present self when visiting Tintern Abbey. This process is both internal and external: combining the elements of nature and his personal feelings to speak for the transcendent sense of emotions that consume him. This specific excerpt refers to Wordsworth in the days of his youth, his days of an ardent love for nature, and his days of effusive admiration for the towering mountains, verdant lands, and rushing streams that characterized his visits to Tintern Abbey five years before the present time. This identical excerpt is used in Frankenstein to describe Henry Clerval, longtime companion of the severely conflicted Victor Frankenstein.

My theory for why Shelley included this particular passage from the poem lies within the idea that Shelley desired to portray the sharp contrast between Victor and Clerval, although their basic seeds of thought were essentially the same. Even as Victor begins to expand upon Henry he exclaims, “Alas, how great was the contrast between us” (Shelley 138). As Clerval, similar to Wordsworth in his youth, observes nature and the scenery with interest and delight, Victor is too preoccupied with the haunting thoughts of the creature’s request to appreciate what Clerval can fully take in. The contrast is so apparent – although both Clerval and Victor had started with a passion for ingenious thought and discovery they turned in two opposite directions. Henry represents something alive and lively, similar to the deafening sound of a cataract. Similar to various colors, feelings, and forms just like the excerpt in Wordsworth’s essay. On the opposite spectrum, Victor was, in essence, lost and gone, troubled by a curse that barred any opportunities of pleasure.

This excerpt immediately draws a parallel between Henry and Victor, and makes Henry a foil character. Henry sees nature as an appetite, a feeling and a love – he respects natural beauty in a way Victor does not. Victor represents the sharp contrast in his obvious attempts to manipulate nature through the application of science. When Victor uses these words to describe Henry, he is essentially commenting on Henry’s ability to appreciate what Victor felt the need to tamper with. Perhaps Victor, because he is actually telling this story after Clerval has already died, feels the need to include these words to emphasize the deep or hidden guilt he felt because something he created led to the destruction of his best friend. This subtle emotion seems to echo throughout the elongated description of Henry Clerval.

I definitely understand why Shelley chose that excerpt to include in her own novel. It successfully draws a parallel between minor character Clerval and major character Victor and illuminates the peculiar qualities that set Victor apart from the norm. I found this a strategic way to draw literary works together, and place them in a way the feelings and thoughts of one easily allow for the flow and characterization of the other.