The Death of Man

Mr. Tangen, because of the difficulty I’ve been having with my blog I have posted all my Molloy entries as one:

My first impression of Molloy is that it will be told in a sort of stream of consciousness style. He just takes right of with the nameless narrator (I’m assuming its Molloy) and doesn’t explain anything, but leaves you to build up what is going on from the “clues” he leaves. It reminds me of the article we read that explains what a blog is, it just takes off and you have to keep up or give up. Molloy seems to be held somewhere, a place he describes as his mother’s room (which seems unlikely) and he apparently can’t leave and doesn’t want to. He just seems tired overall, like he’s ready to die, but he is being kept alive for an unknown reason. He is being asked to write something down (his life I assume) which seems important to his captors. Molloy subtly comments on how ridiculous and demanding these figures are, by remarking that they had been angered that he begun at the beginning. Molloy’s thoughts are often disorderly and nearly incoherent, as if he can barely think straight. Maybe he has suffered some sort of trauma, or he is being drugged by his captors. Certainly his thoughts are less than logical and he seems to be unable to properly remember his past, which means the reader has to imagine it. His memories mix with his examples and he even says he is changing and embellishing them, admitting that his memory is mixing with them. This is all obviously on purpose by the author, who I think want to write a book that the reader would be in charge of instead of having to act like a kindergarten teacher and explain every last detail of his work. The reader has to guide his or her self rather than being guided by the author. Molloy also seems to be quite old (he speaks of the possibility of having a grown son) and he seems to be afflicted with the various health problems that old people have, like difficulties urinating. He also alternates between a sedate complacent state, totally submitted to his situation meekly handing over his papers and vaguely remembering his mother, to cursing her and his present state in a manic sort of rage. It gives the piece certain humanity, because Molloy shifts through emotions like any normal human and it gives us a more realistic picture of him and a better understanding of his situation. He also seems to have had no father, as he is never mentioned and he speaks of affection for old men, I suppose they were surrogate father figures. He also tries repeatedly to remember a girl, which he says was not real love, with which he may have fathered a son. In the same way that Molloy supposes he resembles his mother and that he has taken over her life, the probably son would have taken over Molloy’s having only a mother and an absentee father than didn’t love them. Part two of Molloy shifts radically onto another character, Moran. He is very different from Molloy. His tone is instead bursting with life, a man who obviously talks and thinks to much and is convinced of his being right on everything. Unlike Molloy he explains his name, his home, his son and barrels through his explanations. He begins his half despondent for unknown reasons and then he begins to explain. For now I will assume that he was the one that visited Molloy on Sundays to pick up his papers. It is not explained who he works for, only that he is an agent. The big question I have is what country this could be set in. the author is Irish, and Molloy and Moran are Irish names, but Jacques is French. This may well be irrelevant but I’m wondering just the same. There is also something almost nervous about Moran unceasing chatter. Just what would he say if he didn’t loudly declare his opinions? Unlike Molloy who talks about himself Moran seems to avoid anything truly personal. Moran is charged with finding Molloy, who has escaped, but also avoids thinking profoundly about him. I think Molloy and Moran are the two sides of man. The first knows all about who he is, but to get there he is bleak and dying, while Moran is the younger man, bursting with life, but with no self knowledge or true understanding of the world. Towards the end though (as towards the end of ones life) Moran’s tone begins to resemble Molloy’s, less energy, more sad truth and an almost complete surrender to the possible terrible twists of fate life will bring.