Masculinity

Many of the stories in Paul Theroux’s new collection Mr. Bones follow a pattern.  We start with a depiction of a character or situation that seems familiar. We’ve seen it ourselves, or we’ve heard of it or read about it, and it makes sense.  Theroux shows us that we only understand the surface.  The complete picture is actually quite different, and often very disturbing.  Behind love can be violence, behind care can be abuse, behind innocence can be perversion, what seems at first to be threatening can turn out to be playful and harmless.  The twists that take us there as readers are sometimes abrupt, but more likely the hints of what’s to come are there from the beginning if we’re paying attention.  The stories are useful reminders that though we have to make assumptions about others in order to navigate the world, we actually know very little about others, and perhaps not so much about ourselves either. The conventions of society keep crucial truths hidden, truths that we choose not to face very often, truths that a skillful writer can bring to light.

Theroux gives us glimpses of many men that unhinged.  Male aggression and violence is a theme that he weaves into many of the stories in one way or another.  Anger and aggression are channeled in lots of different and unexpected ways, some relatively harmless, some with devastating consequences.  Through it all Theroux also explores the role of the writer and his need to write.

Many of Theroux’s novels are place-centric, and of course his travel books are well known.  So I expected that the stories might be shorter depictions of exotic and interesting places.  While some of the stories do take place in unusual settings, the focus is on the characters themselves.  Sometimes the setting is integral to the story, but only as a way of getting to the characters themselves.

There’s not much subtlety or softness here, but rather sharp edges pretty much everywhere.  Yes there is the occasional clumsy turn of phrase or plot contrivance. The female characters are sometimes just as dangerous as the men but more often hollow foils to the aggressive and confused male characters. The plots are not particularly delicate either, and are sometimes a bit gimmicky.  Lots of extremes and hidden agendas, all potentially dangerous and threatening in one way or another.

There’s a reason we hide behind conventions.  We can’t spend much of our time actually living out all of our feelings and desires.  That would be inefficient, messy, and dangerous.  But it’s good to be reminded of the existence of those strong impulses, especially in men.  They do sometimes come out into the open, and even when behind the scenes they can get hold of the controls. If we’ve been paying attention we won’t be so surprised. Look carefully and you’ll see the evidence even in our tame and conventional lives.  Theroux extrapolates to extreme cases for us, but if we retrace diligently we’ll find the sources within ourselves just about every time.