Were they gay? (Jack & Ennis) - Next chapter

[Cally]

Just a thought:

This diagram has always appealed to me, probably because although I'm an untidy person I like to see a tidy representation of a concept. And to me it refers to a person's feelings, desires, arousal, not what they DO (however Kinsey intended it to be interpreted), so placing anyone's sexuality would be fairly subjective and fluid. I believe that Kinsey flelt that one's position can change with time, and indeed that his own did.

I find it useful as a starting point to clarify thoughts on sexuality, including my own. But that's all it is - a starting point: sexuality is such a complex matter. It is not a person's label - just one aspect of their personality, albeit a vital one.

[janjo]

Apparently it is a myth that people in the olden days had dreadful decayed teeth, before sugar was easily available people had a healthy diet and good teeth. I wouldn't think this included the 1960's, but how much tooth decay could Jack and Ennis get living on beans, whiskey and stone biscuits?

[AZ.bbm]

Plus, if they were as gay as cherry cake then it's likely that they would be very fastidious in their personal hygiene and overall appearance.

I think Jack was very conscious of his appearance (e.g., shaving while clean-shaven, clothes in good repair, except for the old, beat-up Resistol; later gentrifying himself via the growing of a mustache, the filing down of his buck teeth, etc).

Ennis,  the 'Oscar' to Jack's 'Felix,' being from the "opposite corner of the state," would necessarily be the 'slob' of the duo (-although a torrid affair has been known to morph even a slob into a 'dapper dandy')


_I'm thinking that to care for their teeth they would have had access to sundries like baking soda or its equivalent (that's right, baking soda--a cheap & very effective tooth cleaner-- you don't even need a toothbrush to brush with the stuff!) and of course actual toothbrushes & toothpaste via their weekly grocery run.

For freshening the breath (after dinner, before sex,..?), they could pick & chew natural plants (mint, parsley, basil, clover, etc.), wild herbs growing freely across the mountainsides and valleys)  which would at the same time serve to prevent tooth decay.*
Also, hydrogen peroxide (50% solution) was dirt cheap and available in general stores, cheaper than mouthwash, and just as effective... H.P. would help whiten their teeth, while it sterilized their mouths, cut down on colds, etc.


+In their favor, too, it's likely the boys would have made their coffee using naturally-purified stream water...

*Not in their favor - the alcohol consumption, which tends to damage the gums and cause tooth decay and gum disease, and the teeth to fall out...

FWIW.

 

[janjo]

I have been worrying a little about the cherry cake. Lots of sugar in a cherry cake. Joe Aguirre could have taken one up there when he went to tell Jack about uncle Harold, it is just that as with so many things, AP forgot to mention it.

Mr Janjo said today, that if it wasn't for him I would live on whiskey and doughnuts, which I strongly refute, but he was trying to get me to eat my salad at the time.

[Paul029]

As a previous post of mine received no replies I wondered whether I'd be better off writing in Chinese.
For example:

先前未公開的研究，最近在美國國會圖書館出土證明毫無疑問，任何一種蛋糕在上個世紀​​在懷俄明州的任何年齡的男性的飲食是一個男性同性戀的明確指示
雖然研究結果是否由女性烘烤蛋糕的總隊列中的女性參與的未婚女性，在規定的時間從事在懷俄明州的蛋糕烘烤的同性戀傾向的指示，經調查後發現，有被各方已波士頓婚姻
一個誰提供的蛋糕在懷俄明州北部的部分未婚男性已婚女性的數量進一步調查其後進行的，但不幸的是，其結果是難以辨認的文盲加劇貧困書法
懷俄明州的另一項研究中，提出了休息，甚至到得克薩斯州與重點後，柴德里斯，但為同一基金提供的其中一個原因是，這樣的調查只是多餘的人在得克薩斯州被撤銷沒有連喝咖啡更不用說吃蛋糕任何形式的
一些不熟練擦除和隨後的書面文本上透露，通過先進的X光，得克薩斯州的人關注，調查發現迄今未確認的數字，在得克薩斯州人口的男同性戀者和女同性戀者

 

[Paul029]

...Men who say they are "straight" but aren't, might [fall in love and have sex with other men], but honestly heterosexual men really don't...

-Begging the question, how do we know that each is being 'honest' about his sexuality...?

Taking it a little further, Stan, how do we know that Ennis's 1983 "knowledge" of the manner of Jack's death is correct, according to the requirements of objective fact?
If this is so, and some here appear to believe that it is, does it mean that his 1963 statement (that he's not no queer) is also correct?
In other words, he is factually correct when he says he is not queer. (i.e. He's honest.)

Yet some here appear to believe that he's in denial when he says "INNQ." (i.e. He's dishonest.)

How can such contrary interpretations of Ennis's honesty be justified?
What do they depend upon?
Are they, for instance, dependent upon the passage of time?
That he lies about himself when he's nineteen but when he's thirty-nine he "puts away childish things" and becomes a seer who knows all?†

Is that it?

* I’m unable to track down Jess’s actual post of 25 June so my un-hotlinked quote will have to suffice.

† Despite the fact not only that he wasn't present at the time, and was also given a logical and reasonable explanation for what had occurred.

[Paul029]

-Begging the question, how do we know that each is being 'honest' about his sexuality...?

There are men that I know well enough and have known for long enough that I trust to be honest with me about their sexuality.

I’d like to take this further but will first PM you about your proposed evidence, Jess. 

[janjo]

There are men that I know well enough and have known for long enough that I trust to be honest with me about their sexuality.
I’d like to take this further but will first PM you about your proposed evidence, Jess.  

Well, of course no one can ever completely know what is going on in someone else's mind or life, but I have a husband of over 40 years, I was very close to my late father, I have two sons in law, and several almost lifelong male friends.
I would be very surprised to find out that any of them were not either completely heterosexual, or predominantly heterosexual.
Gay men here on the forum think that they really know and understand men, and I feel sure that is true of a certain type of man, but women see men's sexuality from a completely different perspective.
Not all men are using us for cover, or coping with us until they can see their man friends.
There are men out there who love women, who are obsessed by women, and are not interested in having a sexual relationship with a man at all.
Hard as that may be to believe.

I have even been told here, not by you Paul, that men prefer sex with other men because women don't know how to do it properly.
This is nothing short of misogyny, but again I am not applying that to you.

[janjo]

-Begging the question, how do we know that each is being 'honest' about his sexuality...?
Taking it a little further, Stan, how do we know that Ennis's 1983 "knowledge" of the manner of Jack's death is correct, according to the requirements of objective fact?
If this is so, and some here appear to believe that it is, does it mean that his 1963 statement (that he's not no queer) is also correct?
In other words, he is factually correct when he says he is not queer. (i.e. He's honest.)

Yet some here appear to believe that he's in denial when he says "INNQ." (i.e. He's dishonest.)

How can such contrary interpretations of Ennis's honesty be justified?
What do they depend upon?
Are they, for instance, dependent upon the passage of time?
That he lies about himself when he's nineteen but when he's thirty-nine he "puts away childish things" and becomes a seer who knows all?†

Is that it?

* I’m unable to track down Jess’s actual post of 25 June so my un-hotlinked quote will have to suffice.

† Despite the fact not only that he wasn't present at the time, and was also given a logical and reasonable explanation for what had occurred.

I think expecting everything Ennis del Mar says to be the gospel truth is a misunderstanding of the literary art and technique of Annie Proulx, Paul
Brokeback Mountain is Ennis's story and the observations he makes are the authors way of showing us his character, flaws and all.
He is mixed up, conflicted and in denial, and this is the way we are supposed to understand him.
Therefore, we only know what he knows, or what he deduces, it might be right or wrong according to objective truth, but that is the case with all of us.
Everything that happens will be seen through the filter of the consciousness of the person telling the story.
The narrator tells us things, we are occasionally given access to Jack Twist's thoughts, but Ennis's reflections are his own and are based upon what he "knows" or thinks he "knows" which may or may not be completely true.

[AZ.bbm]

There are men out there who love women, who are obsessed by women, and are not interested in having a sexual relationship with a man at all.
Hard as that may be to believe.

I have even been told here, not by you Stan, that men prefer sex with other men because women don't know how to do it properly.
This is nothing short of misogyny, but again I am not applying that to you.

Thank you. Of course not.

<opinion>
 I know that it's difficult for women to understand the male physiology as well as men themselves do, but then, women have an advantage over men of knowing intuitively what a man needs, and often being able to assess a man's overall 'emotional landscape.'
 

For a guy there are many reasons why he would want to have sex with another man; just there are very many good reasons to have sex with women - often the reasons are one and the same...

Film Ennis seemed to be fond of what people refer to as 'rough sex' -- doing it roughly, getting it roughly -- with only marginal interpersonal communication, if at all, and virtually no foreplay. -Not a criticism, just his style. He liked the pliability of having sex with his wife, the romance (such as it was), life's fecundity, the sense of self-esteem (macho?) he derived from being 'hetero' and having sex "the right way" (-pleasing Daddy's ghost?),  etc. -These are important male conceits.

[AZ.bbm]

I think expecting everything Ennis del Mar says to be the gospel truth is a misunderstanding of the literary art and technique of Annie Proulx...
Brokeback Mountain is Ennis's story and the observations he makes are the authors way of showing us his character, flaws and all.
He is mixed up, conflicted and in denial, and this is the way we are supposed to understand him.
Therefore, we only know what he knows, or what he deduces, it might be right or wrong according to objective truth, but that is the case with all of us.
Everything that happens will be seen through the filter of the consciousness of the person telling the story.
The narrator tells us things, we are occasionally given access to Jack Twist's thoughts, but Ennis's reflections are his own and are based upon what he "knows" or thinks he "knows" which may or may not be completely true.

I was wondering about that - whether we should have to take the character's stories to be 'gospel' - even the story's narrator was called into question, once, in an earlier debate (@TOTW) regarding Jack's 'accident.'



I would definitely question Ennis's account re the murder of Earl, a full grown man allegedly having been "dragged around" by his genitals.? -I wonder whether AP intended for us place stock in the grotesque little anecdote, or whether that was just a device--"a piece of violence inserted to propel the story along," as she puts it -- and a handy excuse for Ennis not to elope' with Jack...?  *(I realize that Earl''s death was a lynchpin  of the argument in favor of Ennis having grown up as a closeted gay kid.)

Did we actually see any real (overt) homophobia in the film, apart from that of Ennis's own, perhaps that of L.D.? -- Even Joe Aguirre was far more concerned about the cost of having his herd abandoned to the coyotes than he was with whom his employees were 'boinking.'

[Paul029]

I think expecting everything Ennis del Mar says to be the gospel truth is a misunderstanding of the literary art and technique of Annie Proulx, Paul
Brokeback Mountain is Ennis's story and the observations he makes are the authors way of showing us his character, flaws and all.
He is mixed up, conflicted and in denial, and this is the way we are supposed to understand him.
Therefore, we only know what he knows, or what he deduces, it might be right or wrong according to objective truth, but that is the case with all of us.
Everything that happens will be seen through the filter of the consciousness of the person telling the story.

Yet many here appear to believe that his interpretation of Lureen is correct, and that she's lying about Jack's death—and not only in the story.
The film's flashback reinforces this by showing Jack actually being bashed, and not that it's the result of Ennis's over-wrought imaginings.

Those who 'sympathise' with Ennis's situation often, if not always, tend to interpret some things as gospel truth but explain others away by saying he's in "denial." (e.g. INNQ.).
I don't recall many saying that his interpretation of Lureen was spurious.

This seems, to me, to be rather contradictory.
Picking and choosing which bits to accept and which to reject isn't justified, even if Ennis is, as you said, "conflicted."

There have to be some "ground rules" for the story to "work," otherwise anything goes.
I mean this in the sense that, if Ennis's perceptions are to be seen as skewed, as unrealistic, as having no coherent or logical relation to actual reality, we need to have this made clear at some stage or other.

The Prologue, for me, seems to indicate a true picture of Ennis, and it's from this that all else, which we're told retrospectively, derives, even though most of it is "a lot of nonsense."
It doesn't really matter how Jack died, or whether Lureen is truthful or lying, or what OMT thinks of him, and so on.
That's all in the past; what matters is in the Prologue (or, as I called it once, the misplaced Epilogue).
(I understand I've gone off on a bit of a weird tangent here.    )

The narrator tells us things, we are occasionally given access to Jack Twist's thoughts, but Ennis's reflections are his own and are based upon what he "knows" or thinks he "knows" which may or may not be completely true.

If this is the case what's the point of discussing anything about him?
It'd be like trying to interpret fog.  

[Paul029]

Well, of course no one can ever completely know what is going on in someone else's mind or life, but I have a husband of over 40 years, I was very close to my late father, I have two sons in law, and several almost lifelong male friends.
I would be very surprised to find out that any of them were not either completely heterosexual, or predominantly heterosexual.

An interesting alternative.

Gay men here on the forum think that they really know and understand men, and I feel sure that is true of a certain type of man, but women see men's sexuality from a completely different perspective...

Well, why wouldn't they think that?
 
Sometimes I wonder whether who would have professed the greater knowledge of the characters had the story been about two women rather than two men—the forum’s male or its female members?

If the thread been called "Were they Gay—Ernestine and Jackie?" would the men here have believed, simply because they’re of the opposite gender, that their opinions had more value than those of the women?  

[janjo]

Yet many here appear to believe that his interpretation of Lureen is correct, and that she's lying about Jack's death—and not only in the story.
The film's flashback reinforces this by showing Jack actually being bashed, and not that it's the result of Ennis's over-wrought imaginings.

Those who 'sympathise' with Ennis's situation often, if not always, tend to interpret some things as gospel truth but explain others away by saying he's in "denial." (e.g. INNQ.).
I don't recall many saying that his interpretation of Lureen was spurious.

This seems, to me, to be rather contradictory.
Picking and choosing which bits to accept and which to reject isn't justified, even if Ennis is, as you said, "conflicted."

There have to be some "ground rules" for the story to "work," otherwise anything goes.
I mean this in the sense that, if Ennis's perceptions are to be seen as skewed, as unrealistic, as having no coherent or logical relation to actual reality, we need to have this made clear at some stage or other.

The Prologue, for me, seems to indicate a true picture of Ennis, and it's from this that all else, which we're told retrospectively, derives, even though most of it is "a lot of nonsense."
It doesn't really matter how Jack died, or whether Lureen is truthful or lying, or what OMT thinks of him, and so on.
That's all in the past; what matters is in the Prologue (or, as I called it once, the misplaced Epilogue).
(I understand I've gone off on a bit of a weird tangent here.    )
If this is the case what's the point of discussing anything about him?
It'd be like trying to interpret fog. 

The ground rules of the story are that we know what Ennis thinks he knows.
If we were interpreting or examining a piece of historical evidence he would be classed as a secondary source.
In the tyre iron attack on Jack, the only primary sources would be, Jack, if he had survived, the perpetrators, or any first hand witnesses who were actually present. Ennis is none of these, so he is a secondary source.
In the case of Earl, Ennis knows what he saw, so in that case he is a primary source, and what his father told him had happened, which may or may not have been the truth, and any images conjured up in his nine year old mind, there fore as far as the actual act is concerned he is a secondary source.
In his telephone conversation with Lureen, he is a primary source, but his interpretation would still be coloured by several factors, his thoughts of what happened to Earl, the tone of her voice, which he may or may not have misunderstood, the fact that he was in love with her late husband and may or may not have harboured a certain amount of jealousy and resentment towards her because she had what he wanted and needed and knew in his heart he could never have.

As  I am a sometime social historian, nowhere in Annie Proulx's league, it must be remembered that she was a fully fledged social historian of the Annales school before she became a writer and I feel sure that she applies these techniques in her writing.
In fact she says she does, so it is not really like knitting fog!

Annie Proulx is of French Canadian extraction


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

[Paul029]

I was wondering about ... whether we should have to take the character's stories to be 'gospel' - even the story's narrator was called into question, once, in an earlier debate (@TOTW) regarding Jack's 'accident.'

If we take everything he says as gospel we have to include INNQ.

I would definitely question Ennis's account re the murder of Earl, a full grown man allegedly having been "dragged around" by his genitals.?

And probably not very far at all, especially as he was "old;" but he was a tough old bird, so who knows?

Perhaps for discussion on a future TOTW:

In the Motel Siesta section of the short story Ennis, in 1967, describes his impressions of how Earl had died in 1953.

"They'd took a tire iron to him, spurred him up, drug him around by his dick until it pulled off, just bloody pulp.
What the tire iron done looked like pieces a burned tomatoes all over him, nose tore down from skiddin on gravel."

a) As Earl was a "tough old bird" how far do you think he was dragged around by his dick until it pulled off?
b) Would it be far enough for his nose to be torn down from skidding on gravel?
c) Do you think that some of his nose damage could have been caused by the tire iron?
d) Ennis's recollection of the event some fourteen years later is presented without supporting evidence.
How much credence, if any, should it be given?