So let me give you this, from Kindle Location 1624:
Do you tell the police that Mrs. Arthur Ruskin of Fifth Avenue and Mr. Sherman McCoy of Park Avenue happened to be having a nocturnal tête-à-tête when they missed the Manhattan off-ramp from the Triborough Bridge and got into a little scrape in the Bronx? He ran that through his mind. Well, he could just tell Judy—no, there was no way he could just tell Judy about a little ride with a woman named Maria. But if they—if Maria had hit the boy, then it was better to grit his teeth and just tell what happened. Which was what? Well…two boys had tried to rob them. They blocked the roadway. They approached him. They said…A little shock went through his solar plexus. Yo! You need some help? That was all the big one had said. He hadn’t produced a weapon. Neither of them had made a threatening gesture until after he had thrown the tire. Could it be—now, wait a minute. That’s crazy. What else were they doing out on a ramp to an expressway beside a blockade, in the dark—except to—Maria would back up his interpretation—interpretation!—a frisky wild animal—all of a sudden he realized that he barely knew her.To me, the most interesting part is "interpretation!—a frisky wild animal." And I've got to admit that I am not positive that interpretation is the frisky wild animal. Maybe Maria is the frisky wild animal.
It reminds me of the problem I had with the last "Bonfire" passage I discussed. Remember? Sherman was "holding a violently lurching animal in his arms, staring, bug-eyed, and talking to himself," and at first glance, it seemed to be the "violently lurching animal" (his dachshund) that was "staring, bug-eyed," and it was only when I got to "talking to himself" that I knew it was Sherman staring bug-eyed.
I do think a writer should be more careful. Wolfe seems to assume the reader will follow the wild pathways he intends to lay down. It's exciting and should be fast, but when multiple pathways open up, we're slowed down, or we just get sloppy and hurtle along. That's what Wolfe wants from us, isn't it? But like Maria behind the wheel of Sherman's Mercedes, we should watch where we're going or we're going to get in trouble.
But I like to think that interpretation is the frisky wild animal. And Wolfe's prose is a frisky wild animal (and a violently lurching animal). Look what's going on in that sentence. We're in McCoy's mind, and he's been going over his story as he might recount it to the police or to his wife (Judy), and he sees what his problem is. The sentence begins with an attempt to fill in what was missing — how the 2 black youths were going to attack him — and he knows that's an interpretation he wants to impose to serve his interests, so he shifts to thinking about how he could get away with that, and he locks onto Maria. She'll back him up. It's all interpretation. With interpretation you can do... what you want, but what about that other person. She could back him up, but he doesn't know that she will. And the sentence ends with his realization that this woman — his lover — is someone he barely knows.
Sad for Sherman! But that's what you get when you cheat on your wife who's not sexy to you anymore because she is so familiar. You get someone you don't know, and the liberty you took is a horrible entanglement, all bound up with someone you never learned you could trust.
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I'm not sure what the frisky wild animal is referring to -- Maria or interpretation -- probably interpretation here. I will say that Sherman's anguish and mental gymnastics throughout the book make me cringe. As you say, that's what you get when you cheat on your wife. I have no sympathy for Sherman whatsoever, but his horribly lame attempts at covering his tracks are brutal. A good example why you shouldn't act the way he does.
I think I'll re-read that book...it sounds pretty good.
at first glance, it seemed to be the "violently lurching animal"
[then] it was Sherman staring bug-eyed.
You get two mental pictures for the price of one, and although the first picture changes, it doesn't disappear; I'd guess the animal was also bug-eyed while it lurched.
It's fun to write stuff like that: "there was only one ear like a dog that had lost a fight made from half a piece of toast"
In this episode we have a true example of a gentleman stepping on his dick.
I read the problematic sentence and thought, noting the dash at the animal-thought juncture, "shouldn't that be a semicolon?"
So I say the problem is in the punctuation. Wolfe wrote many things with manic punctuation. Here is he is more restrained, but he is linking half-thought thoughts together, so he is balancing clarity for the reader with the expression of unclarity of mind of the protagonist. It is inherently tricky.
A violently lurching animal is not going to be staring and an ambiguous reference is unlikely to refer to something later in the sentence, so we have the clues avoid confusion.
I will say that Sherman's anguish and mental gymnastics throughout the book make me cringe.
I recall the pitiful scene where he attempts to explain to his kid what he does for a living. "Masters of the Universe", is that correct? For skimming/scamming off the top?
Read it long ago and, of course, forgot this great scene. To me, it looks like she is the animal, isn’t that what you want young girlfriend for? But, I could see it the other way too.
Is it possible for the writer to intend that we not choose between the two available referents for "frisky wild animal" and instead see that it applies to both of them?
If a writer intended that, is there a name for that literary device? Not that I know of but I think that in fact Wolfe might have intended that here.
Interpretations and Maria...they're BOTH frisky wild animals. Sherman is surrounded by friskiness.
A violently lurching animal is not going to be staring
Au contraire. It won't be staring in calm contemplation, but it'll be wild-eyed and unfocused, from the same terror which made it violently lurch.
I just looked up how you can copy and paste excerpts from Kindle.
Never knew about Notes and Highlights feature you can log in from your computer.
That's pretty cool. Maybe I'm not the only one here who didn't know. Check it out.
"Interpretation! - a frisky wild animal..."
Perception! - a deceptively demure devil...
I don't know about "sad for Sherman!" It might've been worth it to "cheat on his wife who's not sexy to him anymore" so long as Maria was a demon in the sack.
Interpretation and perception! - wild and deceptive slippery slopes leading to sadness...
Interpretation! - a frisky wild animal that is both a floor wax and a dessert topping.
I am Laslo.
Maria is the frisky wild animal. I think Sherman is thinking about an advanced concept like "interpretation" and then suddenly realizes how inappropriate it would be to apply/extend that kind of mental concept and way of thinking to this frisky wild woman. But maybe I'm just being sexist (or Wolfe is).
I finished the book today. Had to get it done to read these threads without worrying about spoilers. Don't trust you lot!
The line I remember the most from the book is the reference to the co-op president in Sherman's building as someone "who emerged from his mother's loins a fifty-year old partner in Davis Polk..."
"Interpretation is the frisky wild animal."
Of course, but Maria, who also interprets, is a frisky wild animal herself, and the connotation presents itself in Sherman's internal monologue, by implication and propinquity. I think the word "allusion" covers this, although there may be a more specific word for this technique.
Jack got it right about the dog; it wouldn't be staring, bug-eyed or not, while violently lurching. I really don't see any problem with the sentence that ordinary reading comprehension can't solve.
Anyway, "bug-eyed stare" seems kinda racist.
Poor Sherman. He is not going to enjoy the frisky young Maria because he cannot love her. She is not of his class, and therefore he must throw her away. And God is watching.
She's clearly the "frisky wild animal." Sherman's mind is jumping, and we, the readers jump with him. He says "interpretation"--and then realizes that what he's talking about is his own interpretation of the events (or at least the one he is manufacturing), and he suddenly realizes with a start that Maria's mind might not be concocting the same same interpretation of the events, which is why he repeats the word (twice, once before the "frisky wild animal"). He's realizing that Maria's interpretation might be quite different from his, and that all he really knows about her is that she's a "frisky wild animal" not in his control. And that he hardly knows her. Wolfe has arranged for us to go along with Sherman in his jumpy, panicked thought processes.
It's fun to write stuff like that: "there was only one ear like a dog that had lost a fight made from half a piece of toast".
That's as mixed up as a dog's breakfast.
It's also fun to write stuff like "I threw my mother from the train a kiss", "I have a hat shaped like Davey Crockett", and "Lincoln wrote the Gettysburg Address while traveling from Washington on the back of an envelope".
"Never knew about Notes and Highlights feature you can log in from your computer."
You can have the Kindle app in your computer and search the text and find and copy things from there. You can also have a page (at Amazon) where all your highlighted things are collected, from whatever device you were using when you highlighted.
These features are very useful to me for blogging, so I buy a Kindle version even when I plan to mostly use the audiobook.
There was never a doubt in my mind that Maria was the wild, frisky animal here.
"Maria's mind might not be concocting the same same interpretation of the events"
She thought along the same lines as Sherman at the time of the incident, and her words and actions bolstered his impression of what was happening. In fact, she was at least little more on the ball when it came to situational awareness and self-preservation than he was.
He can't be certain of what she would tell the police, and he really doesn't want her to tell them anything, for various obvious reasons, one of them being her desire for self-preservation, which may not totally align with his.
If you’re going to describe interpretation as a wild animal, then “frisky” adds nothing but possible confusion. But friskiness is one of Maria’s charms, so the description seems more likely about her than “interpretation”.
For certain Marie is the fisky animal. But the good case can be that Sherman's equipment is the fisky animal. Look where that equipment has taken him.
I’m not sure that Althouse’s lawyerly close reading is the best way to experience Wolfe’s wild ride. It’s not a deposition.
I think "frisky, wild animal" refers to both "interpretation" and to Maria. In fact, look at the discussion here trying to interpret the passage! I think Wolfe intended for the referent of "frisky, wild animal" to be open to interpretation. It's common knowledge that a group of people witnessing the same event will have different perceptions and interpretations of what happened, sometimes wildly divergent perceptions and interpretations. We see the world as we know it from our internal landscape, and we impose that on the external world sothe external world makes sense to us.
With regard to Plato's famous cave of flickering shadows, we each live in our own unique cave.
I read this back in the day, but this project has me listening to the audiobook. Hearing it instead of reading it is slowing me down in a way that I am enjoying. (It's a good hour into Chicago from where I live. Plenty of time for the slow version.) I hear these words in the order in which Wolfe writes them. "Maria would back up his interpretation—interpretation! [Oh, Fuck!] —a frisky wild animal" I've gotta say it has to be both. [Oh, no, I am agreeing with Robert Cook!] Its each and it's both; it's the two together. Its an interpretation being wielded by Maria, whom he barely knows. Its a frisky wild animal in the hands of a frisky wild animal. FWA^2.
Wolfe is not at all shy about making clear precisely what he means when he want to mean something precisely.
yes Sherman chose poorly, like a character out of Balzac or trollope or even Tolstoy, but I think the penalty is exceedingly high, that he incurs,
Maria is the frisky wild animal.
Sherman has a certain attitude about that woman.
It makes sense elsewhere, and later.
Ms. Althouse, I am surprised that you waited this long to read the book. It’s a classic.
Maybe Maria is the frisky wild animal.
It's definitely Maria. Wolfe uses a similar metaphor elsewhere that is less ambiguous to minds easily diverted by ambiguity — unless furniture can be described as frisky.
Some guy: "Have a seat..."
Me: No, thanks.
Some guy pulls a quizzical face.
Me: That chesterfield looks far too frisky.
Ambiguity. There's a lot of that going around. Never bothered me much. Maybe I'm immune.
If Althouse had been a Medieval monk working in a scriptorium I do not believe she... (She? Monk? My mind is showing the ravages of post-insanity American English.) I do not believe he would have drawn any marginalia. Not even chartreuse rats. (That's a joke for the cognoscenti.) Brother Althouse would have had no spare time to decorate the whitespace for fretting over the ambiguity of Cicero's prose. Brother Althouse would have been a much happier contemplative hoeing the radishes.
It might be amusing to write a novel in which all ambiguity is accounted for. Could be quite funny. Could be deadly tedious. Wouldn't yield a farthing. Laurence Sterne tried it back in 1759. Tried to remove all ambiguity regarding Tristram Shandy's origins as I recall. Never got 'round to his life and opinions, though.
Fatal Attraction, the movie, was released at about the same time as Bonfire. Lesson: Don’t cheat on your spouse!
In discussing extramarital affairs, buddy of mine said, “Who has the time?” which is funny as he would never had done so under any circumstances. Which turned out good as his wife wouldn’t pull the plug on him when he was in a coma for FIVE WEEKS. Pulling the plug would have made her a very rich widow. My friend is perfectly fine now. Miracle man. Ivy League honors grad and hasn’t lost a mental step.
I frequently think I’m living a Tom Wolfe novel.
I'm puzzled at those who assert "it's definitely...."
How can they know? The phrasing here purposely makes the meaning uncertain. Even seemingly obvious meaning can be and often is more fugitive as one chases after it.
Some folks just need to have definite answers. Ambiguity of meaning (or multiple-meaning) is always much more fun.
The Althouse Reading Circle hath commenced. I'm assuming you are going to follow the same format as Oprah's Book Club--3 to 5 chapters a week, and nobody is allowed to read ahead or give spoilers. You don't horror until you've been on the receiving end of an Oprah Book Clubber on a rampage.
I've got to admit that I am not positive that interpretation is the frisky wild animal. Maybe Maria is the frisky wild animal.
I think you may be phoning in this close-reading business. In the chapter immediately preceding, Sherman envies a spectacularly rich colleague and covets his (fourth) wife thusly:
“She was Lopwitz's fourth wife, French, a countess, apparently, no more than twenty-five or twenty-six, with an accent like Catherine Deneuve doing a bath-oil commercial. She was something . . . Sherman had met her at a party at the Petersons'. She had put her hand on his forearm, just to make a point in conversation -- but the way she kept the pressure on his arm and stared at him from about eight inches away! She was a young and frisky animal. Lopwitz had taken what he wanted. He had wanted a young and frisky animal with lips as red as blood and skin as white as snow, and that was what he had taken. What had ever happened to the other three Mrs. Eugene Lopwitzes was a question Sherman had never heard brought up. When you had reached Lopwitz's level, it didn't even matter.”
I saw that, too, EP, and there are also several animal references to Maria. Here’s Sherman thinking pre-accident: “He was at the wheel of a $48,000 roadster with one of the most beautiful women in New York—no Comp. Lit. scholar, perhaps, but gorgeous—beside him! A frisky young animal!” Post accident: “Maria had on an Avenue Foch royal-blue jacket with shoulder pads…out to here…a tense little animal writhing under royal-blue shoulder pads from Paris.” The animal is Maria.
The frisky wild animal HAS TO BE MARIA because a novel is no place for figurative language.
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