A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood

[dejavu]

6.)  George has not told his neighbors about Jim's death.  Why do you think he hasn't told them what happened?  Does this decision tell you anything about how George feels toward Jim's death (e.g., is it his own personal pain and domain and does this make him unwilling to share it)?  Do you think this is making him more or less able to deal with his loss?  The discussion in which he says 'Jim wasn't a substitute for anything' is occurring entirely in his own mind.  Is Jim's death yet another isolation that George has imposed upon himself - should he be having this conversation with someone else?

If the neighbors didn’t know that George and Jim were gay lovers, I would say that he doesn’t tell the neighbors about Jim’s death because he doesn’t want to become so emotional in discussing the death with them that they might guess the true nature of their relationship.  But from everything else we learn about George’s perception of the neighbors’ attitudes about homosexuality, it appears that he knows, or believes, that the neighbors already knew he and Jim were lovers.

It seems to be something different at work here.  George seems to be distancing himself from the reality of what happened to Jim.  Maybe he’s still in the stage of denial.  I think it’s later in the book that we learn how George was so distant and cold with Jim’s relative who informed him of Jim’s death, that this relative assumed Jim and George had not been that close after all.  And there was something about how George couldn’t face dealing with Jim’s animals, and gave them all away.  Maybe he feels that Jim’s death is a burden that he has to bear alone, and that if he told the neighbors about it, he would incur unwanted sympathy from them.  Their sympathy might rip off his mask of denial and distance.

I do think it would be healthier for George to be having this conversation with someone else, possibly a therapist, but in the 1950s therapists were looked on with suspicion, too.  He doesn’t seem to have any other close friends or family that he could talk to, except possibly Charlotte, but we haven’t learned much about their relationship yet (and so far, Charley seems the more emotionally needy of the two).

It’s interesting that at the same time George’s insists that “Jim wasn’t a substitute for anything,” he also specifies that Jim wasn’t a substitute for a kid brother, son, husband or wife.  Some of these “non-Jim” identities echo the gender roles discussed earlier, along with age roles (since Jim was younger).  George wants it understood that none of that matters; Jim was just Jim, a unique person who can’t be replaced. 

[Nikki]

7.)  Why does George reject Charley's invitation?  What does the conversation tell you about their relationship?  

Well, she certainly does have the knack for calling at the wrong time!  She irritates him with her blunderings and nagging. Although they seem to have a pretty close relationship (he can read her mind), she is one of these people who are so needy and dependent that it's easy to see why George is annoyed.  Why can't she come right out and ask him what she wants instead of sounding hopeless while he waits for a sob.  Her nagging dispels his guilt and he makes short shrift of the conversation. Although they seem to be close, Charley doesn't seem to understand how her cloying desperation affects George -- she's so wrapped up in her own problems.

[dejavu]

7.)  Why does George reject Charley's invitation?  What does the conversation tell you about their relationship? 

First, George is annoyed because Charley happened to call while he was on the toilet (an awkward situation indeed).  Maybe he only made the effort to answer because he thought it might be a more “important” call (from school, for example).  Nowadays we have answering machines, and can even take a portable phone into the bathroom if we’re expecting an important call.  We have to remember the limits of the telephone technology of the 1950s. 

Early in the book it was mentioned that Charley often called when he was only “three-quarters” of way toward becoming George (rather than “it”), so he may have not felt himself ready for conversation at this hour.

He is also annoyed by what he labels her “possessiveness,” when she apologizes for getting his schedule mixed up, as though she ought to know everything about his schedule.

But the main reason is that Charley appears to be needing some emotional support from him, and George isn’t inclined to provide it.  He hears “desperation” in her voice, and George isn’t in a mood “for one of her crises.”  Then he feels guilty, and then gets mad, and then suggests that he’ll call her another time soon.

The conversation suggests that George and Charley really are close to each other, having some sort of friendship, although the particulars aren’t defined.  But Charley is either having a rough patch with many current crises, or she is somewhat immature about dealing with the problems of life in general.  George, being in a flat emotional state himself in the wake of Jim’s death, seems unable to deal with the ups and downs of another person.  (I’m not sure whether to add “especially a woman”:  Would Charley be less inclined toward crises if she were not a woman? Or would George treat her crises more even-handedly if she were not a woman?  I think we need to know more about their history together to say.)

[tfferg]

Can we assume that George lived in LA during and after World War II? It seems likely. He would have witnessed The Change, the social and demographic changes he describes in the city and its suburbs.

We learn a little later that he teaches literature in a college, so I also assume he may have been aware of broader social developments and attitudes through both observation and reading. He and Jim may have hoped to find a bohemian community. They must have survived somewhere in the 1950s. (There was, at the time, a somewhat alternative community of artists in an outer semi-rural suburb of Melbourne that was soon surrounded by boring mainstream development by the 60s.) George and Jim’s house has its aesthetic charms but at least as importantly, it appeals to them because of its privacy. Same-sex couples of that time would have looked for the life-preserving shield of privacy or suburban anonymity. There was no ‘gay ghetto’ in LA at the time where they could live in a community of similar people, was there?

Jim seems to have been more outgoing and able to enjoy animals and children. He was sociable enough that the kids didn’t imagine ogres until after he was gone. All their games, as George sees them, seem to be based on the archetypes of story books and more importantly television. The appearance of the house, and George’s isolation and unsociability attract stereotyping by the kids who know nothing about George and Jim’s life and the latter’s death.

George’s age and the fact that he had a nanny who looked after him ‘in their dear tiny doomed world’ of the nursery suggests a background where children were mostly seen briefly and not heard by their parents and other adults before they were packed off to boarding school at an early age. Many same-sex couples these days aspire to raising children, but I doubt that gay men would have done so to a similar extent in George's time.

The silhouettes of the sign CHILDREN AT PLAY never struck me as sinister before, but the idea appeals when I think of spoilt brats like Benny.

The 1950s were a time of stifling and boring conformity in suburban Melbourne in the experience of many of my peers and myself and George’s neighborhood as he describes it seems similar in some ways. He may not know how the Strunks and the Garfeins think from the evidence of much conversation with them, but the observable externals of the way they live would make him feel that they fitted into the mainstream (gendered) ideas of the time.

[tfferg]

There’s something about the opening paragraphs where the narrator is ‘it’ before he becomes ‘I’, ‘he’ and eventually ‘George’ that suggest to me that Isherwood is describing not only a man suffering grief and  also putting on the mask that disguises his gayness when he goes out of the house. There seems to be an element, related to Debbie’s comment about him as a universal human figure, of Vedantist ideas about individual identity as merely a social role, even an illusion.

[tfferg]

It’s interesting that at the same time George’s insists that “Jim wasn’t a substitute for anything,” he also specifies that Jim wasn’t a substitute for a kid brother, son, husband or wife.  Some of these “non-Jim” identities echo the gender roles discussed earlier, along with age roles (since Jim was younger).  George wants it understood that none of that matters; Jim was just Jim, a unique person who can’t be replaced. 

Yes, he's insisting that  the relationship is in no way less than the conventional ones. There is also no evidence that George and Jim thought of themselves in stereotyped masculine/feminine roles derived from heterosexual relationship models. And at the time, same-sex marriage would have been much less imaginable than it has become since.

[michaelflanagansf]

Can we assume that George lived in LA during and after World War II? It seems likely. He would have witnessed The Change, the social and demographic changes he describes in the city and its suburbs.

We learn a little later that he teaches literature in a college, so I also assume he may have been aware of broader social developments and attitudes through both observation and reading. He and Jim may have hoped to find a bohemian community. They must have survived somewhere in the 1950s. (There was, at the time, a somewhat alternative community of artists in an outer semi-rural suburb of Melbourne that was soon surrounded by boring mainstream development by the 60s.) George and Jim’s house has its aesthetic charms but at least as importantly, it appeals to them because of its privacy. Same-sex couples of that time would have looked for the life-preserving shield of privacy or suburban anonymity. There was no ‘gay ghetto’ in LA at the time where they could live in a community of similar people, was there?

I guess we can assume that George (fictional being that he is) follows the same timeline as Isherwood.  Isherwood moved to L.A. at the beginning of WWII.

There was a gay community in Los Angeles at the time - although more of one in Long Beach (which was far enough away from the studios for those with jobs there to be more open).

Here is a history of the baths in Los Angeles:

http://www.gaytubs.com/losangeles.htm

And although this gives some false hits there is a timeline which has some information here:

http://www.google.com/#q=gay+los+angeles+history&hl=en&tbs=tl:1&tbo=u&ei=_La6S-xBi_qxA_T5lJQF&sa=X&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=11&ved=0CCMQ5wIwCg&fp=bcdf8cbbf06dc4f

[michaelflanagansf]

And (regarding the history of Gay L.A.) there is also this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Gay-L-Politics-Lipstick-Lesbians/dp/0520260619/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1270530607&sr=1-1

[tfferg]

Thanks for the historical references, Michael.

So the Mattachine Society began in 1950 (but I assume it must have been the only gay community organization at the time). There were bathhouses which were gay meeting places. In the 1950s, there would not have been the wider-spread openly gay community with a broader range of organizations and amenities that developed later, would there? I don't recall George mentioning Long Beach or the Mattachine Society or the tubs either.

I guess there were private networks of gay people that Isherwood knew of and particpated in, but given the legal, social and political conditions of the time, they would have kept themselves fairly private. Would people like the Strunks have been aware of them?

[Cally]

4.)  What do you make of George's relationship with the children in the neighborhood?  Do you think he seriously dislikes or is irritated by the children?  Is his reaction to the children due to his being alone now?  Do you think that his reactions to the children have further isolated him in the neighborhood - set him apart from his neighbors with children?

I think that George does seriously dislike the children, although he also feels guilty about it, knowing that he has made the stiuation worse, remembering that with Jim "they never crossed the bridge uninvited". He has every reason to feel irritated - he perceives them as noisy, thoughtless, even cruel, and worst of all, unchecked by the adults; in his solitude it all becomes magnified out of proportion.   He sees no good in them - the only positive thing is their "arrogant grace".

I suppose that the fact that he is gay is a part of this, but I can imagine any lonely grieving person feeling the same way.

ETA We've previously been shown George's view on breeding: "So the tots appeared, litter after litter after litter."  George's (Isherwood's?) comes across as scathing - and perhaps fearful?

[Cally]

5.)   The book refers to several gender related attitudes in this first section: 'Mrs. Strunk's hour and the power of motherhood'; 'the masculine hour of ball playing'; 'the doctor's pretty sissy son'; 'The Girls--as Mrs. Strunk and the rest will continue to call themselves' - do these descriptions act to further isolate and alienate George from his neighbors?  Do you think that these gender descriptions are meant to allow us to identify with George and take his part against the neighbors? How do the attitudes concerning homosexuality relate to these gender notions?

This gender stereotyping, and the way the women in particular go along with it, certainly scares the  **** out a me (although when I lived through it I suppose I would have accepted it on the whole – I was only a gradual convert to feminism).  And how much more so would it isolate and alienate George.

I think Isherwood is asking the reader to observe all this with George’s own cynicism; but I wonder how far he is expecting this reaction.  I presume he would expect his contemporary readers to be fairly sophisticated.  But it’s occurred to me at this point – I wonder what sort of audience Isherwood did feel he was writing for.  Did he expect heterosexual readers to be sympathetic to and identify with George?  Is anyone aware of contemporary reviews of Isherwood’s work and this book in particular?

[michaelflanagansf]

Thanks for the historical references, Michael.

So the Mattachine Society began in 1950 (but I assume it must have been the only gay community organization at the time). There were bathhouses which were gay meeting places. In the 1950s, there would not have been the wider-spread openly gay community with a broader range of organizations and amenities that developed later, would there? I don't recall George mentioning Long Beach or the Mattachine Society or the tubs either.

I guess there were private networks of gay people that Isherwood knew of and particpated in, but given the legal, social and political conditions of the time, they would have kept themselves fairly private. Would people like the Strunks have been aware of them?

Regarding George and the book I doubt they had much contact with a gay ghetto, such as it was then.  Later on George hints that the bar where the sailors were was a kind of bi friendly place.

The Strunks most certainly would not have been aware of any of this (although anyone with the attitudes Mr. Strunk expressed always has me wondering if he knew about the tubs  ).

In posting the history links I was answering this part of your response: 'There was no ‘gay ghetto’ in LA at the time where they could live in a community of similar people, was there?'  There were a number of organizations and even a magazine, but again I don't think George would have been involved in them.  For others (and probably for some people George would have known) there was also ONE Inc.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ONE,_Inc.

There were certainly people of note acting on their sexuality back then including Bayard Rustin:

http://gay-rights-history.suite101.com/article.cfm/bayard_rustin_and_gay_rights

And Dale Jennings:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Jennings

Here's a bit more about the gay history of the town at that time (all of which I imagine George would have studiously avoided):

http://www.glbtq.com/social-sciences/los_angeles,4.html

[janjo]

Yes, he's insisting that  the relationship is in no way less than the conventional ones. There is also no evidence that George and Jim thought of themselves in stereotyped masculine/feminine roles derived from heterosexual relationship models. And at the time, same-sex marriage would have been much less imaginable than it has become since.

This is relevant, I think, to the discussion we had last week on TOTW about gender roles. Isherwood is saying, that Jim was himself, special in his own way as a human being. Neither of them needed to fit any societal created role. They were just themselves.
Relevant then, relevant now.

[janjo]

3.)  George and Jim fell in love with the house George now lives in the first time they saw it.  They loved it because you could only get to it by the bridge across the creek.  George refers to it as 'our own little island.'  Do you think that George and Jim were attempting to isolate themselves here?  If so who or what are they trying to isolate themselves from?  Does this relate to their being a different couple in the neighborhood?  Do you think the house still fits George or has it become something different without Jim - perhaps a prison?

I think George and Jim fell in love with the house because it offered privacy, important to them because they were gay, and therefore "different," but also important to any lovers who want to just be together and undisturbed. They seemed to be quite "private" people, George was a university professor, a position that requires at least some time alone to think. They also read and were quiet together.
Jim seems the more outgoing of the two, as evidenced by the animals that he kept. He had room in his life to love them as well as George, whereas once he died, George sent them away.
The house was a sanctuary, maybe that was why George never got around to getting the bridge fixed, he stays "semi-detached."
I think it it this mindset that causes him to so resent the children. He doesn't want to be disturbed, not with Jim, and not without him.
The house seems more of a shrine than a prison.
I think George likes it there.

[Nikki]

We've previously been shown George's view on breeding: "So the tots appeared, litter after litter after litter."  George's (Isherwood's?) comes across as scathing - and perhaps fearful?

Sarah, I think more scathing than fearful.  Sounds like (Isherwood) George thinks that the litters of tots will overrun their little paradise -- like rabbits!