Is Howey interesting?
Does Howey think of all these things to make his mundane life more interesting?
Howey has a very normal life. He goes to a corporate job in a big city. His job is so uninteresting that he can talk about everything in his job without ever talking about what he actually does. To me this means that his job must not really have any significance to him or to anyone else. I think he feels unfulfilled in his life and that is why he observes everything and thinks about it in such detail. His mind seems to need constant stimulation, but he doesn't seem to be getting that. The simplest objects, such as a straw, keep his mind running in circles. For the reader unfortunately, this seems like forever. The straws or milk cartons are not interesting to us at all but to him they are fascinating.
I don't think Howey is unhappy in his life either. He seems to be in a good relationship and has a job. To me he never seems depressed or especially unhappy. I think his mind needs a lot of stimulation and he doesn't seem to be getting that in his mundane life. This is why I think Howey finds all these objects in his everyday life fascinating. He compares mundane objects to something very unique. It seems to me that he wishes that a sandwich was actually the eye of a bird, because that would be more interesting then eating a sandwich during his lunch break.
Howey has a very normal life. He goes to a corporate job in a big city. His job is so uninteresting that he can talk about everything in his job without ever talking about what he actually does. To me this means that his job must not really have any significance to him or to anyone else. I think he feels unfulfilled in his life and that is why he observes everything and thinks about it in such detail. His mind seems to need constant stimulation, but he doesn't seem to be getting that. The simplest objects, such as a straw, keep his mind running in circles. For the reader unfortunately, this seems like forever. The straws or milk cartons are not interesting to us at all but to him they are fascinating.
I don't think Howey is unhappy in his life either. He seems to be in a good relationship and has a job. To me he never seems depressed or especially unhappy. I think his mind needs a lot of stimulation and he doesn't seem to be getting that in his mundane life. This is why I think Howey finds all these objects in his everyday life fascinating. He compares mundane objects to something very unique. It seems to me that he wishes that a sandwich was actually the eye of a bird, because that would be more interesting then eating a sandwich during his lunch break.
While I think that you might be correct about his job not being interesting or important, I don't think that Howie talks about these things out of boredom. Howie, throughout the book, seems genuinely exited and interested in the things he talks about (especially perforations).
ReplyDeleteI agree. Howie does not seem bored in his interest in the mundane. It is more just what he does. He gets excited when he considers things that may not seem interesting, because he's found a way to make them interesting and defamiliarizing.
DeleteIt’s interesting to think of Howie’s way of thinking as something he strives to achieve because he is bored with his own life as opposed to being the natural way he sees the world. It certainly darkens our perception of his life and character. I think it’s more of the latter though, and Howie really does have a fascination with the things that we would normally consider to be mundane and uninteresting... or at least I really want that to be the case. Great post!
ReplyDeleteinteresting blog post, it made me think about the mezzanine! I would argue that Howie is not bored at all. Isn't one of the lessons of the mezzanine that there is value and complexity beneath the surface of everything. Then a "normal" job is not boring at all but amazing and complex. I think you could apply the same logic that howie applies to life to argue that howie himself has a complex and fun life
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