On "The Other Man"

Denis Johnson's "The Other Man" begins with the narrator's encounter with a Polish man on the ferryboat from Bremerton to Seattle. The man drinks with the narrator and tells him stories of his motorcycle and the midnight curfew in Warsaw's public parks. After engaging in a somewhat lengthy conversation, the man admits that he, in fact, is not Polish, but is really from Cleveland. He tells the narrator about a fire in the Cuyahoga River, and explains that it spread because the pollutants in the water were flammable. The narrator informs the reader that in previous times in which he told this story, the readers speculated that the "Polish" man was making a pass at him; but the narrator neglects the thought and moves on to speak about his arrival at Seattle and his clash with his friends' neighbor who thought he was a burglar and threatened to call the police. After noticing patients at the hospital across the street, the narrator enters a bar where he meets a women. They dance and kiss, and she says that she will take him home even though her husband is at their house, asleep- and their wedding took place two days earlier. At the end, the narrator alludes to him having sex with the stranger from the bar.

"The Other Man" follows the consistency of Johnson's short stories, that seemingly follow no plot, but rather the chronicled experiences of the narrator as he reveals his strange encounters and personal insecurities. The fact that the narrator couldn't pick up on the "Polish" man's flirtations suggest his inability to interpret situations. He has an easier time analyzing other people's situations, such as the hospital patients. He demonstrated his interest in their maladies and questions whether or not they will visit each other's graves after their deaths. The narrator's inability to enter his friends' apartment in Seattle suggests that he truly has nowhere to go, and that he feels alienated from the comfort of "home." His encounter with his friends' neighbor depicts people's misconceptions about him, and that those who surround him don't understand who he is- mirroring his lack of capability to understand himself. The narrator's intimacy with the stranger at the bar and their premature discussions of love is a reflection of the protagonist's lonesomeness; because he rarely experiences emotion, he grasps on to whatever love he could find, ultimately rendering him vulnerable.

An interesting aspect of Johnson's story is its constant changes in mood and tone. When he is on the ferryboat, the narrator tells the reader that "I'm sure we were all feeling blessed on this ferryboat among the humps of very green-in the sunlight almost cooly burning, like phosphorus-islands, and the water of inlets winking in the sincere light of day, under a sky as blue and brainless as the love of God..." In the presence of nature, the narrator feels cleansed and hopeful. In contrast, the description of the city elicits images of hell: "I imagined jamming her into a roaring fireplace. The screams... Her face caught fire and burned. The sky was bruised red shot with black, almost exactly the colors of a tattoo. Sunset had two minutes left to live." Like in James Fenimore Cooper's works, the concept of nature's goodness and the evil of the city is prevalent in this short story, that described the city as an unwelcoming, deadly place.

Jesus's Son - Denis Johnson

Happy Hour

This short story is about a man who's in love with a belly dancer. The story doesn't actually go into much detail about the relationship between the two of them, but it is more about the days the man spends thinking about her. The main character is a sad "weird" man, who seems to ride the local bus to nowhere and spends two hours every night buying one beer to get another free during Happy Hour, hence the name. The man never tries succeeds in getting the seventeen year old belly dancer, but he does enjoy one night with her. A restless night spent sleeping next to the love of his life, named Angelique. Johnson also explains vividly the relationship that Angelique has with other people, not the main character. Angelique has a "brother" who isn't really her brother. This gives the reader idea that maybe she is emotionally unstable and can't have a "real" relationship for that reason. The reason the main character seems to be in love with the belly dancer is because she seems to have just as many problems as the main character himself. They both seem to be detached from reality, therefore attracting them to each other.

I thought that Denis Johnson did an amazing job at describing a bar scene in a poetic, unique way. Johnson uses a lot of devices that make his writing sound better and help the story to become more "alive". He uses a lot of alliteration and even rhyming, something that is usually seen in poetry, making this short story so unique. "Souls who had wronged each other were brought together here. The rapist met his victim, the jilted child discovered his mother. But nothing could be healed, the mirror was a knife dividing everything from itself, tears of false fellowship dripped on that bar." (101) This is an amazing description. Johnson uses this style of writing throughout all of his short stories, even in the last one, Dirty Wedding. He is describing the bar as a place where the "drop-outs" of society gather, although he says it in a way that almost makes the reader gasp, a reaction that most writers dream of.

On "Dirty Wedding"

Johnson's short story entitled "Dirty Wedding," set in Chicago, tells the story of a man living with his girlfriend Michelle.  Michelle is with child, and after her abortion the narrator behaves inappropriately at the hospital and is asked to leave. When riding the El train, the narrator decides to follow a random man to the laundromat, and when the man removes his shirt, the narrator finds himself sexually attracted to him. Back on the El train, the narrator speaks with a young African American girl, who takes him to the Savoy Hotel where he buys drugs. Later, the narrator explains that Michelle left him for a John Smith, and took her own life shortly after. Haunted by Michelle's death, Smith killed himself too. Johnson's short story ends with a commentary on abortion, emphasizing the concept that the semantics of whether or not a fetus is considered living as well as the behavior of the surrounding lawyers, doctors, and parents are trivial matters. The importance lies in the relationship and actions of the mother and father.

Johnson's short story was intriguing; the dearth of emotion and sentiment that were coupled with the turning points in the story elicited a passive aggressive tone that paralleled the narrator's personality. His reaction to the abortion, "What did they stick up you?" lacked any respect and understanding towards his girlfriend. His willingness to follow random people on the train, his inability to comprehend his sexual orientation, and his spontaneity with drug experimentation reveal his failure in dealing with his dilemmas and coming to an understanding about his identity. At the Savoy Hotel, the narrator states that "I didn't know the rules. I didn't know what to do." Even while doing drugs, the narrator feels as if he doesn't belong- and he is aware of his lack of emotion when relating himself to Michelle, who was heartbroken about the abortion and wanted to make him feel the same pain that she was experiencing. I believe that the main theme of the story is to demonstrate the self-destruction and aimlessness that comes with drug addiction, and Johnson exemplifies this theme successfully through his protagonist's failed relationship.