Alcoholics Just Don’t Get It
This novel is one of many that belongs to arguably the most depressing literary sub-genre of them all: the drunk’s tale. And, like all those that came before it, this one pursues the central thematic concern of being a drunk: alcoholics never understand just how bad their social problem—otherwise known for some reason as a disease—really is. The narrator philosophically observes “Knowing when to drink and when to stop – that’s the trick” and, like every other alcoholic narrator before, he fails miserably when it comes to recognizing and observing this actually rather broad and easily understood line.
Self-Identity
When reading this novel, you have chosen to read a novel written in the second-person perspective. In other words, you are the narrator talking about yourself without using “I” and instead distancing yourself by using “you.” When you talk about yourself in the third-person, it is immediately obvious you are distancing yourself with the reference. Instituting the pronoun equivalent of talking about someone who is not obviously a different person is something else entirely. You bring into the discourse the concept of instability: are you talking about you or are you talking about someone else? You are the reader are forced to constantly reflect upon how “you” is being addressed, but in reality it is not you the reader that the narrator is addressing, but himself. Self-identity becomes a thematic issue that is never fully reconciled.
That Voice in Your Head
The use of the second-person narration also serves to introduce a thematic exploration of what that voice in your head really is. The voice of the narrator is often self-judgmental, saying things to the narrator that really should be coming from other people in his life. At other times, however, it serves not as the voice of reason, but rationalization that justifies bad choices. And yet it still can also be entirely non-committal in providing merely commentary on the actions the protagonist is engaging in at a real-time level. All these various components working together serve to raise the question—but definitely not to answer it—what is that voice we all hear in our head? It is an angelic or devilish? Is it conscience warning us of consequences to come or amoral guide reminding us that no one can predict future results with one-hundred percent accuracy all the time. Ultimately, the book seems to positing an interesting philosophical query: are we really the voice of our conscience or is the conscience merely a societal construct that defines our true selves by how we react to it?
