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spqr

Becca wanted a tattoo. Badly. She’d been planning it for a while.

“Think about it. No one else at home is gonna have one. I mean, it’s not legal ‘til you’re eighteen.”

“But here…”

She gestured out the window to the Italian courtyard below.

“Anyone can get one.”

“You seriously want one?” I asked.

“Mhm. I want something to mark the semester. I got to come home with something new.”

“You’re not gonna regret it?”

“I’ve been wanting it for a while. And it’ll be something Roman—something that says ‘Becca was in Rome for five months. But not that literal, obviously.”

“So what are you thinking?”

“SPQR, maybe?”

It was the motto of Rome—Senatus Populusque Romanus—“the Senate and the People of Rome.” The four letters were everywhere here, on the manhole covers, engraved on the sides of buildings.

“Don’t you think that’s almost too Roman? Like you have to be raised here to get that tattooed?”

She thought a moment.

“I mean, Giovanni has that on his arm,” I told her.

Giovanni was one of the kids we liked to call “super-Italian.” He had slick black hair, wore lots of leather, and drove to school on his moped. Basically, he was your stereotypical image of a suave Italian male.

“Ya, but that’s Giovanni. For me, it’ll have a different meaning. What matters it what the tattoo represents for me, not for all the Italians I’ll never see again in a few months.”

Becca decided to get it. It was going to be on the inside of her wrist, so she could cover it up with bracelets if she needed. She just had to find a decent tattoo parlor. Preferably one where the staff spoke English. We checked out a shop on the outskirts of the city, in an area with cheap dollar stores and modern apartment buildings. When we showed up, there was a group of men lingering outside, smoking. They checked us out.

“Buon giorno,” the man inside greeted us.

“I’d like a tattoo. I made an appointment—Becca.”

“Yes, yes, Becca. Have a seat. I’ll just get the materials ready.”

There was nothing about the shop that was particularly Italian. There were some sleazy car magazines on the table and two binders full of tattoo images. It was full of the usual stuff, busty blonde chicks, fire-breathing dragons, even a “Mom” heart tattoo. Not “Mamma” but “Mom.”

“I’m ready” the guy called out. “Come this way.”

He led us into a tiny room. Becca showed him her design.

“Ok, ok. Very nice. You like SPQR—very Roman, you know?”

“Ya.” She laughed

“You want music?” he asked.

“Sure”

He pulled up a Myspace page on his computer. Rap music started coming out of the speakers.

“You know him?”

“Who?”

“King Dome.” He pointed at the rapper’s Myspace page. “He’s from America too—Brooklyn”

“Uh-no.”

“He’s very good. Very popular here. Real American rap, not like the Italian stuff here. Much better.”

So this was his America, a rapper with a big chain, Lacoste shirt, and a Yankees cap shifted sideways. To so many Americans, it’s an image of what’s wrong with the country—the emphasis on brand names, luxury goods, music that treats women as sexual objects. People think this type of culture is less common in Italy. There’s the illusion that Italians are more sophisticated, that they wear stylish clothes and sip espresso in cafes, that they drink wine and enjoy leisurely lunches. Compared to the American culture of fast food and sweatpants, Italy seems civilized. Yet this perception of a cosmopolitan Italy is as much a myth as the image of crude American society. Both countries have elements of high and low culture, neither of which are necessarily negative. The tattoo artist did not embrace the sophisticated image of Italy but the somewhat trashy American culture. And who’s to say Armani suits are better than Brooklyn rappers in Yankees caps? 

In Xiaolu Guo’s A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers, the male protagonist tells Z “the body is key to everything…eating, drinking, shitting” (240). It is a statement that helps explain one of the themes of the book: the discovery of sex and the body. Z has no real awareness of her body, but, more importantly, of her self. She has never had to live on her own before and, as such, has never had to be self-reliant. Living in a foreign environment forces her to recognize her self-sufficiency, causing a moment of realization that occurs while Z masturbates for the first time. By stimulating bodily awareness, Z has an epiphany that she is independent.

The body is the tool for the epiphany; by understanding her body, Z discovers herself. Though masturbation is the moment of realization, Guo creates a buildup to the scene, incorporating points when Z starts to realize her body’s potential throughout the novel. The first of these instances is when Z loses her virginity, which causes Z to explain her self-image. She regards herself as “not beautiful” because, in China, she has always been told she is an “ugly peasant girl” (51). Thus, Z defines her body as “ugly,” as something unpleasant and offensive, not as a symbol of independence.

Living in England and experiencing British notions of the body allows Z to change her perception of herself. She goes to a peepshow, where she watches a prostitute “fondle her valley,” prompting Z to compare the vagina to a gorgeous rose (109). Z realizes that female anatomy, which she obviously possesses, is beautiful. A woman’s body, because of its ability to seduce men, possesses power. Z realizes she craves this strength, even articulating that she “desire become prostitute” (110). She wants to embrace the Western vision of the body—the idea of the body as a potent force that can prompt male desires. Since Z has never had control over her life, this emblem of power is immensely appealing.

The body becomes a symbol of independence. It represents both command over others and oneself, the ability to function without relying upon others. Guo expresses this element of the body in the scene when Z receives a personal massager as a birthday present. She opens the box, unsure of the gift’s function, and reads that the massager can help women “gain greater self-awareness” (129). It helps women explore their bodies, getting to know their bodies and, in the process, themselves better. With the vibrator, Z no longer needs to rely on a man for sexual fulfillment. Z points out that this is a Western idea, telling everyone that “enjoy sex is a Western concept” (130).

Yet by the masturbation scene, Z has embraced this Western notion. She explains that she used to think sex was an expression of love, but her ideas about sex have changed. Z now “feel[s] tortured by the desire inside [her] body” and “feel[s] strongly how much this desire wanting to be fulfilled” (193). So she masturbates, which makes her feel like she is enveloped in the “deep blue” sky, an allusion to the heavenly and euphoric sensation of satisfying her sexual desire (194). Once she screams, she realizes that, “for the first time in [her] entire life, [she] came by [her]self” (194). It is an epiphany, a moment when she discovers that she can be on her own. She can not only satisfy herself sexually, but she can also live on her own, be independent and control her own life. Accepting Western ideas of sexuality, which she discovered by traveling, allows Z to embrace herself as an individual. Being in a foreign environment forces her to mature, to understand herself as independent, unconstrained by her parents or her lover.

Miu?

Haruki Murakami writes about alternate realities and, as such, his characters have a magical feel to them. This is particularly true of Miu in Sputnik Sweetheart, who has abnormal characteristics, including white hair at a young age, specific eating habits, and no sexual desire. Yet Miu is extremely intriguing, perhaps because of her oddities. This otherworldliness allows Miu to function like a goddess in the story, as a somewhat mysterious being who guides Sumire to another world.

With this in mind, Sputnik Sweetheart can be read as a myth. It follows a myth’s basic plotline: Sumire, the person in need, is rescued by Miu, who teaches her life lessons and permanently changes her perspective. Though Sumire is not aware she needs help, she is lost, unaware of where to go next in life. She has dropped out of college, is unable to truly care for herself in terms of food and appearance, and spends her time trying to create a “massive nineteenth-century-style Total Novel,” which is extremely difficult to do with her writer’s block (14). Furthermore, she explains that “sexual desire has me baffled,” as she is unable to feel it, which one can interpret as a dilemma (8).

When Miu appears in her life, she helps Sumire solve these problems, much in the way a goddess would. “K,” the narrator describes the moment when Sumire met Miu, writing that “in the instant Miu touched her hair, Sumire fell in love, like she was crossing a field and bang! a bolt of lightning zapped her right in the head” (8). Miu’s touch is magical, godlike and transformative. The tap also makes Sumire instantly fall in love with Miu in a manner that recalls Cupid, who shoots arrows that force the recipient to become enamored of a specific person. Miu’s touch is like an arrow—it causes Sumire to fall in love with the next person she lays her eyes on: Miu. By making Sumire experience lust, Miu solves her problems. She offers her a job that requires Sumire give up smoking, dress well, take care of her appearance, and stop obsessing about writing. The newfound love also allows Sumire to finally experience sexual desire.

Teaching Sumire these skills allows her to develop, exploring and discovering the world in the process. As “K” remarks after Sumire’s transformation, “something inside [Sumire] was blossoming” (62). At the same time, though, Sumire feels helpless, “like there’s no more gravity, and [she’s] left to drift in outer space” without knowing where she’s headed (63). Miu, by not demonstrating whether or not she is sexually interested in Sumire, makes Sumire confused and feel unrooted. Miu forces her into a liminal space, the transitional space between the two worlds in the novel. When they go to Greece, the birthplace of Greek mythology, Sumire finally escapes to the second world, the alternate reality. Miu is the instigator in this journey, the goddess who guides Sumire to another realm. Though this world is ambigious, the reader can assume it is a better place for Sumire, with a more suitable lifestyle. By bringing Sumire there, Miu acts as goddess who appears suddenly, rescues Sumire, and fixes her problems, positively altering her life.

In A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers, author Xiaolu Guo uses food as a symbol of identity. The protagonist “Z” comes to England, completely unaccustomed to British life, and describes the elements of culture she finds strange, including the food. One of her first forays with British food is the “full English breakfast” at her bed and breakfast, which is a much larger meal than she is used to. Unused to British portions, she tries to eat most of it, but finds herself unable to finish it. This only makes her feel “guilty and wasty” because she has a Chinese, not British, attitude about food; it is a reaction that reflects her Chinese identity (14).

Z uses food as a means to describe British and Chinese cultural differences. Her lover makes “Eggy Salad,” which strikes Z as bizarre because “in China cold food for guest is bad, only beggars no complain cold food” (48). She cannot complain though, as that would be impolite, but still has trouble responding when her lover asks whether she likes the food. Z nods, but this seems to go unnoticed, as her lover answers for her: “Yes. I like the food very much. It is delicious. It is yami” (48). This is Z, if she were used to British social norms, would respond. It is how she is supposed to behave.

Though she learns appropriate British behavior in other arenas, Z struggles to change her attitudes around food, perhaps because food is so closely linked to her identity. She explains that the “only thing I care in life is eating” (13). Food is part of her upbringing and culture; she has learned to eat a certain way her whole life, which makes her habits hard to change. Even when she is forced into a situation where she has to adapt by living with a vegetarian, she complains. Food becomes the subject of their arguments, a manifestation of the cultural differences that complicate their relationship. Though food is a point of contention, it is also a way to demonstrate love. When Z recovers from her abortion, her lover cooks her a silver carp, food she likes that he does not believe in. It pleases her, mainly because it reminds her of home, of her culture. For Z, food carries a variety of meaning; it reflects her roots, her dissatisfaction with elements of English life, and her relationship with her lover. It becomes more than a meal but an illustration of her life.

This use of food as a representation of Z becomes even clearer in the entry “bestseller,” which describes Z’s dream about becoming a noodle “cookery writer” famous in the West (233). Her book is “about two-way cooking, meaning either it can be prepared as Chinese food or it can become Italian spaghetti”—one can just change a few ingredients and “the noodles will get totally different identity” (234). The dream presents this easy notion of gaining a new identity, suggesting that one just needs to make a few easy adjustments to go from Chinese to Italian. If only, Z seems to imply, transitioning to a new culture was that simple.

By this point in the book, her identity has become more complicated, which the dream reflects. Z writes that she would be “too ashamed” to use her real name in the book, as it writing about “cooking noodles for English people” would be a scandal (234). It would be a betrayal of her Chinese identity, a demonstration that she has become more English. Z decides to use “Anon..the person who has no name” instead (234). It is a name that captures her identity; she is no longer fully Chinese or English, but a nameless blending of the two.

The dream, though, is not reality. Afterwards, Z wants to cook the dream noodles but cannot remember how, so she takes out a pack of instant noodles. She wants to effortlessly switch identities like the dream noodles, but she is forced to accept what she has: the instant, unchanging noodles. One’s identity, she discovers, it not always what one desires.

Does this even exist?

While reading Naguib Mahfouz’s The Journey of Ibn Fattouma, I found myself thinking of it as an almost biblical story. Like the Bible, it has a mythic quality, with an intentionally ambiguous time frame and an imaginary geography. More importantly, though, The Journey of Ibn Fattouma is a common and timeless story: the tale of a romantic quest for a better life. Because of such universality, the book can be read as an allegory. Literary critic Michael Beard, in his article “Master Narrative and Necessity in Ibn Fattouma,” explores this concept of allegory in the novel. He argues that “Ibn Fattouma changes over the course of his travels, though not in the manner of a round character; he functions as a lens through whom we are exposed to

widening backgrounds, unanticipated social alternatives.” The novel is then an allegory of the search for a lifestyle, an exploration of different societies.

Each locale Ibn Fattouma visits functions as an example of distinct cultural values. The first site, Mashriq, translates as “abode of sunrise,” which reflects the ancient, prehistoric society of the town. In Mashriq, the citizens live communally, wear no clothing, and worship the sun. Ibn Fattouma lives in the town briefly, marrying a woman named Arousa, and experiencing the culture of Mashriq. He quickly discovers, however, that Mashriq is not a paradise but a society with its own faults. In fact, Ibn Fattouma is forced to leave because he is accused of bringing his son up in godlessness, demonstrating the problems with a lack of religious tolerance.

He then proceeds onto the next destination, Haira, which functions as a divine monarchy, with the god as king. Ibn Fattouma enjoys a more civilized life there, but tries to purchase Arousa as a slave, which only results in trouble. A man with more power, the sage Daizing, wants possession of Arousa, and accuses Ibn Fattouma of ridiculing Haira religion, a false allegation that allows Daizing to throw Ibn Fattouma in jail and take Arousa. Here, Ibn Fattouma experiences the faults with a divine monarchy, namely a lack of justice and equality.

After leaving jail, Ibn Fattouma goes to Halba, a sophisticated civilization based on the modern democracy. Yet like any democracy, Halba has its faults, mainly crime and class inequality. He then journeys to Aman, an almost socialist town where everyone works. The problems of crime and class inequality do not exist in Aman, but it is not a perfect society. There is no crime but there is also no fun or entertainment; it is a dreary place that Ibn Fattouma cannot wait to get out of. He then travels to Ghuroub, which is a place of preparation for Gebel, a place of meditation almost like an ashram.

It is unclear, however, whether Ibn Fattouma ever reaches Gebel, a fact that lends insight into the meaning of the story. Since Ibn Fattouma perhaps never finds his destination, the story is truly about the journey. Mahfouz suggests that this journey is the path of self-discovery, of experiencing different cultures and societies in order to better understand oneself. Ibn Fattouma sets off on his trip, dissatisfied with his own society and in search of a better one. He finds though, that none of the five places he visits is any better than his home—every society has its pros and cons. Furthermore, Ibn Fattouma, doesn’t even find Gebel, the land of paradise, perhaps suggesting that such a place cannot exist. The allegory of the novel then seems to be one of discovery, the realization that no place is perfect.

Is this what they really want?

In Erik Cohen’s “A Phenomenology of Tourist Experiences,” Cohen groups tourism into five modes: the recreational, the diversionary, the experiential, the experimental, and the existential. He defines a traveler in the experimental mode as a person who does not adhere to “the spiritual centre of their own society, but engage[s] in a quest for an alternative in many different directions” (Cohen, 189). This type of traveler is a “drifter,” who lacks “clearly defined priorities” and is thus “pre-disposed to try out alternative life-ways in their quest for meaning,” a description that perfectly captures Dean and Sal in Kerouac’s On The Road (Cohen, 189). On the Road chronicles this “essentially religious quest…without a clearly set goal,” illustrating the experimental mode of travel throughout the whole novel (Cohen, 189). The segment in Mexico, though, is one of the strongest depictions of this method and lucidly defines Dean and Sal as experimental travelers.

When Dean and Sal first enter Mexico, they are ecstatic, believing that they have discovered an authentic world with meaning. Sal writes that “we had finally found the magic land at the end of the road,” their spiritual centre, a place where they felt a personal resonance (Kerouac, 264). They are looking for a world distinct from 1950s conventional America, somewhere that is real rather than created. In Mexico, Dean thinks they can “understand the world as, really and genuinely speaking, other Americans haven’t done before,” that they can use Mexico to break free from a phony American life (Kerouac, 264). They see the 1950s paradigm of a family, the father with a stable but dull job, living in the suburbs, as contrived, a false way to live. Instead, they seek its very opposite, an undeveloped lifestyle, complete with “barefoot women,” “dirty broken down abode fronts,” and muddy main streets “full of holes” (Kerouac, 265). To Dean and Sal, this is authentic. Like the travelers Cohen writes about, they “seek to experience vicariously the authentic participation in the centre of others, who are as yet less modern and less…‘disinherited’ (Cohen, 181). Since Dean and Sal do not feel resonance with their centres, they seek meaning elsewhere, trying to find a more suitable centre in Mexico.

What they like about Mexico is this lack of development, as it represents a real life, even though it is one of poverty. Dean tells Sal, “I am digging the interiors of these homes as we pass them—these gone doorways and you look inside and see beds of straw and little brown kids sleeping and stirring to wake…and the mothers cooking up breakfast in iron pots” (Kerouac, 266). Though they feel a connection to Mexican culture, they remain removed from it. They become more similar to experiential travelers in this regard, who Cohen defines as those on a quest for authenticity. Experiential travelers never partake in the authentic life they observe, instead experiencing it but never appropriating it for themselves (Cohen, 188). Dean and Sal do not delve into the Mexican lifestyle, learning to live like the natives, but sample it. They smoke “tea” with the locals, go to the whorehouse, drink, and then leave, just enjoying the parts of Mexico they like.

Dean and Sal have the idea that they will “finally learn [themselves] among the Fellahin Indians of the world” but they only continue to live as they know how—by drinking, sleeping with girls, getting high, and driving around from place to place. (Kerouac, 268) They don’t learn anything new in Mexico, which makes their trip belong in the experiential mode of travel. Dean and Sal never appropriate the Indian lifestyle but experience it superficially. Though they have found a resonant centre in Mexico, they are unable to commit themselves to it. As Cohen writes, “the habitual seeker cannot be ‘converted’” (Cohen, 189).

How much does she know?

In Ian McEwan’s The Comfort of Strangers, the protagonists Mary and Colin are in a foreign city, surrounded by the unfamiliar, but manage to remain inward. They do not truly interact with Venice, the probable setting for the novel, and instead maintain a comforting routine. Although they “set out each morning after breakfast with their money, sunglasses, and maps” and “dutifully fulfill[] the many tasks of tourism the ancient city imposed,” there is no sense of engagement with Venice (12). For example, they “had yet to enter a shop,” a place of social interaction where they would be forced to communicate with others (12). They have trouble finding restaurants and frequently get lost, demonstrating their difficulty adapting to a tourist lifestyle. Though they are “on holiday,” they don’t seem to enjoy their vacation or Venice but wander the city more out of tourist’s obligation than out of pleasure. They continually use the term “on holiday” as an excuse for everything that goes wrong, as though it can justify their discontent.

Being “on holiday” appears to make them unhappy, as they seem ill suited for the tourist lifestyle. Traveling forces one to explore the unfamiliar and step outside one’s comfort zone, which scares Mary and Colin. As a result, they become more inward, only really talking and engaging with each other until they meet Robert and Caroline. Their intimacy becomes a burden, “a matter of perpetual concern; together they moved slowly, clumsily, effecting lugubrious compromises, attending to delicate shifts of mood, repairing breaches” (13). McEwan writes that alone “they could have explored the city with pleasure, followed whims,” could have acted like normal tourists (13). Their intimacy, however, forces them inward and away from the city, as “with each step the city would recede as they locked tighter into each other’s presence” (13).

This closeness with each other presents a problem when other people enter their realm. Take the maid, for instance, who parallels and even foreshadows Robert and Caroline in her familiarity with their behavior. She comes into their room while they are out, lines up their shoes, folds their dirty clothes, and arranges loose change in little stacks, touching and reordering all their personal objects. She closely knows their personal belongings yet she is a total outsider to them. At first, this makes Mary and Colin uneasy and they are “inhabited by this intimacy with a stranger they rarely saw (12). But they slowly grow accustomed to it and even begin to depend on her.

Similarly, Robert and Caroline are strangers who know intimate details of Mary and Colin’s lives. Though Robert and Caroline only learn about the couple through stalking, there is still a parallel between them and the maid; both are strangers who are familiar with the idiosyncrasies of Mary and Colin’s lives. Robert takes dozens of candid pictures of Colin, which together freeze “every familiar expression, the puzzled frown, the puckered lips about to speak” and each photograph appears “to celebrate a different aspect of that fragile face” (115). The pictures paint an intimate portrait of Colin, one that allows Robert and Caroline to feel like they really know him. The characteristics of his face lend insight into his behavior just as the personal objects the maid rearranges indicate details about Mary and Colin’s life. In both situations, a stranger grows acquainted with the couple without direct human communication. This even parallels Mary and Colin’s own reluctance to engage in social interaction, perhaps suggesting that their inwardness made them more vulnerable. 

A Fairytale Land

Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice is less of a story grounded in reality than a constructed tale that probes the self. One of the main issues Mann examines is the tension between Apollonian and Dionysian principles, between the rational and the delirious, a balance that Aschenbach struggles to maintain. Mann, in particular, relies upon setting, namely the juxtaposition between Munich and Venice, to explore strain between the Apollonian and Dionysian. Place, then, becomes more of a symbol than a locale, a manifestation of the self that lends insight into Aschenbach’s character.

Munich, the original setting for the novel, serves as an image of Apollonian thought, of the ordered world that Aschenbach inhabits. Aschenbach has led a disciplined life and has “never known leisure, the carefree idleness of youth (13). An observer even describes his lifestyle as a tight fist instead of a dangling, free open hand, as he has never unearthed his Dionysian side. He leads a “solid bourgeois existence” in Munich, a rational, disciplined life that he eventually breaks with (23). Aschenbach gives in to his “urge to flee…this yearning for freedom, release, oblivion—an urge to flee his work, the humdrum routine of a rigid, cold, passionate duty (8). To satisfy his Dionysian parts he leaves Munich, a place of order and discipline, and travels to Venice, a fairytale land. Venice, which Mann describes as an “improbable city” is a place that breaks with reality, offering an escape from rational life (34). It’s a city built on water, a wavering, unsteady mass. Aschenbach decides he wants to live by the sea in Lido, fully taking advantage of the water and the lack of grounding it provides. He settles in there, isolated from the rest of Venice, displacing himself even further from reality and into a floating world.

Even the rest of Venice is otherworldly, from the “fantastic architecture,” to the “ethereal splendor of the Place and the Bridge of Sighs, the waterside columns with lion and saint, the majestically projecting flank of the fairy-tale basilica, and the view of the gateway and giant clock” (34). As this description implies, Venice is a dreamlike realm, more mythical than real, a manifestation of the Dionysian principle of the unrestrained and orgiastic. Furthermore, Venice is not a place where people truly live—it’s a place for tourists, a Disneyland that is removed from reality. By traveling to Venice, Aschenbach enters this mythical realm, finally connecting with his Dionysian side because of the ethereal setting.

The one thing that allows him to explore desire and temptation is not Venice itself but Tadzio, a godlike Polish boy. Aschenbach becomes infatuated with him despite never establishing verbal contact, instead creating an extravagant mental image of the boy. Tadzio, as a representation of the Dionysian, resembles Venice in many ways. He is more mythical than real, an emblem of desire and beauty rather than a person. Venice is also a fantasy, a place for the imagination rather than a place for the body to inhabit. Both Tadzio and Venice are fantastical creations, physically real and tangible yet not truly grounded in reality. They are symbols of the Dionysian world, tools to illustrate Aschenbach’s eventual failure to reconcile the two halves of the self, to strike a balance between the rational and irrational.

A '49 Hudson

In Carole Gottlieb Vopat’s “Jack Kerouac’s ‘On the Road:’ A Re-Evaluation,” Vopat states that the characters in novel “are suspended from life and living” “in their cars…as if in a capsule hurtling coast-to-coast above the earth.” Like in other travel fictions, Kerouac’s figures travel to escape from their lives. In this manner, Sal, the protagonist, parallels Jake Barnes in Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, for both lead meaningless lives. Yet unlike Jake, Sal is not searching for purpose but fleeing from it, running away from the responsibilities of life.

Cars, a motif, become the instrument for this break with identity, a way for Sal and his friends to live without establishing lasting connections to a place. This has particular resonance for Dean, who is obsessed with “midget auto races” (37). Dean “jumps and yells,” gets excited and even “hung-up” about the races. He watches a purposeless act: these midget cars, which are a means of travel, circle around, not traveling anywhere, thus not filling their function. The cars do not have an attachment to a place but simply cruise, tracing their steps with no reason over than to just drive, to just travel. Dean lives in a similar manner, running back and forth across the country without establishing lasting connections or generating meaning.

These cars are the only things of significance for Dean. Before journeying across the country, Dean works in a parking-lot, where he was “the most fantastic parking-lot attendant in the world,” moving in and out of one car, “sprinting like a track star” (6). In essence, he’s an expert at traveling, switching in and out of cars. It’s one thing he’s good at, as Sal notes that “he could handle a car under any circumstances” (115). When Dean is in a car, he feels in control—important. He describes an image he used to imagine when traveling in cars of “driving across the West” with an “immeasurably” long scythe that “had to curve over distant mountains, slicing off their tops, and reach another level to get at further mountains and at the same time clip off every post along the road” (196). When he’s in a car, he’s in control. He can shape the world, “slicing off” mountain tops and “clipp[ing] off every post,” giving him power that, in real life, he does not possess. He also imagines himself running “on foot along the car and at incredible speeds, sometimes ninety, ” a similar scenario (197). Both dreams give Dean a sense of identity, of being able to do the impossible, be strong and unstoppable. Cars are the only way he feels like he matters.

Dean, however, is reckless with cars, which demonstrates the his desire to live spontaneously. For example, he sees a ’49 Hudson for sale and rushes to buy it, even though in bankrupts him. He does not even stick with the Hudson but constantly switches cars throughout the book, unable to attach himself to one. Just as he cannot settle down, he cannot attach himself to one car. He steals cars and drives other people’s cars, often ruining them, as he does with a Cadillac. While driving it, he pushes “well over 100 miles an hour” and breaks the speedometer (214). Dean doesn’t just love cars; he loves going fast in cars, as it provides that sense of power. In the Cadillac, he goes so fast that “all the cars fell from us like dead flies,” a description that expresses this sense of superiority Dean feels in cars. They make them feel like he can triumph over other drivers, other people, giving him the illusion of importance. For someone whose life lacks meaning, this is the one way he can feel significant.

While reading The Sheltering Sky, I found myself drawing comparisons to Hemingway’s The Sun also Rises, as both novels “dramatize[] a frightening quest for the buried self” that comes from an initial sense of feeling placeless. In both cases, the main characters, Port and Jake, struggle with disillusionment after the war and set off to travel, hoping to find some sort of meaning in another country. Bowles explains these motives for travel by defining a traveler as he who “rejects elements [of civilization] he finds not to his liking,” which includes war, “one facet of the mechanized age he [Port] wanted to forget” (6). Port, then, travels to find a replacement civilization, one untainted by the horrors of the mechanized age and one that might help him uncover his true self. But as Port and Kit dive further and further into the interior, the Sahara, Port begins to lose his identity rather than find it, which Bowles expresses through the symbol of the passport.

After Port discovers his passport is missing, he claims he feels “only half alive,” as “it’s a very depressing thing in a place like this to have no proof of who you are, you know” (154). Even though the passport is just an identification document, it is the one tangible piece of identity that Port has, something that confirms his existence. In Bou Noura, where there are few travelers and no Americans, it is easy to feel lost, as there is nothing to remind him of home. But the passport reminds him of America, a place that is part of his identity whether or not he wants to acknowledge it. It serves a similar purpose to Kit’s valise, which she unpacks to build a “pathetic little fortress of Western culture in the middle of the wilderness;” both act as comforts and reassurances of their homes (156).

To illustrate the importance of such objects, Bowles uses the passport as a turning point in the novel. When the lieutenant informs Port that Tunner will be arriving with his passport, Port decides to flee, moving further into the Sahara and escaping from anything connected to his home and identity—the passport and Tunner. Shortly after he makes this decision, however, Port falls ill and never recovers, perhaps indicating the necessity of maintaining a connection to one’s home and initial self. One, it seems, can never truly escape. By attempting, Port only kills himself, losing rather than gaining his identity in the process. As Kit remarks when Port is close to death, “he’s stopped being human” (208). He has just become a sick body without the normal functions of a human—just a hollow shell like Kurtz in The Heart of Darkness. Africa has not nourished and sustained Port as he hoped, providing him with some sort of meaning and purpose, but has depleted and devoured him, leaving Port with nothing.