The Laughing Chief
Towards the end of class, we discussed the parallels between the end of the Chief's relationship with Mary Hudson and the end of The Laughing Man. However, looking back at all of the stories told of The Laughing Man, I noticed a lot of parallels in general between descriptions of the Chief's life and stories of The Laughing Man.
The short story begins with a description of the Comanches, and with it one of the Chief. The Chief is painted as almost a legend, with a "Just in passing" description of his achievements going on for a quarter of a page and ending with a statement of everyone's admiration for him. Similarly, The Laughing Man is described as a more conventional legend, with an epic backstory outlining how much awe the children held him in. Right from the beginning, the idea of both of these figures being legendary, almost superhuman, is laid out.
Towards the end of the "backstory" of The Laughing Man, he is described as lonely, until he finds his group of confederates. While not strictly implied, it can be reasonably inferred that the Chief is rather lonely as well - he presumably spends a lot of time planning things out for these 9-year-olds when he isn't spending time with them. These children almost act as the confederates for the Chief, a group that blindly follows their legendary hero.
After that, time passes, with the next installment of The Laughing Man worth noting being in April. Here, The Laughing Man is put into a sticky situation, where a full automatic clip is fired into The Laughing Man. The Chief is much more irritable than usual on the bus ride, and, given what happens afterward, there is presumably context to a similar effect going on in The Chief's life - a sticky situation that he assumes he can get out of, but is still stressing him out nonetheless. Much like The Laughing Man story, The Chief's life is on a cliffhanger until his next meeting with Mary Hudson.
Finally, the climax in both "shows" arrives, with the presumed breakup between Mary Hudson and The Chief, or at least bad blood between them, and the death of The Laughing Man. The two stories happen almost simultaneously, leaving a clear connection between the death of The Laughing Man and the death of The Chief and Mary Hudson's relationship.
From legendary origins to devastating deaths, The Laughing Man and The Chief both seem to have aligned stories. I have to wonder about the end of The Laughing Man's story, though. The Chief kills off all of the characters, all of the allies of The Laughing Man, at the end. Earlier, I related the children to these allies of The Laughing Man. If The Laughing Man's death is the same as The Chief's loss of Mary Hudson, I wonder how soon after the story the relationship between these children and The Chief would be severed. Obviously the narrator is revisiting memories - the Comanches are no more. It leaves me wondering whether or not the Comanches ended soon after the breakup with Mary Hudson. That might be too much of a stretch, but the parallels between The Laughing Man and The Chief seem clear enough, so maybe not.
The short story begins with a description of the Comanches, and with it one of the Chief. The Chief is painted as almost a legend, with a "Just in passing" description of his achievements going on for a quarter of a page and ending with a statement of everyone's admiration for him. Similarly, The Laughing Man is described as a more conventional legend, with an epic backstory outlining how much awe the children held him in. Right from the beginning, the idea of both of these figures being legendary, almost superhuman, is laid out.
Towards the end of the "backstory" of The Laughing Man, he is described as lonely, until he finds his group of confederates. While not strictly implied, it can be reasonably inferred that the Chief is rather lonely as well - he presumably spends a lot of time planning things out for these 9-year-olds when he isn't spending time with them. These children almost act as the confederates for the Chief, a group that blindly follows their legendary hero.
After that, time passes, with the next installment of The Laughing Man worth noting being in April. Here, The Laughing Man is put into a sticky situation, where a full automatic clip is fired into The Laughing Man. The Chief is much more irritable than usual on the bus ride, and, given what happens afterward, there is presumably context to a similar effect going on in The Chief's life - a sticky situation that he assumes he can get out of, but is still stressing him out nonetheless. Much like The Laughing Man story, The Chief's life is on a cliffhanger until his next meeting with Mary Hudson.
Finally, the climax in both "shows" arrives, with the presumed breakup between Mary Hudson and The Chief, or at least bad blood between them, and the death of The Laughing Man. The two stories happen almost simultaneously, leaving a clear connection between the death of The Laughing Man and the death of The Chief and Mary Hudson's relationship.
From legendary origins to devastating deaths, The Laughing Man and The Chief both seem to have aligned stories. I have to wonder about the end of The Laughing Man's story, though. The Chief kills off all of the characters, all of the allies of The Laughing Man, at the end. Earlier, I related the children to these allies of The Laughing Man. If The Laughing Man's death is the same as The Chief's loss of Mary Hudson, I wonder how soon after the story the relationship between these children and The Chief would be severed. Obviously the narrator is revisiting memories - the Comanches are no more. It leaves me wondering whether or not the Comanches ended soon after the breakup with Mary Hudson. That might be too much of a stretch, but the parallels between The Laughing Man and The Chief seem clear enough, so maybe not.
To your final point: this is exactly what I was thinking as we ended the discussion in class today. The strained relationship with Mary Hudson and it's negative ending must've been strong, because it's obviously correlated to the Chief's mood and the end of the Laughing Man story. We're not told this explicitly in the text, but I think we can infer that the Chief and Mary weren't in a relationship when the tales of the Laughing Man begun. That means that the story couldn't have been dependent on Mary Hudson's involvement in the Chief's life, so he didn't have to end the story when he did. Yet he ended it anyway, which is a testament to the powerful effect this schism had on the Chief. To me, if this conflict was large enough to end the unifying story of the Comanches, it was certainly influential enough to end the enthusiasm of the Chief, and therefore destroying the Comanches.
ReplyDeleteDid you also agree with the idea that Mary might be pregnant? I follow your train of thought here, the two stories are undoubtedly linked, but do you have a theory for the break up? I really like the parallel you drew between the chief and his confederates, it was something that wasn't talked about extensively in class and you made a very good argument!
ReplyDeleteI also thought that the end of the Laughing Man meant the end of the Comanches. I saw this final installment of the Laughing man tale as the Chief's way of telling the boys it was "over" (to be cliché). Like you mention, their tie to the Chief is similar to their tie to the Laughing Man, perhaps the tie is even the same: so wouldn't it make sense that if one tie was severed, the other must be too? Besides this one, the comparisons you draw between the two seem very well-observed.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading this story, I also picked up on some of the similarities between the Chief and the Laughing Man, but your post helped me notice some other ones as well. I particularly liked the observation that the Laughing Man and the Chief are both a sort of "legend," at least in the minds of the Comanches. Also, I think that the ending of the Laughing Man story signaled the end of the Comanches. This story was the main thing that all the kids looked forward to. Once it's over, their club isn't as unique as it was before.
ReplyDeleteAt first I wasn't positive that the two were connected, but your post definitely opened my eyes to just how tied together they are. Like Camden, I didn't really correlate Mary with the Laughing Man since she didn't seem connected to the stories at all, just to the Chief's mood. But then again, that now makes sense with the Laughing Man's internal initial loneliness. If that's the case, then I believe the "sticky situation" from the April story is probably related to some relationship problem with Mary, and the final death of the Laughing Man makes all the more sense.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it did seem like the Laughing Man stories were influenced by the Chief's life, especially as his relationship with Mary Hudson soured. The note you make about the Chief seeming like the type to be lonely is something that makes sense to me. He's described as this short, unhandsome man who is taking care of little kids on his own (though Mary does drop by for a while). Makes me wonder why the Chief doesn't involve his friends in the Comanches project, if he has any? Does he like being the one figure the kids look up to? (aimless conjecture lol)
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