Brokeback Mountain Forum @ ennisjack.com
The Movie & Story => Characters, Quotes & Scenes => Topic started by: jetzenpolis on Feb 28, 2008, 08:56 PM
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Buddhism: Ennis fears the "Thing" (1967); Jack's favorite memory of Ennis (1983)
Annie Proulx ends her January 19, 2006 interview with "Bookworm" radio show host Michael Silverblatt (KCRW 89.9 FM, Santa Monica, CA) by saying that Brokeback Mountain is all about "desire." Heath Ledger said in his December 7, 2005 interview with Charlie Rose on the Charlie Rose Show that Ang Lee told him to be "still" (quieting the fidgety hands and flailing arms of Heath Ledger as he talked).
There is an aching yearning in all that Ennis & Jack feel for each other. Perhaps it's a sense of impending loss through their inevitable separation (that Ennis demands of Jack when he tells Jack this is a "one shot deal" the evening after the night they first have sex together in the cook camp tent).
Perhaps the sense of loss goes deeper than that. The awe that their emotions fill them with becomes a source of desire. How can these emotions be kept? How can they be preserved? What is left of us when such inspiring emotions are gone?
Coming down from Brokeback Mountain, back to Signal, WY, is not the end of the bond Ennis & Jack have forged between themselves, however. Ennis proclaims to Jack, to the world, to himself that he is not "queer" on the evening after they first had sex. Jack, probably anxious not to discourage Ennis's willingness to continue such intimacy, agrees, saying "me neither" but without much conviction, with a look in his eyes that he knows that being "queer" is precisely what he is.
But Ennis finds himself becoming ill after Jack drives off to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY from Signal, WY. He thinks his dry heaves are simply a bad hangover. But it takes him a long time to get over the feeling.
He later tells Jack at the Siesta Motel in 1967, the night after they first see each other again, that it took him a year to realize what that feeling was. (He was in love with Jack.) But by that time, he was already married to his fiance, Alma. If he could do it over, he said it would be done different for him and Jack.
Ennis & Jack, upon seeing each other for the first time in four summers in 1967 at the bottom of the steps up to the landing of Ennis's & Alma's inexpensive apartment over the laundromat in Riverton, WY, embrace and kiss (with Ennis initiating the kiss, after he looks to the side to see if anyone is looking, not realizing that a stunned Alma is watching them through the screen door of the apartment).
Ennis is frightened of the strength of the emotions that overtook them, causing Ennis & Jack to throw caution to the wind. He calls it the "Thing." He's afraid that if it happens to them again, at the wrong place, at the wrong time, as he tells Jack later that night in bed at the Siesta Motel, "We're dead."
Ennis does fear that they will be killed by homophobic vigilantes (who may be less interested in their sexuality than in seeking entertainment through brutality, bullying, torture, and murder). But there is also a suspicion that this Thing that he and Jack feel for each other is something to be wary of, perhaps, not just because it could get them killed (if it shows up, unexpected at the wrong place, at the wrong time). Ennis tells Jack that they have their marriages and children now, they must remain "decent."
Ennis may desire to keep a self-image of himself that doesn't include open homosexuality. But he may also have doubts about any feeling, whether it's a good feeling or a bad feeling, that has gone "out of control." (Certainly, Ennis has seen very ugly emotions in his older brother K.E.'s bullying of him and his father's laughter at the old gay rancher Earl's body in the irrigation ditch with his penis pulled off when Ennis was 9 years old and K.E. was 11 years old.)
Jack does wish to continue to throw caution to the wind. He has a plan to get Lureen's father (who Jack says hates him) to pay off Jack to leave his wife, Lureen. The money will help them to fix up Jack's parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY where they can become ranch partners. (Jack's plans don't seem to contain much room for a continued presence in the life of Bobby, his son with Lureen or for Ennis in the lives of Alma, Jr. and Jenny, his daughters with Alma, though.)
As the years go by - perhaps especially after Ennis's divorce from Alma and his later Thanksgiving kitchen argument with Alma (which starts when Ennis says "...once burned" in reply to Alma's suggestion that he find another woman, Alma responding by asking if he still sees Jack; ending with Alma saying "Jack Twist?...Jack Nasty!" and Ennis telling her she knows "nuthin' about it") - Ennis sees Jack less frequently ("a couple of times a year" as Jack puts it).
In their May 1983 argument, Ennis "cuts fence" crossing a line that turns them bitterly against each other. Jack has been complaining that he doesn't get to see very often anymore an Ennis who used "to come away easy." He would like to go together someplace "warm" (such as Mexico). Ennis replies, "Mexico, Jack? I've heard about what boys like you do in Mexico." He goes on, "If I ever find out what I don't know, it could get you killed Jack Twist!" Jack becomes angry, complaining that he, unlike Ennis, can't get by "on a couple of high altitude fucks a year." Jack ends by saying "I'd like to how I can quit you!" to a now emotionally devastated Ennis. Jack tries to put his arms around Ennis to embrace and comfort him and is, at first, rebuffed. Then Ennis relents. Jack tells him it will be alright.
When Ennis leaves in his pickup truck, Jack flashes back to his favorite memory of Ennis - on Brokeback Mt. in 1963, with Ennis holding him from behind, rocking him into a trance in front of the campfire, humming a song 19 year old Ennis learned from his mother in long ago childhood - that satisfied a "sexless" hunger in Jack. But Jack, perhaps in a moment of intuition, returns to the present seeing Ennis drive off. There's a great sadness in his eyes. When Jack arrives at his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, he tells them of his plans for a Texas ranch neighbor to be his new partner on the Twist family ranch in Wyoming.
Annie Proulx on "Bookworm" (interview with Michael Silverblatt) KCRW 89.9 FM (Santa Monica, CA) 1/19/2006
www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/bw/bw060119annie_proulx
Charlie Rose Show: A conversation about the film "Brokeback Mountain" 12/07/2005
(interviews: Ang Lee, Heath Ledger)
www.charlierose.com/shows/2005/12/07/1/a-conversation-about-the-film-brokeback-mountain
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Ennis knew loss, it was ingrained in him. His parents, his childhood home, and his innocence in the sense that his father brought him face to face with death. His feeling for Jack was so big, so overwhelming that the loss of that was greater possibility for him than the thought of a sweet life.
Jack experience of total acceptance of him in the dozy embrace, was what he yearned for he never experience that with his father, he was always in search of that.
What each man experience in the other is what they clung to and try to hold on to, but it's funny how just that need is what was pulling them apart. The fear of getting what they wanted and needed, and the fear of losing it. How many times we get scared when we even come close to what we desire the most.
Just my 2cents.
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Nice essay jetzenpolis. However, I must confess I know little of Buddhism, maybe you can enlighten us.
The desire of peace (i.e. stillness). As you say MHG
. . . The fear of getting what they wanted and needed, and the fear of losing it. How many times we get scared when we even come close to what we desire the most.
Maybe we are fearful of attainment, fearful that achievement (reality) will not live up to our imagined satisfaction. In life, in love, in peace. Ennis’s fear.
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Ennis knew loss, it was ingrained in him....His feeling for Jack was so big, so overwhelming that the loss of that was greater possibility for him than the thought of a sweet life.
Jack experience of total acceptance of him in the dozy embrace, was what he yearned for he never experience that with his father, he was always in search of that.
What each man experience in the other is what they clung to and try to hold on to, but it's funny how just that need is what was pulling them apart. The fear of getting what they wanted and needed, and the fear of losing it. How many times we get scared when we even come close to what we desire the most.
Just my 2cents.
[/quote]Nice essay jetzenpolis. However, I must confess I know little of Buddhism, maybe you can enlighten us.
The desire of peace (i.e. stillness). As you say MHG
Maybe we are fearful of attainment, fearful that achievement (reality) will not live up to our imagined satisfaction. In life, in love, in peace. Ennis's fear.
hi mattangirl!
hi jackster!
I agree with you. "Engrained" loss is a part of Ennis's "stoic" character. Buddhism would sees such a "melancholy" sense of loss in Ennis as the result of having "desire." (Ang Lee described Ennis as someone having the melancholy of an "Old West" fronteir that was lost with the end of the nineteenth century, in the first half of the same December 7, 2005 Charlie Rose Show interview that Heath Ledger also appeared in.)
For Buddha, "desire" is the cause of all suffering. Ennis's sense of loss is the result of his desire for what he had in the past; or, in the case of his love for Jack, an alternative course in life he could have taken but he is convinced can no longer be available to him now.
I think Jack accepted that things could never be "right" with his father. Jack's father, John C. Twist, urinated on him for being too young to pee properly in the toilet without getting the floor around it wet. Jack saw that his father's penis was uncircumcised, unlike his own. Jack took his own circumcision as a sort branding, the same as done to ranch livestock, that marked him as the "property" of his father.
But Jack still wanted his father to come to see him in the rodeo, though, as a teenager. He remained embittered that his father never took time to teach him any of the rodeo tricks that his father knew from when he was something of a famous (local?) rodeo rider "in his day." He would never have remained embittered if he didn't care whether his father wanted to make him a part of his life or not.
Did Jack continue to search for a way to overcome the wounds his father left upon him emotionally, either consciously or unconsciously?. He does find an acceptance in Ennis's embrace. Perhaps, it does overcome that sense of loss from the psychological scars his father left upon him.
(Annie Proulx, as narrator, adds that Jack was never "fully conscious" of what that "sexless hunger" was in Jack's favorite memory of Ennis: holding him from behind, in front of the campfire, rocking him to sleep. This suggests that Ennis was more conscious of his emotions for Jack - Ennis realizing a year later after they came down from Brokeback Mt. what had made him "sick" when Jack drove off from Signal, WY in his pickup truck in August 1963.)
"What each man experiences in the other is what they clung to..." But, as you say, manhattangirl, it is (just) what they need that pulls them apart. It's the desire for what they need that is the source of the anguish each of them feels, according to Buddhism. (Even if what they desire might be good for them, the desire to have it still inflicts their suffering upon them, in the Buddhist view.)
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(Annie Proulx, as narrator, adds that Jack was never "fully conscious" of what that "sexless hunger" was in Jack's favorite memory of Ennis: holding him from behind, in front of the campfire, rocking him to sleep. This suggests that Ennis was more conscious of his emotions for Jack - Ennis realizing a year later after they came down from Brokeback Mt. what had made him "sick" when Jack drove off from Signal, WY in his pickup truck in August 1963.)
"What each man experiences in the other is what they clung to..." But, as you say, manhattangirl, it is (just) what they need that pulls them apart. It's the desire for what they need that is the source of the anguish each of them feels, according to Buddhism. (Even if what they desire might be good for them, the desire to have it still inflicts their suffering upon them, in the Buddhist view.)
This for me brings up the question of just that realization you spoke so beautifully, and at the point that each man understood in their own way how they felt towards each other.
Ennis walking up behind Jack rocking him gently, recalling his mother, that feeling of protectiveness, comfort, a place where all children feel when in the arms of parent who love them, and Jack being the recipient of just that type of love.
There was no fear in Ennis, no doubts, no hesitation, and Jack accepting it, taking it in, leaning against Ennis and letting him rock him into that twilight sleep of a child. And bringing both to that point of unity that not even sex can do.
Question is, was this something that Ennis felt all along, unconsciously, and what Jack finally understood, after Ennis's breakdown that this one memory kicked in. I don't know for me its like in Ennis's wings that Jack found shelter, and Ennis regained what he lost in loving Jack. It was in this one moment is when the truth of this relationship is revealed.
Does this make any sense at all?
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OT: I sorry but this subject goes so far deeper than the surface. I find I going deeper into what I myself feel. jetzenpolis please be patient with me.
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OT: I sorry but this subject goes so far deeper than the surface. I find I going deeper into what I myself feel. jetzenpolis please be patient with me.
I understand manhattangirl!
Annie Proulx said in her January 19, 2006 "Bookworm" KCRW 89.9 FM interview (with Michael Silverblatt) and elsewhere that the story of Brokeback Mountain is written sparsely so that its readers draw upon their own personalities, personal histories, values, knowledge of others to fill in the blanks. The reader participates in the telling of the story. Every reader's (or movie watcher's) view of Brokeback Mt. will be from a unique perspective - that of their own life.
I think that what we are all doing, in one way or another, especially those of us who are participating in this forum and others about Brokeback Mt., is to describe our own questions about life. What is important to us? What are our values? What are we searching for (especially in regards to romantic love)? What sort of interactions do we find ourselves having with other people?
Something in the story has made some connection to us in a very profound way, often subconsciously. Our efforts to understand the story and its characters are our own way of better understanding our own questions about ourselves and others in our lives.
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I understand manhattangirl!
Annie Proulx said in her January 19, 2006 "Bookworm" KCRW 89.9 FM interview (with Michael Silverblatt) and elsewhere that the story of Brokeback Mountain is written sparsely so that its readers draw upon their own personalities, personal histories, values, knowledge of others to fill in the blanks. The reader participates in the telling of the story. Every reader's (or movie watcher's) view of Brokeback Mt. will be from a unique perspective - that of their own life.
I think that what we are all doing, in one way or another, especially those of us who are participating in this forum and others about Brokeback Mt., is to describe our own questions about life. What is important to us? What are our values? What are we searching for (especially in regards to romantic love)? What sort of interactions do we find ourselves having with other people?
Something in the story has made some connection to us in a very profound way, often subconsciously. Our efforts to understand the story and its characters are our own way of better understanding our own questions about ourselves and others in our lives.
Brilliantly stated, Heath said that the movie should raise more questions than answers. This is true, for over 2 years we are still questioning, based upon our own perspectives and personal feelings about this classic film. Brokeback got us all here good and I hope it will continue. ennisjack.com forever. Thanx.
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Brilliantly stated, Heath said that the movie should raise more questions than answers. This is true, for over 2 years we are still questioning, based upon our own perspectives and personal feelings about this classic film. Brokeback got us all here good and I hope it will continue. ennisjack.com forever. Thanx.
Hi aintfoolin!
Brokeback has got us good! Our different perspectives on Brokeback Mt. provide us with a window not only into our own souls but also those of other people, especially those who share our keen interest in Ennis & Jack and the other characters of Brokeback Mt.
I would like to think that our questions about Brokeback Mt. will also provide some answers to our questions about ourselves.
I think looking at the characters in a that way requires us to find our own answers to the questions left behind in the telling of the tale of Brokeback Mountain (in both the short story and the movie). It also helps us to look at look at the details of our lives and those of others more closely. We see the questions (we should be asking) more clearly than before, perhaps.
Me, personally, I find myself trusting emotion less, my intuition more (about who is "right" for me). I trust less what I want, no matter how attractive it seems, no matter how high my emotions fly (especially when my gut tells me something is not "right"). I trust more what I "know" (through my intuitive sense of what I "know.")
I'm trying to avoid being caught, as Ennis was in his dreams of Jack at the end of the short story, between what I "know" and what I "wish to believe" (what I hope for: against all experience to the contrary).
It is striking how Ennis avoids the big decisions in his life.
Annie Proulx in the short story describes Ennis as making an instant decision to have sex with Jack the first night they have sex (in the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt.) She says he is somebody who throws himself wholeheartedly into whatever he makes up his mind to do.
But does he ever decide between Alma and Jack? Does he ever decide what he would like his and Jack's life to be (even after he gets divorced from Alma)? He might even be thinking about marrying Cassie, the waitress, when he asks Jack how Jack & Lureen are getting along. Perhaps he thinks Jack can tell him how to have a "successful" marriage - when Jack sees himself as simply marking time while he waits for the opportunity that he hopes Ennis might give them to share their lives together, unless Jack has already given up on Ennis ever being willing to agree to his wish for them to live together by this time.
Ennis tries to "have it all." He'd like to keep his marriage to Alma. He'd like to keep his family life with Alma and their daughters, Alma, Jr. and Jenny intact. He doesn't want to make a choice between them and Jack.
Ennis also wants to keep Jack in his life, whom he has "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking of him in the years since they came down from Brokeback Mt., when Ennis married Alma, Jack married Lureen, and both of them had children from their marriages, before Jack came to see him in 1967 at the bottom of the steps leading up to the landing of Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat in Riverton, WY. Afterwards, Ennis is willing to go on frequent "fishing" trips (forgoing vacations with Alma and their daughters as Alma later complains in their Thanksgiving kitchen argument), at least until later years when he sees Jack less frequently, only a couple of times of year in a cold wilderness, at a cold time of the year.
(Jack wants to go someplace "warm." Perhaps he doubts whether Ennis is any longer is a "warm" presence in his life. With Jack suggesting "Mexico" as such a place, Ennis responds he knows what "boys like you, Jack, do in Mexico!")
But instead of having it all, Ennis fails to make a choice between the different roads his life might lead down. As a result, Ennis loses just about everything: Alma, family, and Jack. He had to let Alma or Jack go, so they could decide what to do next, without being tied to Ennis any longer.
Alma, who knew Ennis better than anyone else - not idealizing him but clearly aware of his shortcomings and even his deviousness - saw that she had to cut ties with more cleanly by suggesting that Ennis find someone (a woman), saying she and the girls (their daughters) thought it would be good for him to do so. Of course, once Ennis replies, "Once burned...," Alma brings up Jack, asking Ennis whether he stills sees him.
Ennis can't away with anything with Alma. She sees through him. Perhaps that has a lot to do with his wish to stay with her. It is Alma who decides to divorce Ennis, after a long time of their "growing apart," as Annie Proulx describes them in the short story. You can see how well Alma understands how Ennis thinks in the opposing strategies they employ over whether Ennis should buy Alma a pack of cigarettes. Ennis is going out for the night with Jack, when Jack first comes to Riverton, WY. Alma wants Ennis to buy her a pack of cigarette, knowing he'll have to cut short his night out with Jack and come home. Ennis counters Alma's ploy with a successful one of his own: saying he had a pack of cigarettes in the pocket of his shirt hanging over a chair. It would be difficult to believe that Alma didn't know what he was up to.
- jetzenpolis
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I have so much trouble trying to express exactly what I want to say. I see both Jack and Ennis, though their love was a force of nature, they somehow went against it, by living lives contrary to that so paid a price for denying destiny, what should be.
Ennis clung on to a facade that he and Alma knew not to be true, and in the end both was left bitter, Ennis alone dedicating himself to a shrine of a dead lover he refused in life. Alma married to a man not out of love, she didn't love Monroe, but he did offer to regain her identity as wife and mother.
Jack like a ship waiting to come to port, was at sea waiting for his lover. lived a life that cause him to travel, on the road whether for business, or seeing Ennis, that road was his life, and waited for Ennis, and that sweet life, where he could finally settle down, stay put.
The "thing" was who they were, and what Ennis feared, and Jack clung to which made for an untenable situation. To deny the one's true nature, to put off the love of someone else because of fear is only asking for trouble, and both men had it ten folds, they were given a great gift, but didn't trust themselve enough to grab hold of it.
Does this make sense to you.
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Great posts jetzenpolis and MG,
In 1967. this "thing" that Ennis spoke of had a name ,though Ennis just could'nt even speak it. An attraction, a feeling of growing need and love for Jack. He also realized in the reunion scenes that this "thing" was real and uncontrollable when Jack came back. had became a part of him though I feel he sometimes resented it's control. Spoke of it as if was some intruding entity in their *friendship*, that went against what he felt himself to be. He feared it yes, but he also craved it. Why? What was it about the "thing" that provided him with such completion? At one point Ennis Ennis appears to accept his feelings stating "aint no reins on this one" . This one? as opposed to that one with Alma, where he is stuck between obligations and loyaties to his wife and kids, and his acceptance of unspeakable cravings for Jack's presence in his life. I feel that it is the relationship with Jack that allowed him the true freedom he sought from somewhere within. It's true indeed, that he felt the pressure from both ends, but I think he knew he found more of his real identity with Jack..
With Alma, his role was clear, father, husband, breadwinner, the "normal life "of a man of his times, but with Jack it's not so clear, his "role" not so clear and his assurredness incomplete and unformed, undefined. Yet he knew he needed this "thing" like flowers need rain. I think Ennis was in deep denial, playing a game with himself, telling himself *what I don't know or admit completly to myself, won't hurt me", but left himself and Jack vulnerable to a confusing half-life. Yes he was in denial, but he was doing the deeds physically, emotionally, and sexually that pointed him in a different direction than where his conflicted denials told him to go. His actions spoke a lot louder than his words. Jack never forced Ennis to do anything, he did what he did because he wanted and needed to. What message was he sending Jack? A mixed one.
I am struck by jetzenpolis's last paragraph, speaking of the "opposing strategies" over the pack of cigs. I feel that certainly Alma knew Ennis, but only up to a certain extent. What she could see clearly, she had no qualms about. To her Ennis's role was clearly defined, husband and father of her children. But from the very beginning of her knowledge of Jack's existence, Ennis was one step ahead of her. Think about the picture Ennis has painted of Jack for Alma. A rodeo bullrider, ("He rodeos mostly" then quickly leaves the kitchen to avoid further detailed explaination) who did'nt like resturants (" he's not the resturant type") and just wanted to go out and "get drunk", *man stuff* all in an effort to distance Jack from Alma. He had no intentions of sharing a lovely dinner and pleasent conversation at the Knife and Fork with both Alma and Jack sitting there. A nightmare scenario for him. He niether wanted nor needed this drama, so he paints a negative picture of Jack for Alma's benefit, but really for his, he somehow had to ditch her. She saw what she saw at the bottom of the stairs yes, and tried to use a "cigarette run" in order to force Ennis back home, but again, Ennis is a step ahead . He already has a pack stashed in "the front pocket of my blue shirt in the bedroom". Telling detail, he knows where they are ,down to the color of the shirt and which pocket they're in. Ennis wins that little *strategic battle *hands down. Then, there's the excuse he gives her why they may not return till morning. "we get to drinkin and talkin and all," giving no thought to Alma's certain logical question (* what bar in little tiny Riverton Wy stays open all night?*) None, but obviously motels do. Alma was a innocent country girl , but she was'nt that dumb, but Ennis oneupped her.
btw, I never saw Alma smoking in the film,, even as she sat haggared at the table with coffee the following morning. What gives? MO, Thanx.
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jacks favorite memory in the film just makes the scene 100 times more heart renching for me, its such an amzing scene the way ennis hums to him and sways him and then the ive got to go i'll see you in the morning i just didnt want jack to snap out of the memory and when he did to see ennis driving away i was devestated the reason i mentioned the see you in the morning line was as too me this just makes jacks death stand out in the momory he rode away knowing he would see him in the morning, but after ennis drove away after the argument he would never see jack again well not in this life but im pretty sure they will have met up in a better place were they could relive those beautiful memories of brokeback without being fearful or worried.
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I've always wondered whether Ennis didn't want a "scene", or didn't want to share, when Jack came to town. Jack was part of his life she wasn't welcome to. But it was the "thing", that uncontrolled need for Jack, which scared him, and in turn lived a life thinking it was keeping it in control. Husband, father, all the right moves.
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Yes, beautifully stated zankow, the Dozy embrace. jack's fav memory of Ennis. A "sexless hunger" content only to know that he was Ennis's and Ennis was his. That was enough. Let be, Let be. Jack felt assured that his man having to leave to attend to the sheep, was returning to him soon in the morning. A moment of pure love expressed by both, that need'nt be questioned or doubted. It just was, and that was enough.
MG,
I doubt seriously if Ennis wanted the drama of a shouting match between he and Alma, Alma and Jack, or any other scenario that would bring attention to what wsas going on between the three of them. I think your right, his thing with Jack was theirs and theirs alone. I also feel that Ennis had the ability to seperate the two relationships in his mind. That's the way he wanted it imo. Simillar to a married guy, cheating on his wife with a secret mistress. Only this one had a twist( no pun intended) ;) That way, he never had to justify anything to anybody. He took the easy way out. He should have known that this "best of both worlds" scenario would eventually play out. Someone was gonna eventually crack and rock his boat. Alma makes the choice for him by divorcing him. So be it. He came to live with that, but his need for Jack was gonna win out in the end imo.
Even when he was sure she knew after Thanksgiving,, that did'nt stop him from seeing Jack.
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After their divorce, Ennis, Alma, her second husband Monroe (the grocer), Alma, Jr., and Jenny are sharing Thanksgiving together in Riverton, WY. As I thought about it more, I don't think Alma was ready to "move on" from Ennis when they started talking in the kitchen (when Alma said that she and the "girls" thought Ennis should find "someone.")
I think Ennis & Alma were still involved with each other: they were still engaged in the same contest of wits with each other. Alma wanted to appear as if she had "moved on" from Ennis in her life after the divorce (either to appear that way to Ennis, herself, or even Monroe, or all three, perhaps - but certainly to Ennis). She wanted Ennis to know she was over him. She was urging him to see other women.
In the movie, when the Thanksgiving scene opens inside Alma's & Monroe's house, Alma is pouting in a terribly embittered way. Part of her annoyance may be with Monroe, who's playing with a noisy 1970s-style electronic carving knife, cutting the Thanksgiving turkey. Whatever part of her irritation is directed to Monroe, it goes a lot farther than the minor (almost comical) nuisance Monroe may be making of himself.
Perhaps she is dissatisfied with Monroe as a husband. Perhaps she was too "practical" in her decision to marry Monroe. (Judging by the appearance of their home, he could provide a comfortable income for himself, Alma, and Alma's two daughters whom she had custody of from her divorce from Ennis. During their marriage, Alma offered suggestions for jobs Ennis could take to bring in more money than a ranch hand makes. But she never pressed him too hard on it. Instead, she was "practical" about it and got a job, herself.)
Perhaps she has, over time, come to realize, too late, that she doesn't love Monroe the way she loved Ennis (and believes that Ennis loved her).
Alma is also very bitterly annoyed with Ennis, probably more so, telling their daughters he didn't have much of a rodeo career. It amounted to only about 3 seconds of a bull ride, when his daughters ask him to tell him about his being in the rodeo. Her resentment seems to grow even more ferocious as he continues with his story.
Again, Alma sees through Ennis, of course, whatever he's doing. She sees him as presenting himself as a humble man to his daughters: a man who did not do well in the rodeo. Alma doesn't buy it. That's not what Ennis is up to, underneath surface appearances.
Given her knowledge of Ennis, Alma is probably right. Although I'm not sure what she sees Ennis as being up to, in this case. Perhaps she's asking herself why Ennis is here, with her and the girls, on Thanksgiving. Perhaps she knows that Ennis still wants to keep his family together, as much as possible, after the divorce. Annie Proulx, in her short story, says that Ennis does not want to be the "sad daddy." He tries to make the divorce "work," as best he knows how. (It is all that is left him of Alma and their girls, after the divorce.)
In the kitchen, all of Ennis's surface appearances begin to become unglued when he says the fateful words, "Once burned...," in reply to Alma's urging him to start seeing other women. Ennis would like to appear as if he was a humble man making a joke about his failed marriage. Of course, by saying, "Once burned..." there is the somewhat subtle suggestion underneath that the divorce was Alma's fault.
Perhaps part of it was. Alma might have been carrying on an affair with Monroe before she divorced Ennis. He feels "vaguely cheated" by the divorce. (Perhaps that's why Ennis was so upset when Alma took off for work at the grocery story from their apartment over the laundromat, when they were still married, although she left dinner on the stove ready for them to eat. However, Ennis stops in the middle of his angry outburst at Alma's leaving them behind, to ask his daughters, in a very benign, helpful way - as if nothing has happened - if they want a push on their swing. When Alma, Jr. answers, "No Daddy," Ennis goes back to displaying his angry frustration with Alma's defiance of his demand that she stay, kicking the side of the white building behind the swings his daughters are on. Perhaps Ennis & Alma have fought so much in their marriage that they've all become accustomed to it as part of "normal" family life.)
Of course, Ennis was carrying on his extramarital affair with Jack long before that. Their divorce was certainly not all Alma's fault: even if Ennis tries to put the blame on her - however tentatively - by saying, "Once burned..." in the kitchen doing the dishes.
But Alma may be thinking of something else, here. When Ennis says, "Once burned...," Alma may be hearing Ennis say, "It didn't work out when I tried it with a woman." It's at that point that she asks if Ennis still sees Jack Twist.
The Thanksgiving kitchen argument begins. Alma says she knew Ennis never caught any fish on his many "fishing" trips with Jack because he never opened his brand new fishing tackle box to take out the note she left him (to bring home some fish to her and the girls). "Jack Twist?...Jack Nasty!"
Before she can put what she's thinking into words (that Ennis & Jack are having sex), Ennis grabs her by the arm, twists it hard to stop her from saying what they both know she's thinking (and they both know is true). Then Ennis flees the house (after Alma says she'll call Monroe for help and Ennis says he'll knock both of them to the floor).
A distraught Ennis ends up that night throwing a punch through the window of a pickup truck on the street at the driver who yells at him. The driver gets out of the truck, knocks Ennis down onto the street, and kicks him where he lies. But Ennis's moans of pain seem as much emotional as physical. Ennis knows that his ties to Alma have been severed by the events of that night.
Whatever Ennis felt for Jack, he also felt for something for Alma, too.
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Whatever Ennis felt for Jack, he also felt for something for Alma, too.
yup I 100% agree with you here, ennis still loved alma aswell as jack even if it was in a different way.
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I really think Ennis loved Alma -- maybe for years. He was tied to her, promised to marry her. Of course, this was before he met Jack. Still, he felt his future was tied in with Alma. I really don't think he hesitated to marry her at all. He was committed, so he went through with it. I believe he did love her in some way. Had he not met Jack, he would probably been content with Alma for a lifetime. But that 's not how the story goes. He does meet Jack and he does fall in love with Jack, even though he doesn't realize it right away. So, everything changes. From then on, Alma is second to Ennis -- not his one and only love, as she should have been.
I think Ennis is a very deep person with many layers, one over the other. He is the youngest son of parents who probably loved him, then the hanger-on little brother, then the orphan out on his own, then the young man who fell in love with Alma and went to work to make a few bucks for their future, and then he met JACK! From that moment on, that is how he defined himself. He ran his daily life around the times he could be with Jack. Everything else was second. This becomes very clear when he and Jack have their fight in the last scene with Jack. Ennis has made his life in response to Jack's dictates. so, when he gets the card that Jack is dead, he dies, too. Just mho.
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yup I 100% agree with you here, ennis still loved alma aswell as jack even if it was in a different way.
That's exactly what I'm trying to say zankou1991!
- jetzenpolis
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I guess I'm of a different belief, I don't know if I would call what Ennis felt for Alma was love. He cared for her, he liked her, she suited him. Ennis married her, that's what you're suppose to do. His brother and sister did it. He was nineteen, on his own, "there was no room for him" anywhere.
When he met Jack, he fell in love, not knowing what this feeling for this man was until a year after they split up from the mountain, he knew than he shouldn't have let him go.
My personal opinion, I don't think he was fearing a scene when Jack came back, I think Ennis was planning to keep Jack all to himself, just like on the mountain, Alma was beginning to be shut out. She was part of his life that he was stuck with, and nothing much to he could do about it.
I know it's popular here to think that Ennis loved Alma, in some way. As if it had to make sense for him to even marry her. But Ennis had a philosophy "I'll stick to beans", and Ennis stuck with what was expected of him.
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I do agree that there is something deeply Buddhist about BBM. jetzenpolis is right in noting two things that touch on this: desire and stillness.
The "Great Mirror of Desire" is certainly intrinsic in Buddhist thought: that the desires of this world are all illusion, and one must free oneself of it -- typically during times of great pain and catastrophe. Throughout history, Buddhists have renounced the world in times of great personal loss (the death of a loved one, disgrace from public office, etc.) This is not coincidental, because central to this is the idea that it is during these times of intense pain that one lifts the veil of illusion and see the world as it is. This is why life is often referred to in Buddhist thought as a "Floating Bridge of Dreams" -- something transient and insubstantial, that seemingly brings us from one state of the soul to another. It is no coincidence that dreams figure prominently in the beginning and end of the story.
As for stillness, it is associated with the blocking out of all thoughts and desires. It is an important element in Buddhist meditation, espeically in Chan/Zen circles. The fact that Ang Lee insists on it when Heath plays the role of Ennis is not at all surprising. It becomes the way in which the actor channels the raw emotions and desires of a character he or she wishes to protray, as in the greatest exponents of Japanese Noh Drama, for instance...
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Very proper the similarity of Alma with the beans in Ennis mind...Seriously,I really think he had loved her in any way with a strange and complicated-as everything was in Ennis way of seeing and living life...-mix of need,social rules accomplishment,commodity and a love that couldn't compare with the one he felt for Jack.Perhaps in the beginning she felt for her because HE NEEDED TO,it's to say; he needed someone who cared for him,who loved him,since he had arrived to be nineteen with a life full with loses and lack of real love,what had turned him into a kind of uprooted boy.Of course,he had never gone against what was expected of him-his social and religious environment didn't allow him to-,so the next step was,obviously,marry and have children,that's all...
Yes,if he hadn't ever met Jack his life would have been as full as it could be,as it's EXPECTED TO BE,one more time.It's difficult to declare if he had known another man sooner or later because homosexual tendencies were on him,or if the root of his love for Jack is in this same loneliness sense and need for caring and affection.I have always thought that Jack arrived in the right moment to-almost-"oblige" Ennis to fall in love with him; but also that the quality of forbidden and punished that homosexuality have in his childhood world made him somehow to be attracted to this so dangerous tendency.Anyhow,it's another story...
The real story is that he realised that he couldn't make a woman happy-be this Alma or Cassie-much before the divorce because his love for her wasn't so well builded as the one for Jack,clearly.I think the most attached he was to Jack,the less he was to his wife;from the very moment his lover arrived,their marriage was beginning to break,because the building was breaking.But I'm sure Alma still loved him much after this divorce,being the scene of Thanksgiving day a kind of revenge for her because she felt bitter;both for having lost him and because his marriage to Monroe was a kind of economical and social security for her and the girls,nothing else.She was looking for the right moment to make Ennis paid for her unsatisfaction insulting her "rival" because she knew that was going to hurt him.And Ennis fell on the trick because somehow he was expecting it from long time before.
I don't know if this makes sense; sometimes it's difficult to me to explain properly... ~)
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I guess I'm of a different belief, I don't know if I would call what Ennis felt for Alma was love. He cared for her, he liked her, she suited him. Ennis married her, that's what you're suppose to do. His brother and sister did it. He was nineteen, on his own, "there was no room for him" anywhere.
When he met Jack, he fell in love, not knowing what this feeling for this man was until a year after they split up from the mountain, he knew than he shouldn't have let him go.
My personal opinion, I don't think he was fearing a scene when Jack came back, I think Ennis was planning to keep Jack all to himself, just like on the mountain, Alma was beginning to be shut out. She was part of his life that he was stuck with, and nothing much to he could do about it.
I know it's popular here to think that Ennis loved Alma, in some way. As if it had to make sense for him to even marry her. But Ennis had a philosophy "I'll stick to beans", and Ennis stuck with what was expected of him.
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I guess I'm of a different belief, I don't know if I would call what Ennis felt for Alma was love. He cared for her, he liked her, she suited him. Ennis married her, that's what you're suppose to do. His brother and sister did it. He was nineteen, on his own, "there was no room for him" anywhere.
When he met Jack, he fell in love, not knowing what this feeling for this man was until a year after they split up from the mountain, he knew than he shouldn't have let him go.
My personal opinion, I don't think he was fearing a scene when Jack came back, I think Ennis was planning to keep Jack all to himself, just like on the mountain, Alma was beginning to be shut out. She was part of his life that he was stuck with, and nothing much to he could do about it.
I know it's popular here to think that Ennis loved Alma, in some way. As if it had to make sense for him to even marry her. But Ennis had a philosophy "I'll stick to beans", and Ennis stuck with what was expected of him.
I think people's idea of what love is changes as they go through life. What they feel for their first love may be totally different from what they feel for a lover ten years later. I think Ennis loved Alma with the love of a 19 year old boy. This may have been his very first contact with someone he thought he loved. And maybe he did love her to the extent that he was able to love someone else at that age. When Jack came along, he still didn't realize he loved him for another year. So, within that year he grew. He married and lived with Alma, and, in his own words, thought about Jack a lot. So, when he realized he loved Jack, he had a different view of what love is. It wasn't the same thing he felt for Alma. But, still, I think he loved her as much as he could at the time and in the circumstances within which he found himself. just me two cents.
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I think people's idea of what love is changes as they go through life. What they feel for their first love may be totally different from what they feel for a lover ten years later. I think Ennis loved Alma with the love of a 19 year old boy. This may have been his very first contact with someone he thought he loved. And maybe he did love her to the extent that he was able to love someone else at that age. When Jack came along, he still didn't realize he loved him for another year. So, within that year he grew. He married and lived with Alma, and, in his own words, thought about Jack a lot. So, when he realized he loved Jack, he had a different view of what love is. It wasn't the same thing he felt for Alma. But, still, I think he loved her as much as he could at the time and in the circumstances within which he found himself. just me two cents.
Again, this is a very Buddhist notion: that all things change and are transiet in their current state.
But also central to the Buddhist tenet is that all passion and desire -- even LOVE -- dies eventually. In this way of thinking, one must free oneself of all love, because it is an illusion.
I try to think if there is any echo of this in BBM. I would like to think that their love endures, but I wonder sometimes if there is a Buddhist moral embedded in Ennis's sad and lonely end. Perhaps there is, although it makes me uncomfortable.
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Again, this is a very Buddhist notion: that all things change and are transiet in their current state.
But also central to the Buddhist tenet is that all passion and desire -- even LOVE -- dies eventually. In this way of thinking, one must free oneself of all love, because it is an illusion.
I try to think if there is any echo of this in BBM. I would like to think that their love endures, but I wonder sometimes if there is a Buddhist moral embedded in Ennis's sad and lonely end. Perhaps there is, although it makes me uncomfortable.
It makes sense if I understand you correctly, look at it in that context, how else could he survive, how long must he suffer and mourn. In some Eugene O'Neill kind of way seal himself up in that trailer and do his penance, or does he release the pain, and live on.
tpe, am on the right track or way off?
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Again, this is a very Buddhist notion: that all things change and are transient in their current state.
But also central to the Buddhist tenet is that all passion and desire -- even LOVE -- dies eventually. In this way of thinking, one must free oneself of all love, because it is an illusion.
I try to think if there is any echo of this in BBM. I would like to think that their love endures, but I wonder sometimes if there is a Buddhist moral embedded in Ennis's sad and lonely end. Perhaps there is, although it makes me uncomfortable.
Isn't it the desire (craving) for "love" that must be stopped, not necessarily the feelings of love, themselves, tpe (as temporary as they may or may not be)? If Ennis is to free himself from his mourning for Jack, as mattangirl says, he must release himself from his pain.
Buddhism would say Ennis must find a way to ease away from his desire for Jack (or any of the other desires that bring him suffering).
If Buddhism is right - that a craving form of desire is the source of all suffering - then the source of all the pain Ennis, Jack, and the other characters in Brokeback Mountain feel finds its ultimate source in their desires.
Love might be transient but Buddhists certainly don't think we should stop loving each other. "Loving kindness" and "compassion" are frequently mentioned by the Dalai Lama, the head of Tibetan Buddhism, for example.
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Love might be transient but Buddhists certainly don't think we should stop loving each other. "Loving kindness" and "compassion" are frequently mentioned by the Dalai Lama, the head of Tibetan Buddhism, for example.
I think both Ennis and Jack can be considered kind and compassionate if you look at the evidence presented in the film: Jack is never viewed as being less than kind to anyone. He kindly tries to assuage Ennis's pain after he is thrown from his horse; he is kind to Lureen when he retrieves her hat and dusts it off for her and when he defends all her hard work at Thanksgiving dinner; he is kind to Bobby as shown through his concern for his education and his playing with him teaching him to drive the big combine; he is even kind to Lureen's daddy up to a point when he has to defend his place in the family. Ennis, too, is always kind. Even in the midst of a fight with Alma, he stops and asks the girls if he can give them a push on the swings; he is kind to Alma when he wipes the snow off her face, and when he jumps right in and helps with the crying, sniveling, croupy babies when he has just come home from a hard day's work. Both men show kindness very naturally -- it is part of their essence.
As far as compassion goes, who could be more compassionate than Ennis when he gets the post card marked deceased? or when he spoke with Lureen and expressed his sorrow over Jack's death? Or when he did the same to Mrs. Twist and the old man when he visited them. Jack, showed compassion for Ennis when he consoled him at the beginning of the SNIT and again in the motel scene, and probably many times more when they met over the years. In this way, I find both men to be living examples of Buddhist principles.
Now, when desire comes into the picture, they both do their share of suffering. They are constantly running into obstacles which turn into major problems for them both. (NB: The fan fic writers ignore this suffering by creating scenarios in which both men desire and win. I am not criticizing them, but recognize that they are changing the Buddhist karma of both men when they create the proverbial happy ending.) It is the problems they run into that intrigue us and make the story what it is --sad, but not maudlin-- realistic, but not without consequences.
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I think both Ennis and Jack can be considered kind and compassionate if you look at the evidence presented in the film: Jack is never viewed as being less than kind to anyone. He kindly tries to assuage Ennis's pain after he is thrown from his horse; he is kind to Lureen when he retrieves her hat and dusts it off for her and when he defends all her hard work at Thanksgiving dinner; he is kind to Bobby as shown through his concern for his education and his playing with him teaching him to drive the big combine; he is even kind to Lureen's daddy up to a point when he has to defend his place in the family. Ennis, too, is always kind. Even in the midst of a fight with Alma, he stops and asks the girls if he can give them a push on the swings; he is kind to Alma when he wipes the snow off her face, and when he jumps right in and helps with the crying, sniveling, croupy babies when he has just come home from a hard day's work. Both men show kindness very naturally -- it is part of their essence.
As far as compassion goes, who could be more compassionate than Ennis when he gets the post card marked deceased? or when he spoke with Lureen and expressed his sorrow over Jack's death? Or when he did the same to Mrs. Twist and the old man when he visited them. Jack, showed compassion for Ennis when he consoled him at the beginning of the SNIT and again in the motel scene, and probably many times more when they met over the years. In this way, I find both men to be living examples of Buddhist principles.
Now, when desire comes into the picture, they both do their share of suffering. They are constantly running into obstacles which turn into major problems for them both. (NB: The fan fic writers ignore this suffering by creating scenarios in which both men desire and win. I am not criticizing them, but recognize that they are changing the Buddhist karma of both men when they create the proverbial happy ending.) It is the problems they run into that intrigue us and make the story what it is --sad, but not maudlin-- realistic, but not without consequences.
to true lamusica, i would like to expand and reinforce some of your points but you explained them perfectly on you own :)
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I kind of think that the final scene in the movie is perfect example. To avoid Alma, Jr. suffering in the final scene of the film, Ennis had to release his own suffering. She wanted him at her wedding, he was going to the roundup, but he see the disappointment in her face, and he shows compassion and tells her he'll be there.
To do this he had release himself from his own pain, and not bring pain to someone else.
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I kind of think that the final scene in the movie is perfect example. To avoid Alma, Jr. suffering in the final scene of the film, Ennis had to release his own suffering. She wanted him at her wedding, he was going to the roundup, but he see the disappointment in her face, and he shows compassion and tells her he'll be there.
To do this he had release himself from his own pain, and not bring pain to someone else.
I think Ennis learned to put his loved beings comfort before his own needs;no matter he was breaking inside,he decided not to bring pain and dissapointment to his daughter,in this case.Not to put even his duties-material duties-before his other duties-emotional duties-as so many times he did with Jack,as an easy excuse several times for not committing too much.Perhaps as a kind of penitence?.
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I think Ennis learned to put his loved beings comfort before his own needs;no matter he was breaking inside,he decided not to bring pain and dissapointment to his daughter,in this case.Not to put even his duties-material duties-before his other duties-emotional duties-as so many times he did with Jack,as an easy excuse several times for not committing too much.Perhaps as a kind of penitence?.
Yes a repentance, the acknowledgement of the guilt, fear, possessive love "his suffering" to think about it, and to do better. Ennis acknowledges his suffering, and releases his self from it through showing compassion and love to Alma, Jr., thinking not of himself but of her, wanting her to be happy.
my 2cents
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It makes sense if I understand you correctly, look at it in that context, how else could he survive, how long must he suffer and mourn. In some Eugene O'Neill kind of way seal himself up in that trailer and do his penance, or does he release the pain, and live on.
tpe, am on the right track or way off?
I think you are on the right track -- certainly, your mentioning O'Neill surprised me. It certainly resonated with me, when I read it.
The notion of retribution -- as, for instance, in O'Neill's "Desire Under the Elms" - somehow seems to be relevant here. It is the notion of retrubution as an act of cleansing, as in the sense of purging in Greek Drama. An act of murder exposes the depth of one's love, even as it implies a sense of complicity in the murder itself.
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Isn't it the desire (craving) for "love" that must be stopped, not necessarily the feelings of love, themselves, tpe (as temporary as they may or may not be)? If Ennis is to free himself from his mourning for Jack, as mattangirl says, he must release himself from his pain.
Buddhism would say Ennis must find a way to ease away from his desire for Jack (or any of the other desires that bring him suffering).
If Buddhism is right - that a craving form of desire is the source of all suffering - then the source of all the pain Ennis, Jack, and the other characters in Brokeback Mountain feel finds its ultimate source in their desires.
Love might be transient but Buddhists certainly don't think we should stop loving each other. "Loving kindness" and "compassion" are frequently mentioned by the Dalai Lama, the head of Tibetan Buddhism, for example.
Hello jetzenpolis. What disturbs me somehwat, I admit, is that it is both the repudiation of the desire for love and the feeling of love itself that is central to the Buddhist tenet. Granted, out of compassion, one can "delay" enlightenment in order to bring about the awakening in others, but the final goal is a release from all attachments. This is what the bodhisattvas and the various manifestations of the Buddha (of which the Dalai Lama is supposed to be one) do.
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Hello jetzenpolis. What disturbs me somewhat, I admit, is that it is both the repudiation of the desire for love and the feeling of love itself that is central to the Buddhist tenet. Granted, out of compassion, one can "delay" enlightenment in order to bring about the awakening in others, but the final goal is a release from all attachments. This is what the bodhisattvas and the various manifestations of the Buddha (of which the Dalai Lama is supposed to be one) do.
Hi tpe!
Buddhism repudiates bothe the "desire" for love and the "desire" for the feeling of love, I think, rather than either "love" or even the "feeling of love," themselves. It is "desire" that is the cause of suffering - whatever it is that is desired (as a craving).
It's not "love" or the "feeling of love," themselves, that are causes of suffering. Again, it is not "love" that is the problem but rather an "attachment" to love.
Just because I wasn't sure what a "bodhisattva" is, myself, I looked it up on Wikipedia.
There are a variety of definitions for "bodhisattva," depending upon the school of Buddhism. In some, a "bodhisattva" is someone whose preceding reincarnated lifetimes lead up to Buddhist "enlightenment." Others, such as Tibetan Buddhism (a form of Mahayana Buddhism, one of the two great divisions in Buddhist thought, Theravada Buddhism being the other), describe a "bodhisattva" as someone who aspires to become enlightened as soon as possible and, once enlightened, help others to do so, too.
I thought I knew what the difference between Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism was - before, I read what struck me as scholarly, theologically detailed entries for them in Wikipedia. Using the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary for definitions of them, Mahayana Buddhism is "a liberal and theistic branch of Buddhism comprising sects chiefly in China and Japan, recognizing a large body of scripture in addition to the Pali canon, and teaching social concern and universal salvation [for all sentient beings]" and Theravada Buddhism is "a conservative branch of Buddhism comprising sects chiefly in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia and adhering to the original Pali scriptures alone and to the nontheistic ideal of nirvana for a limited select number [of people]."
As far as I can tell, Wikipedia and the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary are substantially in agreement about what a "bodhisattva" is. The Mahayana tradition believes that all sentient beings are destined for "enlightenment" eventually, in one lifetime or another (however distant in the future that might be). Within all of us is a "Buddha-nature," an inherent part of ourselves attracted to Buddhist principles. According to Wikipedia, "The Buddha Nature or Buddha Principle (Buddha-dhatu) is taught to be a truly real, but internally hidden potency or element within the purest depths of the mind, present in all sentient beings, for awakening and becoming a Buddha." Wikipedia continues, "The Tibetan Jonangpa monk, Dolpopa, refers to the Buddha-nature as "Self always residing in all, as the selfhood of all" (Mountain Doctrine: Tibet's Fundamental Treatise on Other-Emptiness and the Buddha Matrix, tr. by Jeffrey Hopkins, Snow Lion, New York, 2006, p.135)."
Zen, which like Tibetan Buddhism, is also Mahayana, places less emphasis on "bodhisattvas." Wikipedia says Zen also "de-emphasizes theoretical knowledge and the study of religious texts in favor of direct individual experience of one's own true nature." Zen is instead "notable" for its use of "mindful acceptance of the present moment, spontaneous action, and letting go of self-conscious, judgmental thinking."
bodhisattva (Wikipedia):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhisattva
Mahayana Buddhism (m-w.com)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Mahayana
Theravada Buddhism (m-w.com)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theravada
Buddha-nature (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha-nature
Zen (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen
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Hello jetzenpolis. What disturbs me somehwat, I admit, is that it is both the repudiation of the desire for love and the feeling of love itself that is central to the Buddhist tenet. Granted, out of compassion, one can "delay" enlightenment in order to bring about the awakening in others, but the final goal is a release from all attachments. This is what the bodhisattvas and the various manifestations of the Buddha (of which the Dalai Lama is supposed to be one) do.
I was wondering was Jack closest to the Buddhist tenet than Ennis was. In the final confrontation didn't you get the idea that Jack was releasing himself from Ennis so Ennis's suffering can end? I can't help but think of scene where Jack watches Ennis drive off for the last time.
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I was wondering was Jack closest to the Buddhist tenet than Ennis was. In the final confrontation didn't you get the idea that Jack was releasing himself from Ennis so Ennis's suffering can end? I can't help but think of scene where Jack watches Ennis drive off for the last time.
i dont know i never really thought jacks "i wish i could quit you" was meant as away of seperating them i think he was saying to ennis thet ennis was making it so hard for them to be together jack wished he could just quit the relationship, but in my eyes it was just proving he didnt want to and couldnt quit ennis (im sorry if that didnt make sense).
it saddens me to no end that it is amongst the confrontation that we see jacks favorite memory the dozy embrace to me this is the most powerful, deep and spiritual moment in the film and shows against all else jack is holding on to every piece and memory of ennis he can this is also shown by the shirts in his closet. its just to sad that in the dozy embrace ennis was riding off after saying see you in the morning and after the confrontation scene he is driving away without a word unknowing it would be the last time he would see jack.
well in life anyway.
sorry if you cant understand my point i sometimes make no sense when i right aout something im so emotional about.
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Hi tpe!
Buddhism repudiates bothe the "desire" for love and the "desire" for the feeling of love, I think, rather than either "love" or even the "feeling of love," themselves. It is "desire" that is the cause of suffering - whatever it is that is desired (as a craving).
It's not "love" or the "feeling of love," themselves, that are causes of suffering. Again, it is not "love" that is the problem but rather an "attachment" to love.
Just because I wasn't sure what a "bodhisattva" is, myself, I looked it up on Wikipedia.
There are a variety of definitions for "bodhisattva," depending upon the school of Buddhism. In some, a "bodhisattva" is someone whose preceding reincarnated lifetimes lead up to Buddhist "enlightenment." Others, such as Tibetan Buddhism (a form of Mahayana Buddhism, one of the two great divisions in Buddhist thought, Theravada Buddhism being the other), describe a "bodhisattva" as someone who aspires to become enlightened as soon as possible and, once enlightened, help others to do so, too.
I thought I knew what the difference between Mahayana and Theravada Buddhism was - before, I read what struck me as scholarly, theologically detailed entries for them in Wikipedia. Using the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary for definitions of them, Mahayana Buddhism is "a liberal and theistic branch of Buddhism comprising sects chiefly in China and Japan, recognizing a large body of scripture in addition to the Pali canon, and teaching social concern and universal salvation [for all sentient beings]" and Theravada Buddhism is "a conservative branch of Buddhism comprising sects chiefly in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia and adhering to the original Pali scriptures alone and to the nontheistic ideal of nirvana for a limited select number [of people]."
As far as I can tell, Wikipedia and the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary are substantially in agreement about what a "bodhisattva" is. The Mahayana tradition believes that all sentient beings are destined for "enlightenment" eventually, in one lifetime or another (however distant in the future that might be). Within all of us is a "Buddha-nature," an inherent part of ourselves attracted to Buddhist principles. According to Wikipedia, "The Buddha Nature or Buddha Principle (Buddha-dhatu) is taught to be a truly real, but internally hidden potency or element within the purest depths of the mind, present in all sentient beings, for awakening and becoming a Buddha." Wikipedia continues, "The Tibetan Jonangpa monk, Dolpopa, refers to the Buddha-nature as "Self always residing in all, as the selfhood of all" (Mountain Doctrine: Tibet's Fundamental Treatise on Other-Emptiness and the Buddha Matrix, tr. by Jeffrey Hopkins, Snow Lion, New York, 2006, p.135)."
Zen, which like Tibetan Buddhism, is also Mahayana, places less emphasis on "bodhisattvas." Wikipedia says Zen also "de-emphasizes theoretical knowledge and the study of religious texts in favor of direct individual experience of one's own true nature." Zen is instead "notable" for its use of "mindful acceptance of the present moment, spontaneous action, and letting go of self-conscious, judgmental thinking."
bodhisattva (Wikipedia):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhisattva
Mahayana Buddhism (m-w.com)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Mahayana
Theravada Buddhism (m-w.com)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/theravada
Buddha-nature (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha-nature
Zen (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen
Hello jetzenpolis. Thank for taking the time to look up the notion of bodhisattvas, which I think has some relevance to our discussion. Central I think to many of the interpretations is the resolve of these beings not to enter Nirvana before expounding the Law to all sentient beings. In most cases, it is from compassion (which is a form of love) that they do this.
An extreme case would Amida Buddhisim, where the invocation of the sacred name "namu Amida Batsu" is sufficient to guarantee salvation (i.e., freedom from the cycle of death and rebirth). And all this is done out of compassion.
But going back to the subject of Ennis and Jack...
In some ways, I look upon Jack's death as the moment of satori (as in Zen/Chan Buddhism) whereby Ennis is released from his own world of illusion. But this anaolgy has its limits, because what happens after this is that Ennis seems to enter into another world of illusion -- a world of dreams alternating between pleasure and pain.
In the latter sense, one can think of BBM as a Buddhist moral: as a warning on the pitfalls of passion and the subsequent pain it engenders. It is very similar for example to the Buddhist interpretation of the medieval Japanese romance "Genji Monogatari", of which I am a devoted fan. In such works of art, the beauty of love is made manifest, even as it undermines it as part of a world of illusion.
As you can see, there is a deep dichotomy in all this -- especially in the attitude towards love.
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I was wondering was Jack closest to the Buddhist tenet than Ennis was. In the final confrontation didn't you get the idea that Jack was releasing himself from Ennis so Ennis's suffering can end? I can't help but think of scene where Jack watches Ennis drive off for the last time.
I do think that in the End, one can say that Jack was -- he perhaps saw things in a way that released him from the bond, without having to condemn it.
As I had said in my earlier post, I am torn between a dual interpretation of Ennis's "end". The fact that he continued to live in a world of dreams may indicate that he was still enmeshed in the world of pain and desire.
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But going back to the subject of Ennis and Jack...
In some ways, I look upon Jack's death as the moment of satori (as in Zen/Chan Buddhism) whereby Ennis is released from his own world of illusion. But this analogy has its limits, because what happens after this is that Ennis seems to enter into another world of illusion -- a world of dreams alternating between pleasure and pain.
In the latter sense, one can think of BBM as a Buddhist moral: as a warning on the pitfalls of passion and the subsequent pain it engenders. It is very similar for example to the Buddhist interpretation of the medieval Japanese romance "Genji Monogatari", of which I am a devoted fan. In such works of art, the beauty of love is made manifest, even as it undermines it as part of a world of illusion.
As you can see, there is a deep dichotomy in all this -- especially in the attitude towards love.
Thank you tpe for your views on what a Buddhist perspective on Brokeback Mountain might be. They've certainly given me much to think about, even if we might differ about "love" and the Buddhist search for a (universal) transcendence of "suffering."
(In Buddhist tradition, Siddhārtha Gautama, the first Buddha, was a prince. His father, a king, was told by an astrologer that his son would either be a "universal leader" or a "universal teacher." His father, in order to make his son a universal ruler, sought to eliminate all sights of physical suffering from his son's life. But the prince saw the carcass of a cow and sought an answer to suffering. I believe there are versions of this same story, too.)
You might be reluctant to embrace a Buddhist view because you correctly see Buddhism's primary goal (value) as the "end of suffering." From my understanding of what you've said, this brings Buddhism into conflict with "love" as a first principle (in a ranking of a hierarchy of values). Perhaps you also associate the "desire" for love with a "devotion" to love.
From a Buddhist perspective, such an association linking "desire" and "devotion" might be a misperception, an illusion. Certainly, for example, Buddhists are devoted to the end of suffering. But to "desire" an end to suffering would be self-defeating - in the Buddhist perspective.
Similarly, a "desire" for love might be confused with a "devotion" to love.
I think manhattangirl makes a good point. ("...In the final confrontation didn't you get the idea that Jack was releasing himself from Ennis so Ennis's suffering can end? I can't help but think of scene where Jack watches Ennis drive off for the last time.")
There can be different interpretations of this last scene of Ennis & Jack seeing each other for the last time. Ennis has just told Jack, "...I quit all those jobs," saying that "because of you [Jack], I'm nothing..." (offering to Jack an explanation of seeing him less frequently now than Ennis had in the early years of his marriage to Alma).
If Jack takes at face value what Ennis is saying to him, he is hearing Ennis tell him that the "thing" (as Ennis describes the emotions of their kiss at the bottom of the steps going up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat in Riverton, WY) has brought Ennis to this point of suffering (in the May 1983 argument). Is there much point in continuing their ride further?
From this interpretation of their May 1983 argument, Jack's favorite memory of Ennis (holding him from behind, rocking him into a trance, humming him a song...) is a last temptation, a last tie holding him to Ennis that he decides to break. (Jack, after the flashback, watches Ennis drive off with great sadness in his eyes.)
Jack decides to give up the pleasure that Ennis's company brings him. He does this out of his devotion to Ennis's welfare. He loves Ennis more than the "feeling" of romantic passion Ennis brings to him. (In other words, Jack loves Ennis more than what the "thing," as Ennis describes it, brings to both of them.) Devotion to Ennis (out of love for him) decides the question for Jack. He must leave Ennis to do what is "right" by him. Jack does what he thinks is in Ennis's best interest.
While I think I disagree this is the best interpretation of what is going on in Jack's mind - in response to Ennis saying ("...because of you [Jack], I'm nothing!") - it nonetheless clearly illustrates the difference between a "desire" for love and a "devotion" to it.
I don't think Ennis wanted Jack to stop seeing him. After all, Ennis sent a postcard to Jack in Texas to tell him that November was "still" set for them (to see each other) that is returned marked "deceased." Ennis wanted to continue his "ride" with Jack.
I think Ennis wanted to see Jack on his own terms (and not more often than that). Ennis started seeing Jack less frequently. This may have happened after his divorce from Alma because a part of him needed the "balance" of his marriage to Alma to keep seeing Jack. In other words, without Alma as a counterbalance, Ennis wanted to hold himself back from Jack.
It might be said that this is a matter of Ennis being homophobic about his own homosexuality. I feel it might be something more.
I find I best understand who Ennis is when he's with Alma, not when he's with Jack. With Alma, all sides of Ennis's personality (good and bad) come out. It's possible to see the whole human being. With Alma, Ennis's emotions are better tempered, more restrained because of what Alma's personality contributes to their marriage partnership.
Alma is willing to go to great lengths to make their marriage "work." Ennis rushes the girls into the grocery store where Alma is working, dropping them off so he can go to a ranch job he's just been called to. Alma, taken by surprise, protests. She quickly regains her composure and suggests to Ennis she can call her sister to take care of them. Their young daughter, Alma, Jr., pulls a jar out of a stack of jars causing them to collapse. Instead of exploding in frustration and rage, she apologizes to Monroe, the grocer, her employer.
Nor does Alma immediately confront Ennis upon his return from his night out with Jack (spent at the Siesta Motel together in bed) when Ennis & Jack reunite at the bottom of the landing steps up to their apartment over the laundromat. She saw them kissing each other through the screen door. She's deeply hurt. She barely holds back her tears. She "knows what she saw," as Annie Proulx puts it. But she doesn't get in a fight with Ennis about it when he returns the next morning (with Ennis immediately leaving, again, almost as soon as he walks in the door, to go on his first "fishing trip" with Jack). She also fails to discuss it with him (until it's too late and only brings up her suspicions in their Thanksgiving kitchen argument). She does what she thinks will hold their marriage together.
With Jack, it's different. The emotions between them are so strong that it is the "feeling of emotion" between them that dominates them when they are with each other. Their personalities, the differences in their personalities seemed to be pushed aside.
In her narration of their May 1983 argument, Annie Proulx describes the fissure that opens up between Ennis & Jack as "clouds of steam" pouring out of vents cracking, rupturing the ground they stand on, releasing all the differences of opinion, disappointments, etc. between them that they had covered up and pushed aside over all the years they had been together. After the argument, Ennis & Jack had "patched things up almost to the way the way they were before." The important word in Annie Proulx's phrasing is "almost" (to the way things were before).
When Jack goes next to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, he tells them his plans for who he wants to bring in as a ranch partner (on the Twist family ranch) have changed. He's now saying he's bringing in a Texas ranch neighbor (not Ennis del Mar).
I don't whether Jack decides at last, despite his flashback to his favorite memory of Ennis, that he must "quit" Ennis (in favor of Randall, his Texas ranch neighbor). Perhaps the decision is made later.
Jack, once too many times, watches Ennis leave him. Perhaps the sadness of seeing him go finally produces a resolve that Jack must end the loneliness he can sometimes hardly stand that he feels for Ennis. In either case, earlier or later, or whenever it happens, Jack chooses an end to his suffering rather than continuing to ride with Ennis.
But Randall is no escape from illusion or suffering, either. You described the Buddhist metaphor of a "bridge of dreams." Jack crosses that bridge. He leaves the illusion of his dreams of a life together with Ennis (or the illusion of his passion for Ennis that the "thing" gives them).
For a moment, crossing this bridge away from Ennis, Jack sees the pointlessness of the suffering of the loneliness he feels when he's not together with Ennis. But rather than renounce suffering, Jack continues over the bridge of dreams to the next dream, a similar illusion with Randall, perhaps.
With Jack gone, Ennis is left with his night dreams of Jack. Sometimes the pillows are wet, at other times, it's the sheets that are wet. On a good day, Ennis has dreamed of Jack the night before as: he was at 19, wavy hair and buck teeth. On a bad day, the "garish" can of beans with a dirty spoon sticking out of it sitting on a log has marred the dreams. Is the "garish" can of beans (with the dirty spoon sticking out it), the mature Jack (with a mustache and fixed teeth)? Ennis cries on those nights. Is it the mature Jack he misses most?
Ennis is caught between what he "knows" and what he "tries to make himself believe" (wishes to believe). In the last scene in the movie, the screen is split between an old photograph of Brokeback Mountain and the view of a field of "amber grain" outside Ennis's trailer bedroom window.
Jack told Ennis in their May 1983 argument that Brokeback Mountain is "all we have" (seeing each other only a few times for a short time in the following years). Ennis holds the two bloody shirts to his face (that Jack has saved from their last day on Brokeback Mt. together when Jack accidentally bloodied Ennis's nose and Ennis knocked Jack out when Jack tried to staunch the bleeding - with Ennis left asking himself in the years before their 1967 reunion at the bottom of the landing steps leading up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat if Jack never tried to contact him because he was angry Ennis had hit him then). But he can't catch the scent of Brokeback Mt. It has vanished.
Brokeback Mt. is only a memory. It has faded with time.
The world outside Ennis's bedroom window is there now, in the "present moment," to use a Zen phrase.
I remember reading a post soon after the movie was first released in December 2005 describing Ennis's choice as being between "Brokeback Mountain" and the "pollution of the plains." But the flat field of waving grass is what is there for Ennis. Buddhism describes a reed growing in a field as having the "strength" to withstand a hurricane because it bends in the wind. The grass outside moves back and forth, the wind rippling across it in waves.
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Thank you tpe for your views on what a Buddhist perspective on Brokeback Mountain might be. They've certainly given me much to think about, even if we might differ about "love" and the Buddhist search for a (universal) transcendence of "suffering."
(In Buddhist tradition, Siddhārtha Gautama, the first Buddha, was a prince. His father, a king, was told by an astrologer that his son would either be a "universal leader" or a "universal teacher." His father, in order to make his son a universal ruler, sought to eliminate all sights of physical suffering from his son's life. But the prince saw the carcass of a cow and sought an answer to suffering. I believe there are versions of this same story, too.)
You might be reluctant to embrace a Buddhist view because you correctly see Buddhism's primary goal (value) as the "end of suffering." From my understanding of what you've said, this brings Buddhism into conflict with "love" as a first principle (in a ranking of a hierarchy of values). Perhaps you also associate the "desire" for love with a "devotion" to love.
From a Buddhist perspective, such an association linking "desire" and "devotion" might be a misperception, an illusion. Certainly, for example, Buddhists are devoted to the end of suffering. But to "desire" an end to suffering would be self-defeating - in the Buddhist perspective.
Similarly, a "desire" for love might be confused with a "devotion" to love.
I think manhattangirl makes a good point. ("...In the final confrontation didn't you get the idea that Jack was releasing himself from Ennis so Ennis's suffering can end? I can't help but think of scene where Jack watches Ennis drive off for the last time.")
There can be different interpretations of this last scene of Ennis & Jack seeing each other for the last time. Ennis has just told Jack, "...I quit all those jobs," saying that "because of you [Jack], I'm nothing..." (offering to Jack an explanation of seeing him less frequently now than in the early years of his marriage to Alma).
If Jack takes at face value what Ennis is saying to him, he is hearing Ennis telling him that the "thing" between him and Ennis has brought Ennis to this point of suffering. Is there much point in continuing their ride further?
From this interpretation of their May 1983 argument, Jack's favorite memory of Ennis (holding him from behind, rocking him into a trance, humming him a song...) is a last temptation, a last tie holding him to Ennis that he decides to break. (Jack, after the flashback, watches Ennis drive off with great sadness in his eyes.)
Jack decides to give up the pleasure that Ennis's company brings him out of his devotion to Ennis's welfare. He loves Ennis more than the "feeling" of romantic passion Ennis brings to him (that, in fact, the "thing," as Ennis describes it, brings to both of them). Devotion to Ennis (out of love for him) decides the question for Jack. He must leave Ennis to do what is "right" by him. Jack does what he thinks is in Ennis's best interest.
While I think I disagree this is the best interpretation of what is going on in Jack's mind in response to Ennis saying ("...because of you [Jack], I'm nothing!"), it nonetheless clearly illustrates the difference between a "desire" for love and a "devotion" to it.
I don't think Ennis wanted Jack to stop seeing him. After all, it is the postcard Ennis sent to Jack to tell him that November was "still" set for them (to see each other) that is returned marked "deceased." Ennis wanted to continue his "ride" with Jack.
I think Ennis wanted to see Jack on his own terms (and not more often than that). Ennis may have started seeing Jack less frequently after his divorce because a part of him needed the "balance" of his marriage to Alma to keep seeing Jack. Without Alma as a counterbalance, Ennis wanted to hold himself back from Jack. It might be said that this is a matter of Ennis being homophobic about his own homosexuality. I feel it might be something more.
I find I best understand who Ennis is when he's with Alma, not when he's with Jack. With Alma, all sides of Ennis's personality (good and bad) come out. It's possible to see the whole human being. With Alma, Ennis's emotions are better tempered, more restrained because of what Alma's personality contributes to their marriage partnership.
Alma is willing to go to great lengths to make their marriage "work." Ennis rushes the girls into the grocery store where Alma is working, dropping them off so he can go to a ranch job he's just been called to. Alma, taken by surprise, protests. She quickly regains her composure and suggests she can call her sister to take care of them. Alma, Jr. pulls a jar out of a stack of jars causing them to collapse. Instead of exploding in frustration and rage, she apologizes to Monroe, the grocer, her employer.
Nor does Alma immediately confront Ennis upon his return from his night out with Jack (spent at the Siesta Motel together in bed) when Ennis & Jack reunite at the bottom of the landing steps up to their apartment over the laundromat. She saw them kissing each other through the screen door. She's deeply hurt. She barely holds back her tears. She "knows what she saw," as Annie Proulx puts it. But she doesn't get in a fight with Ennis about it when he returns (to immediately go on his first "fishing trip" with Jack). She also fails to discuss it with him (until it's too late and only brings up her suspicions in their Thanksgiving kitchen argument). She does what she thinks will hold their marriage together.
With Jack, it's different. The emotions between them are so strong that it is the "feeling of emotion" between them that dominates them when they are with each other. Their personalities, the differences in their personalities seemed to be pushed aside.
In her narration of their May 1983 argument, Annie Proulx describes the fissure that opens up between Ennis & Jack as "clouds of steam" pouring out of vents cracking, rupturing the ground they stand on, releasing all the differences of opinion, disappointments, etc. between them that they had covered up and pushed aside over all the years they had been together. After the argument, Ennis & Jack had "patched things up almost to the way the way they were before." The important word in her phrasing is "almost" (to the way things were before). When Jack goes next to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, he tells them his plans for who he wants to bring in as a ranch partner on the Twist family ranch have changed, saying he's bringing a Texas ranch neighbor.
I don't whether Jack decides at last despite his flashback to his favorite memory of Ennis that he must "quit" Ennis (in favor of Randall, his Texas ranch neighbor). Perhaps the decision is made later. Jack, once too many times, watches Ennis leave him. Perhaps the sadness of seeing him go finally produces a resolve that Jack must end the loneliness he can sometimes hardly stand that he feels for Ennis. In either case, Jack chooses an end to his suffering rather than continuing to ride with Ennis.
But Randall is no escape from illusion or suffering, either. You described the Buddhist metaphor of a "bridge of dreams." Jack crosses that bridge. He leaves the illusion of his dreams of a life together with Ennis (or the illusion of his passion for Ennis the "thing" gives them). For a moment, crossing this bridge away from Ennis, Jack sees the pointlessness of the suffering of the loneliness he feels when he's not together with Ennis. But rather than renounce suffering, Jack continues over the bridge of dreams to the next dreams, a similar illusion with Randall, perhaps.
With Jack gone, Ennis is left with his night dreams of Jack. Sometimes the pillows are wet, at other times, it's the sheets that are wet. On a good day, Ennis has dreamed of Jack the night before: as he was at 19, wavy hair and buck teeth. On a bad day, the "garish" can of beans with a dirty spoon sticking out of it sitting on a log has marred the dreams. Is the "garish" can of beans (with the dirty spoon sticking out it), the mature Jack (with a mustache and fixed teeth)? Ennis cries on those nights. Is it the mature Jack he misses most?
Ennis is caught between what he "knows" and what he "tries to make himself believe" (wishes to believe). In the last scene in the movie, the screen is split between an old photograph of Brokeback Mountain and the view of a field of "amber grain" outside Ennis's trailer bedroom window. Jack told Ennis in their May 1983 argument that Brokeback Mountain is "all we have" (seeing each other only a few times for a short time in the following years). Ennis holds the two bloody shirts to his face (that Jack has saved from their last day on Brokeback Mt. together when Jack accidentally bloodied Ennis's nose and Ennis knocked him out when Jack tried to staunch the bleeding - with Ennis left asking himself in the years before their 1967 reunion at the bottom of the landing steps leading up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat if Jack never tried to contact him because he was angry Ennis had hit him). But he can't catch the scent of Brokeback Mt. It has vanished.
Brokeback Mt. is only a memory. It has faded with time.
The world outside Ennis's bedroom window is there now, in the "present moment," to use a zen phrase.
I remember reading a post soon after the movie was first released in December 2005 describing Ennis's choice as being between "Brokeback Mountain" and the "pollution of the plains." But the flat field of waving grass is what is there for Ennis. Buddhism describes a reed growing in a field as having the "strength" to withstand a hurricane because it bends in the wind. The grass outside moves back and forth, the wind rippling across it in waves.
I find myself reacting to the part of your post illustrating your point using the last confrontation.
Whatever distinction we make between desire and devotion, perhaps it is love itself that is at work, in spite of themselves. As with Hölderlin:
Trennen wollten wir uns? wähnten es gut und klug?
Da wirs taten, warum schröckte, wie Mord, die Tat?
Ach! wir kennen uns wenig,
Denn es waltet ein Gott in uns.
(So we wanted to part, thought it clever and good,
That we did it, why did it shock us like murder, the deed?
Oh, we know ourselves little
For a god is at work in us.)
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I guess I'm of a different belief, I don't know if I would call what Ennis felt for Alma was love. He cared for her, he liked her, she suited him. Ennis married her, that's what you're suppose to do. His brother and sister did it. He was nineteen, on his own, "there was no room for him" anywhere.
When he met Jack, he fell in love, not knowing what this feeling for this man was until a year after they split up from the mountain, he knew than he shouldn't have let him go.
My personal opinion, I don't think he was fearing a scene when Jack came back, I think Ennis was planning to keep Jack all to himself, just like on the mountain, Alma was beginning to be shut out. She was part of his life that he was stuck with, and nothing much to he could do about it.
I know it's popular here to think that Ennis loved Alma, in some way. As if it had to make sense for him to even marry her. But Ennis had a philosophy "I'll stick to beans", and Ennis stuck with what was expected of him.
Yeah, that's exactly how I feel about Ennis's relationship with Alma. A lot of people who get married don't really love each other. Before he met Jack, Ennis had convinced himself he loved Alma. After he met Jack, he realized he'd been lying to himself, and that Jack was his one true love. But he just married Alma because it was what was expected of him. He wasn't happy about it, but like he said "If you can't fix it, you just gotta stand it." He was trapped, and that was the only thing society would allow him to do. Alma was the life that Ennis felt forced into by society, Jack was the life that was real, and that Ennis would have chosen if he were free, but he felt he wasn't, so he had to endure his life with Alma. In the end, he realizes that he should have just not been afraid, and that he should have fought to be free, rather than pretended to be something he wasn't just to please others. He endured years of suffering quietly inside, and in the end he realized that it wasn't worth it. He realized he should have spent those years being happy with his one true love, Jack. He lived a life full of sorrow and regret, and that's why though my heart breaks for both Ennis and Jack, I always feel sadder for Ennis.
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Yeah, that's exactly how I feel about Ennis's relationship with Alma. A lot of people who get married don't really love each other. Before he met Jack, Ennis had convinced himself he loved Alma. After he met Jack, he realized he'd been lying to himself, and that Jack was his one true love. But he just married Alma because it was what was expected of him. He wasn't happy about it, but like he said "If you can't fix it, you just gotta stand it." He was trapped, and that was the only thing society would allow him to do. Alma was the life that Ennis felt forced into by society, Jack was the life that was real, and that Ennis would have chosen if he were free, but he felt he wasn't, so he had to endure his life with Alma. In the end, he realizes that he should have just not been afraid, and that he should have fought to be free, rather than pretended to be something he wasn't just to please others. He endured years of suffering quietly inside, and in the end he realized that it wasn't worth it. He realized he should have spent those years being happy with his one true love, Jack. He lived a life full of sorrow and regret, and that's why though my heart breaks for both Ennis and Jack, I always feel sadder for Ennis.
So true, marriage is such a complicated thing, emotions, motives, social mores, why one gets married can be ignored by the idea of "happily ever after". And also the idea that one day one can awaken and realize that this was the biggest mistake they've ever made and live in quite desperation, and which Ennis found himself in. In the ss Ennis lamented how he should have never let Jack get away, but what would have been his alternative, to hop in Jack's pick up on that last day on Brokeback that first summer and go with him to LF?
Ennis's "suffering", his inability to recognize it, and release himself from it brought so much suffering to Jack and Alma. He learned that all too late.
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After he met Jack,
So true, marriage is such a complicated thing, emotions, motives, social mores, why one gets married can be ignored by the idea of "happily ever after". And also the idea that one day one can awaken and realize that this was the biggest mistake they've ever made and live in quite desperation, and which Ennis found himself in. In the ss Ennis lamented how he should have never let Jack get away, but what would have been his alternative, to hop in Jack's pick up on that last day on Brokeback that first summer and go with him to LF?
Ennis's "suffering", his inability to recognize it, and release himself from it brought so much suffering to Jack and Alma. He learned that all too late.
After Ennis met Jack, he didn't want to think about a life without him...but of course in the back of his mind, he knew the day would come when they had to part ways. That's why Ennis fought with Jack on their last day, and that's why he was so distraught after he said goodbye to Jack and started walking down the road. Ennis didn't know how he was going to go back to Alma, to the life that was expected of him, he knew he would be miserable. Ennis didn't know how he was going to live a day without Jack. All he knew was that it was what he felt he had to do, because he didn't have a choice, he wasn't free. Jack didn't know how he was going to live without Ennis either, and that's why he tells Ennis exactly where he will be for the next several months, he hopes Ennis will come with him and they would always be together from then on. So he told him he would be at his parents' house hoping Ennis would take the hint and come with him. Believe me, Ennis wanted to do exactly that, he wanted to go with Jack and never be apart from him...but he felt it was something he could never do, he could never have that beautiful life, no matter how much he wanted it. Memories of the gruesomely murdered Earl flashed in his mind, and he didn't want neither himself nor Jack to suffer a heinous death like that. That's why he becomes physically sick...he's just said goodbye to the man he loves, to his one true love, his soulmate, and it's killing him inside knowing he's not going to see him anymore, but he feels like there's nothing he can do. Ennis is torn between being true to himself and living the life he wants, needs, and deserves, having true love and happiness forever with Jack, and what might happen if anyone found out...that they might brutally murder him for it. He's stuck between a rock and a hard place.
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After he met Jack,
After Ennis met Jack, he didn't want to think about a life without him...but of course in the back of his mind, he knew the day would come when they had to part ways. That's why Ennis fought with Jack on their last day, and that's why he was so distraught after he said goodbye to Jack and started walking down the road. Ennis didn't know how he was going to go back to Alma, to the life that was expected of him, he knew he would be miserable. Ennis didn't know how he was going to live a day without Jack. All he knew was that it was what he felt he had to do, because he didn't have a choice, he wasn't free. Jack didn't know how he was going to live without Ennis either, and that's why he tells Ennis exactly where he will be for the next several months, he hopes Ennis will come with him and they would always be together from then on. So he told him he would be at his parents' house hoping Ennis would take the hint and come with him. Believe me, Ennis wanted to do exactly that, he wanted to go with Jack and never be apart from him...but he felt it was something he could never do, he could never have that beautiful life, no matter how much he wanted it. Memories of the gruesomely murdered Earl flashed in his mind, and he didn't want neither himself nor Jack to suffer a heinous death like that. That's why he becomes physically sick...he's just said goodbye to the man he loves, to his one true love, his soulmate, and it's killing him inside knowing he's not going to see him anymore, but he feels like there's nothing he can do. Ennis is torn between being true to himself and living the life he wants, needs, and deserves, having true love and happiness forever with Jack, and what might happen if anyone found out...that they might brutally murder him for it. He's stuck between a rock and a hard place.
im begining to realise why your username is athena you are so wise :)
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I can't do anything but quote all what you have said,Athena; wonderfully stated¡ :clap: But I only wanted to add a little observation: I've always thought that Ennis fought with Jack on their last day on the mountain as a kind of relief in his nervous state...Jack wanted to remove dramatic quality to the situation on one hand due to his cheerful way of being and on the other hand,because he saw Ennis was more devastated than him,or at least Ennis showed this devastation in a deeper way than Jack...And I thought that Ennis,always more closed in his reactions and in his way of showing his inner feelings,reacted so because he knew that they never see each other again down on the mountain.As you say,he knew from the beginning there would be an end;while Jack,always a dreamer,thought and believed that there would be an continuation in real life.For this reason,he felt happier inside-what I must confess surprised me the first time I saw the movie,because Jack had always been so demonstrative that I believed that he would be the most broken down of the two...-and wanted to play with his friend,what woke up this lasts wraths...IMO this was the first deception Jack got from Ennis...
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After he met Jack,
After Ennis met Jack, he didn't want to think about a life without him...but of course in the back of his mind, he knew the day would come when they had to part ways. That's why Ennis fought with Jack on their last day, and that's why he was so distraught after he said goodbye to Jack and started walking down the road. Ennis didn't know how he was going to go back to Alma, to the life that was expected of him, he knew he would be miserable. Ennis didn't know how he was going to live a day without Jack. All he knew was that it was what he felt he had to do, because he didn't have a choice, he wasn't free. Jack didn't know how he was going to live without Ennis either, and that's why he tells Ennis exactly where he will be for the next several months, he hopes Ennis will come with him and they would always be together from then on. So he told him he would be at his parents' house hoping Ennis would take the hint and come with him. Believe me, Ennis wanted to do exactly that, he wanted to go with Jack and never be apart from him...but he felt it was something he could never do, he could never have that beautiful life, no matter how much he wanted it. Memories of the gruesomely murdered Earl flashed in his mind, and he didn't want neither himself nor Jack to suffer a heinous death like that. That's why he becomes physically sick...he's just said goodbye to the man he loves, to his one true love, his soulmate, and it's killing him inside knowing he's not going to see him anymore, but he feels like there's nothing he can do. Ennis is torn between being true to himself and living the life he wants, needs, and deserves, having true love and happiness forever with Jack, and what might happen if anyone found out...that they might brutally murder him for it. He's stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Again, I can't argue at what you're expressing, I'm just looking at it in a different way. There are implications to what we do, our fears, prejudices, self-doubt, possessive love, jealousy, grief, and how it affects us and those around us. Ennis is the epicenter of all that went on in the story, and his words, actions, decision had such profound effect on all those closest to him.
In my humble opinion when Ennis agrees to go to Alma wedding, he for the first time in life, is going beyond himself, to release his own suffering so Alma, Jr. would not have to suffer, remember how he look when she was disappointed that he might not come to her wedding, he finally got it. He didn't want her to have the pain of him refusing again something she requested. This is a sign of hope that Ennis could get beyond his pain, and make someone else happy. To make someone else happy. It takes great courage to go beyond the pain.
Just my take.
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I can't do anything but quote all what you have said,Athena; wonderfully stated¡ :clap: But I only wanted to add a little observation: I've always thought that Ennis fought with Jack on their last day on the mountain as a kind of relief in his nervous state...Jack wanted to remove dramatic quality to the situation on one hand due to his cheerful way of being and on the other hand,because he saw Ennis was more devastated than him,or at least Ennis showed this devastation in a deeper way than Jack...And I thought that Ennis,always more closed in his reactions and in his way of showing his inner feelings,reacted so because he knew that they never see each other again down on the mountain.As you say,he knew from the beginning there would be an end;while Jack,always a dreamer,thought and believed that there would be an continuation in real life.For this reason,he felt happier inside-what I must confess surprised me the first time I saw the movie,because Jack had always been so demonstrative that I believed that he would be the most broken down of the two...-and wanted to play with his friend,what woke up this lasts wraths...IMO this was the first deception Jack got from Ennis...
Yes, exactly. Jack, being the dreamer, wasn't upset on the last day because he really thought Ennis would come with him that day and they would never be apart. Ennis gets upset and fights with Jack because he realizes that their time on Brokeback Mountain has run out, and he would have to say goodbye to Jack, something he didn't want to do, but felt he had no choice but to do so. When Jack realizes that Ennis isn't coming with him, his heart sank. He deliberately tells Ennis where he will be, hoping that Ennis will come. I don't think that Jack ever thought Ennis wouldn't come with him that day, until the moment Ennis said goodbye and walks away. Jack just sits in his truck, watching Ennis out of the side mirror and looking like he's about to cry.
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Again, I can't argue at what you're expressing, I'm just looking at it in a different way. There are implications to what we do, our fears, prejudices, self-doubt, possessive love, jealousy, grief, and how it affects us and those around us. Ennis is the epicenter of all that went on in the story, and his words, actions, decision had such profound effect on all those closest to him.
In my humble opinion when Ennis agrees to go to Alma wedding, he for the first time in life, is going beyond himself, to release his own suffering so Alma, Jr. would not have to suffer, remember how he look when she was disappointed that he might not come to her wedding, he finally got it. He didn't want her to have the pain of him refusing again something she requested. This is a sign of hope that Ennis could get beyond his pain, and make someone else happy. To make someone else happy. It takes great courage to go beyond the pain.
Just my take.
That's why I feel so sad for Ennis at the end...because he's such a tragic character. In the end, he hates himself for not listening to his heart because he realizes the sorrow, pain, and despair it caused Jack to feel. All that time, he thought he was just protecting both himself and Jack from a cruel society that he felt sure would brutally murder them if it knew they were together...but in the end he realizes that his fear just caused both of them to suffer and be miserable. He hates himself for hurting Jack and wishes he could start again, have another chance, and this time do things right, this time never make the mistake of marrying Alma, this time never letting Jack out of his sight, this time never saying goodbye to Jack after they came down from Brokeback Mountain that first summer.
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That's why I feel so sad for Ennis at the end...because he's such a tragic character. In the end, he hates himself for not listening to his heart because he realizes the sorrow, pain, and despair it caused Jack to feel. All that time, he thought he was just protecting both himself and Jack from a cruel society that he felt sure would brutally murder them if it knew they were together...but in the end he realizes that his fear just caused both of them to suffer and be miserable. He hates himself for hurting Jack and wishes he could start again, have another chance, and this time do things right, this time never make the mistake of marrying Alma, this time never letting Jack out of his sight, this time never saying goodbye to Jack after they came down from Brokeback Mountain that first summer.
i agree
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im begining to realise why your username is athena you are so wise :)
Awww, thanks. :)
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On their last day on Brokeback Mt., when Ennis punches Jack, he strikes at the moment Jack is tenderly staunching Ennis's bleeding nose. (In Annie Proulx's short story, Jack caused Ennis's nosebleed accidentally when he knocked his knee into it while they were having sex. In the movie, it all starts with Jack playfully lassoing a brooding Ennis. They begin to "roughhouse" with each other. But the wrestling suddenly takes a serious take. Ennis ends up with a bloody nose.)
Is Ennis angry because Jack caused his nosebleed or is he angry because Jack, as his "ministering angel," as Annie Proulx puts it, is tending to him? Perhaps, Ennis becomes angry at just this moment because somewhere deep inside him, unconsciously understood, he knows how much he loves Jack for Jack's tenderness toward him.
But he doesn't want to have these feelings for Jack. Brokeback Mt. is only supposed to be a "one shot deal" (as Ennis told Jack the next evening after the night they first have sex together in the cook camp tent). Ennis says he "ain't no queer."
But Ennis now finds he has these feelings for Jack that tell him otherwise. He knows, again unconsciously, that having these feelings for Jack will bring him incredible loss when they come down from Brokeback Mt. and part.
Of course, Ennis, in someway, is already aware of his feelings for Jack. He's "pissed" at Joe Aguirre, the ranch manager, for calling them down from the mountain a month early because of an early August snowstorm that Ennis says will soon melt away. Ennis says he's upset because he'll lose a month's pay. He goes off in a corner of a meadow and broods.
But he knows that when they come down from the mountain that he and Jack will no longer be together. (Their "one shot deal" will be over.) Then Jack comes to tell him it's time to come down from the mountain (and lassos a reluctant Ennis playfully. They begin to wrestle...)
When they come down from the mountain, Jack asks Ennis if he plans to work again on Brokeback Mt. next summer. Obviously, Jack - who has already worked on Brokeback Mt. the year before he worked with Ennis - would be back, again, if Ennis were there, too.
Jack does come back next summer. Joe Aguirre tells him he doesn't have a job for him. Jack asks if Ennis del Mar has been around. Joe Aguirre says that he and Ennis spent too much time "stemming the rose," not minding the herd. Jack takes off for Texas, his homosexuality exposed.
Ennis is not fully conscious of his feelings for Jack. He thinks that he had the dry heaves from a hangover in Signal, WY after he and Jack came down from Brokeback Mt. (when he got sick after Jack left for his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY in his pickup truck). Annie Proulx says it took him a long time before he felt better.
In the short story, in the Siesta Motel, the first night of their reunion in 1967 on the landing steps of Ennis's & Alma's apartment over laundromat in Riverton, WY, Ennis tells Jack it took him about a year to "figure out" what he was feeling (for Jack) that day in Signal, WY, the day when they came down from Brokeback Mt. But by the time he became consciously aware of his love for Jack, it was too late: he was already married to Alma.
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Yeah, I feel so sad for Ennis when he fights with Jack on the last day. You can tell what he's really feeling inside and what he's really upset about. He's not really mad because Aguirre cheated them out of a month's pay. He's upset because he won't be seeing Jack anymore. But he doesn't know how to express this, so he fights with him. I do believe that Ennis always knew it would be a mistake to go back and marry Alma, deep down inside, he knew that, but he just goes back and marries her because he feels he doesn't have a choice. It was what was expected of him, and that pretty much summarizes the tragic flaw in Ennis's character. He was always so afraid of what other people in society would think and say, and even more of what they might do, that he sacrificed his happiness pretending to be something he wasn't, just to please others.
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hmm i also feel that the fight was part if ennis' frustration about what he thought was the end of his and jacks relationship and also the fact it came earlier then he expected.
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hmm i also feel that the fight was part if ennis' frustration about what he thought was the end of his and jacks relationship and also the fact it came earlier then he expected.
Yeah, that's what I feel it was all about. Jack, the dreamer, didn't think of the day they'd have to come off the mountain, and when he did, it didn't bother him because he could envision in his mind a continuation, never saying goodbye, "riding off into the sunset", so to speak, always being with Ennis no matter what. Jack was an idealist, and he thought "love will find a way and overcome everything". While for poor Ennis, it was always in the back of his mind. He knew that they would eventually have to part ways, because he couldn't see them really being together since society would never allow that. He could see a devastating end to all their dreams, and it upset him deeply, but he didn't know how to express that. So on that last day, all that pent up emotion was let loose in a fight with Jack.
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Yeah, that's what I feel it was all about. Jack, the dreamer, didn't think of the day they'd have to come off the mountain, and when he did, it didn't bother him because he could envision in his mind a continuation, never saying goodbye, "riding off into the sunset", so to speak, always being with Ennis no matter what. Jack was an idealist, and he thought "love will find a way and overcome everything". While for poor Ennis, it was always in the back of his mind. He knew that they would eventually have to part ways, because he couldn't see them really being together since society would never allow that. He could see a devastating end to all their dreams, and it upset him deeply, but he didn't know how to express that. So on that last day, all that pent up emotion was let loose in a fight with Jack.
hmmm good way of putting it.
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hmm i also feel that the fight was part if ennis' frustration about what he thought was the end of his and jacks relationship and also the fact it came earlier then he expected.
I agree with this. From the moment of the news that they had to bring the sheep down from Jack, There seemed to be a progression of anger that says Ennis was'nt ready to let go . Unprepared for what he knew what would eventually have to happen. The timing of the end was too abrupt for him to accept all at once, as he sees Jack packing, happening too fast.
Ennis leaves the scene to go sit on the hill alone. Perhaps to contemplate his situation and buy more time to prepare himself. Jack was calm and almost non-chalant about it perhaps to relieve Ennis's panic, Jack's words "time to go cowboy" spelled the end of his time with Jack. Time was up and they had to move., his violence became the only communication he had. and what Jack thought was a playful wrestling match becomes a fight.
I feel he felt he could never verbally expresses the way he felt out loud to Jack. Helpless to stop the inevitable, with desperation, he lashes out , as if Jack does'nt get what he's feeling. ( I think Jack knew.) A way to make Jack understand that he wanted more than anything to stay with him, not marry a woman whom he cared for, but was not in love with. He now knew what true love felt like, he no longer had to find it in Alma. Ennis's demeanor at the truck back in Signal and the breakdown in the alley, imo is evidence of what he preferred, not necessarily what said. He'd already found what he needed in Jack. Indeed he did what society expected of him, does'nt mean he was satisfied with what he got. Who was still the one for Ennis after 20 yrs? One guess.
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I agree with this. From the moment of the news that they had to bring the sheep down from Jack, There seemed to be a progression of anger that says Ennis was'nt ready to let go . Unprepared for what he knew what would eventually have to happen. The timing of the end was too abrupt for him to accept all at once, as he sees Jack packing, happening too fast.
Ennis leaves the scene to go sit on the hill alone. Perhaps to contemplate his situation and buy more time to prepare himself. Jack was calm and almost non-chalant about it perhaps to relieve Ennis's panic, Jack's words "time to go cowboy" spelled the end of his time with Jack. Time was up and they had to move., his violence became the only communication he had. and what Jack thought was a playful wrestling match becomes a fight.
I feel he felt he could never verbally expresses the way he felt out loud to Jack. Helpless to stop the inevitable, with desperation, he lashes out , as if Jack does'nt get what he's feeling. ( I think Jack knew.) A way to make Jack understand that he wanted more than anything to stay with him, not marry a woman whom he cared for, but was not in love with. He now knew what true love felt like, he no longer had to find it in Alma. Ennis's demeanor at the truck back in Signal and the breakdown in the alley, imo is evidence of what he preferred, not necessarily what said. He'd already found what he needed in Jack. Indeed he did what society expected of him, does'nt mean he was satisfied with what he got. Who was still the one for Ennis after 20 yrs? One guess.
hmmmmmm good points
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I feel he felt he could never verbally expresses the way he felt out loud to Jack. Helpless to stop the inevitable, with desperation, he lashes out , as if Jack does'nt get what he's feeling. ( I think Jack knew.) A way to make Jack understand that he wanted more than anything to stay with him, not marry a woman whom he cared for, but was not in love with. He now knew what true love felt like, he no longer had to find it in Alma. Ennis's demeanor at the truck back in Signal and the breakdown in the alley, imo is evidence of what he preferred, not necessarily what said. He'd already found what he needed in Jack. Indeed he did what society expected of him, does'nt mean he was satisfied with what he got. Who was still the one for Ennis after 20 yrs? One guess.
The problem with Ennis then was that he believed that stoicism would inevitably lead him to reject his own deep-seated passions. IMO, Ennis's stoicism was not a rejection of the world of desire, as is understood in Buddhism. Ironically, it is in the last scene when we see him come closest to this...
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The problem with Ennis then was that he believed that stoicism would inevitably lead him to reject his own deep-seated passions. IMO, Ennis's stoicism was not a rejection of the world of desire, as is understood in Buddhism. Ironically, it is in the last scene when we see him come closest to this...
hmmm :\'(
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I agree with this. From the moment of the news that they had to bring the sheep down from Jack, There seemed to be a progression of anger that says Ennis was'nt ready to let go . Unprepared for what he knew what would eventually have to happen. The timing of the end was too abrupt for him to accept all at once, as he sees Jack packing, happening too fast.
Ennis leaves the scene to go sit on the hill alone. Perhaps to contemplate his situation and buy more time to prepare himself. Jack was calm and almost non-chalant about it perhaps to relieve Ennis's panic, Jack's words "time to go cowboy" spelled the end of his time with Jack. Time was up and they had to move., his violence became the only communication he had. and what Jack thought was a playful wrestling match becomes a fight.
I feel he felt he could never verbally expresses the way he felt out loud to Jack. Helpless to stop the inevitable, with desperation, he lashes out , as if Jack does'nt get what he's feeling. ( I think Jack knew.) A way to make Jack understand that he wanted more than anything to stay with him, not marry a woman whom he cared for, but was not in love with. He now knew what true love felt like, he no longer had to find it in Alma. Ennis's demeanor at the truck back in Signal and the breakdown in the alley, imo is evidence of what he preferred, not necessarily what said. He'd already found what he needed in Jack. Indeed he did what society expected of him, does'nt mean he was satisfied with what he got. Who was still the one for Ennis after 20 yrs? One guess.
Yes, I completely agree. I also believe Jack knew what that fight was really about.
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The problem with Ennis then was that he believed that stoicism would inevitably lead him to reject his own deep-seated passions. IMO, Ennis's stoicism was not a rejection of the world of desire, as is understood in Buddhism. Ironically, it is in the last scene when we see him come closest to this...
What you said, Thomas!
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The problem with Ennis then was that he believed that stoicism would inevitably lead him to reject his own deep-seated passions. IMO, Ennis's stoicism was not a rejection of the world of desire, as is understood in Buddhism. Ironically, it is in the last scene when we see him come closest to this...
Ennis's stocism to me was like the sin of pride, which cost him. He learned Jack was more honest about who he was, and his love for him. Ennis I think had a sense of shame, a sense of letting Jack down sitting there in Jack's parents home. Jack never denied him, or who he was to him.
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Thanks lamusica and MG.
I do think pride was at the root of Ennis's tragic flaw. He was too proud to own up to who he truly was deep inside -- and his stoicism is therefore the root of the illusion he allowed himself to believe for so long -- that he could deny that love in spite of himself.
From a Buddhist perspective, one can say that the "shock" of love and the tragic end brought Ennis closer to an enlightenment of sorts...
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I stgill have a bit of a problem thinking of Ennis as proud. To me, the explanation of so much in his character relies on the poor self-image Ennis has. I just feel his stoic actions are more out of fear than pride. If he admits he has sexual feelings for another man, he is admitting he is gay and that is dangerous in his eyes, so, the safe thing to do is keep it all inside. He dissembles in order to keep himself safe from pulic criticism and danger, and also from self-knowledge. If you don't admit to yourself what you are, you cannot hate yourself for it.
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I agree with this. From the moment of the news that they had to bring the sheep down from Jack, There seemed to be a progression of anger that says Ennis was'nt ready to let go . Unprepared for what he knew what would eventually have to happen. The timing of the end was too abrupt for him to accept all at once, as he sees Jack packing, happening too fast.
Ennis leaves the scene to go sit on the hill alone. Perhaps to contemplate his situation and buy more time to prepare himself. Jack was calm and almost non-chalant about it perhaps to relieve Ennis's panic, Jack's words "time to go cowboy" spelled the end of his time with Jack. Time was up and they had to move., his violence became the only communication he had. and what Jack thought was a playful wrestling match becomes a fight.
I feel he felt he could never verbally expresses the way he felt out loud to Jack. Helpless to stop the inevitable, with desperation, he lashes out , as if Jack does'nt get what he's feeling. ( I think Jack knew.) A way to make Jack understand that he wanted more than anything to stay with him, not marry a woman whom he cared for, but was not in love with. He now knew what true love felt like, he no longer had to find it in Alma. Ennis's demeanor at the truck back in Signal and the breakdown in the alley, imo is evidence of what he preferred, not necessarily what said. He'd already found what he needed in Jack. Indeed he did what society expected of him, does'nt mean he was satisfied with what he got. Who was still the one for Ennis after 20 yrs? One guess.
I think your description aintfoolin of Ennis's anger (disappointment? despair? desperation?) being in a "progression" is very apt. Something is going on during their wrestling play that turns very serious in Ennis. He responds playfully at first when Jack lassos him but...
I agree with you that Ennis thought Jack was taking things too "nonchalant." The words, "time to go cowboy" must have come as a shock of cold water to Ennis: Jack didn't mean anything by these words but Ennis "knew" that it was the end of their time on Brokeback Mountain. The spell was broken.
If Ennis was going to abide by his earlier words to Jack that this was a "one shot deal" (that he spoke to Jack the first evening after the night they had sex together for the first time in the cook camp tent), he knew that the time they had spent together on Brokeback Mountain was coming immediately to an end. Ennis would be going back to marry Alma, start a family, and be who he thought (probably correctly) his conservative rural Wyoming society thought he should be: a married heterosexual man holding down a job to support a wife and family.
Then there was Jack. Despite Ennis's belief that he could be the married heterosexual family man living the sort of life the Old West culture he saw himself a part of demanding of him, it would not give him what Jack could give him. In fact, it could never give him what Jack could give him.
Remember that Ennis, at this point in the story, is unaware of what his feelings for Jack are. He is, as yet, unconscious that he is in love with Jack. He thinks that what he feels when they get back to Signal, WY from herding on Brokeback Mt. is just a hangover from drinking - a very bad hangover that gives him the "dry heaves" and makes him feel as if his intestines are being "pulled out yard by yard" - but nothing more than that. It's only a year later, Ennis later tells Jack in the Siesta Motel four summers afterward in the short story, that he "figured out" what it was.
At that point, by the time Ennis had "figured out" what his feelings for Jack were, Ennis said it was too late. Both of them were married and had children and wives. They had to "stay decent." As Ennis tells Jack, almost as if it was a motto that he condemned himself to live by, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it."
It was Ennis's father who passed down this philosophy of life to his son: the same father who laughed when he showed his two sons, K.E. at age eleven and Ennis at age nine, the corpse of the old gay rancher Earl in the irrigation ditch, left mutilated, with tire iron welts covering his face.
But I think Ennis had accepted his homosexuality at the point he had "figured out" what happened in the shed (warehouse) in Signal, WY that caused him to have the dry heaves after Jack left in his pickup truck. He told Jack in the Siesta Motel that he had "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack since he last saw him. He was afraid of what antihomosexual vigilantes such as father (whom Ennis said he wouldn't have been surprised if he was the old gay rancher Earl's murderer) might do to him and Jack. In fact, he expected that if his father had walked into their motel room at the Siesta Motel in 1967, his father would have killed them in their bed. (Ennis puts himself in the company of the old gay rancher Earl when he thinks of his father doing this to them, too, as well as Earl.)
In a later scene, after Ennis's divorce from Alma, when Ennis & Jack are on one of their "fishing" trips, Ennis asks Jack if he thinks people know who "fellas like us" (homosexual men) are just by the look of them. Ennis also uses the phrase, "boys like you" to describe other men who go to Mexico for the same reason Jack did (for homosexual sex) at the start of their May 1983 argument.
Of course, for whatever reason, Ennis & Jack still talk about having sex with women over their campfire. (Annie Proulx describes their lies as the sparks of quickly fading burning embers caught in the updraft of rising smoke.) Jack says he's cheating on his wife with a Texas ranch neighbor's wife. (Actually, it's probably his Texas ranch neighbor, Randall, whom Jack is cheating with.) Ennis says he's "putting the blocks" on a waitress (Cassie, in the movie).
Ennis's desire to live up to the image of being a "settled" married heterosexual family man (wife and children) prevents him from an earlier recognition of his own homosexuality. The illusions of society's expectations about what is sexually "normal" for everyone destroys Ennis's life.
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I think your description aintfoolin of Ennis's anger (disappointment? despair? desperation?) being in a "progression" is very apt. Something is going on during their wrestling play that turns very serious in Ennis. He responds playfully at first when Jack lassos him...
I agree with you that Ennis thought Jack was taking things too "nonchalant." The words, "time to go cowboy" must have come as a shock of cold water to Ennis: Jack didn't mean anything by these words but Ennis "knew" that it was the end of their time on Brokeback Mountain. The spell was broken. If Ennis was going to abide by his words to Jack that this was a "one shot deal" (that he spoke to Jack the first evening after the night they had sex together for the first time in the cook camp tent), he knew that the time they had spent together on Brokeback Mountain was coming immediately to an end. Ennis would be going back to marry Alma, start a family, and be who he thought (probably correctly) whom he thought his conservative rural Wyoming society thought he should be: a married heterosexual man holding down a job to support a wife and family.
Then there was Jack. Despite Ennis's belief that he could be the married heterosexual family man that the Old West culture he saw himself a part of, it would not give him what Jack could give him. In fact, it could never give him what Jack could give him.
Remember that Ennis, at this point in the story, is unaware of what his feelings for Jack are. He is, as yet, unconscious that he is in love with Jack. (He thinks that what he feels when they get back to Signal, WY from herding on Brokeback Mt. is just a hangover from drinking - a very bad hangover that gives him the "dry heaves" and makes him feel as if his intestines are being "pulled out yard by yard" - but nothing more than that.) It's only a year later, Ennis later tells Jack in the Siesta Motel four summers afterward in the short story, that he "figured out" what it was.
At that point, when Ennis had "figured out" what his feelings for Jack were, Ennis said it was too late. Both of them were married and had children with their wives. They has to "stay decent." As Ennis tells Jack, almost as if it was a motto that he condemned himself to live by, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it."
It was Ennis's father who passed down this philosophy of life to his son: the same father who laughed when he showed his two sons, K.E. at age eleven and Ennis at age nine, the corpse of the old gay rancher Earl in the irrigation ditch left mutilated and with tire iron welts covering his face.
But I think Ennis had accepted his homosexuality at the point he had "figured out" what happened in the shed (warehouse) in Signal, WY that caused him to have the dry heaves after Jack left in his pickup truck. He told Jack in the Siesta Motel that he had "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack since he last saw him. He was afraid of what antihomosexual vigilantes such as father (whom Ennis said he wouldn't have been surprised if he was the old gay rancher Earl's murderer) might do to him and Jack. In fact, he expected that if his father had walked into their motel room at the Siesta Motel in 1967, his father would have killed them in their bed. (Ennis puts himself in the company of the old gay rancher Earl when he thinks this.)
In the later scene, after Ennis's divorce from Alma, when Ennis & Jack are on one of their "fishing" trips, Ennis asks Jack if he thinks people know who "fellas like us" are just by the look of them. Ennis also uses the phrase, "boys like you" to describe other men who go to Mexico for the same reason Jack did (for homosexual sex) at the start of their May 1983 argument.
Of course, for whatever reason, Ennis & Jack still talk about having sex with women over their campfire which Annie Proulx describes their lies as the sparks of quickly fading burning embers caught in the updraft of rising smoke. Jack says he's cheating on his wife with a Texas ranch neighbor's wife. (Actually, it's probably his Texas ranch neighbor, Randall, that Jack is cheating with.) Ennis says he's "putting the blocks" on a waitress (Cassie, in the movie).
Ennis's desire to live up to the image of being a "settled" married heterosexual family man (wife and children) prevents him from an earlier recognition of his own homosexuality. The illusions of society's expectations about what is sexually "normal" for everyone destroys Ennis's life.
well said :clap: i nearly cried at some parts of your post especially the bits about ennis feelings on the last day on brokeback i often wonder imagine if it had been just a 'on shot deal' imagine if jack never sent ennis that post card if ennis and jack never met up again if ennis and jack had just kept going living their lives never seeing each other again, what would be different how would they live, i suppose it doesnt matter because the fact of the matter was they did meet again.
sorry for being *o)
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I stgill have a bit of a problem thinking of Ennis as proud. To me, the explanation of so much in his character relies on the poor self-image Ennis has. I just feel his stoic actions are more out of fear than pride. If he admits he has sexual feelings for another man, he is admitting he is gay and that is dangerous in his eyes, so, the safe thing to do is keep it all inside. He dissembles in order to keep himself safe from pulic criticism and danger, and also from self-knowledge. If you don't admit to yourself what you are, you cannot hate yourself for it.
I do see your point, lamusica. I think there is a lot of truth to what you say. However, I feel that insecurity breeds a kind of hauteur or even flamboyance that only seeke to hide one's weakness. We do see this a lot with very insecure people, no?
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I think your description aintfoolin of Ennis's anger (disappointment? despair? desperation?) being in a "progression" is very apt. Something is going on during their wrestling play that turns very serious in Ennis. He responds playfully at first when Jack lassos him but...
I agree with you that Ennis thought Jack was taking things too "nonchalant." The words, "time to go cowboy" must have come as a shock of cold water to Ennis: Jack didn't mean anything by these words but Ennis "knew" that it was the end of their time on Brokeback Mountain. The spell was broken.
If Ennis was going to abide by his earlier words to Jack that this was a "one shot deal" (that he spoke to Jack the first evening after the night they had sex together for the first time in the cook camp tent), he knew that the time they had spent together on Brokeback Mountain was coming immediately to an end. Ennis would be going back to marry Alma, start a family, and be who he thought (probably correctly) his conservative rural Wyoming society thought he should be: a married heterosexual man holding down a job to support a wife and family.
Then there was Jack. Despite Ennis's belief that he could be the married heterosexual family man living the sort of life the Old West culture he saw himself a part of demanding of him, it would not give him what Jack could give him. In fact, it could never give him what Jack could give him.
Remember that Ennis, at this point in the story, is unaware of what his feelings for Jack are. He is, as yet, unconscious that he is in love with Jack. He thinks that what he feels when they get back to Signal, WY from herding on Brokeback Mt. is just a hangover from drinking - a very bad hangover that gives him the "dry heaves" and makes him feel as if his intestines are being "pulled out yard by yard" - but nothing more than that. It's only a year later, Ennis later tells Jack in the Siesta Motel four summers afterward in the short story, that he "figured out" what it was.
At that point, by the time Ennis had "figured out" what his feelings for Jack were, Ennis said it was too late. Both of them were married and had children and wives. They had to "stay decent." As Ennis tells Jack, almost as if it was a motto that he condemned himself to live by, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it."
It was Ennis's father who passed down this philosophy of life to his son: the same father who laughed when he showed his two sons, K.E. at age eleven and Ennis at age nine, the corpse of the old gay rancher Earl in the irrigation ditch, left mutilated, with tire iron welts covering his face.
But I think Ennis had accepted his homosexuality at the point he had "figured out" what happened in the shed (warehouse) in Signal, WY that caused him to have the dry heaves after Jack left in his pickup truck. He told Jack in the Siesta Motel that he had "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack since he last saw him. He was afraid of what antihomosexual vigilantes such as father (whom Ennis said he wouldn't have been surprised if he was the old gay rancher Earl's murderer) might do to him and Jack. In fact, he expected that if his father had walked into their motel room at the Siesta Motel in 1967, his father would have killed them in their bed. (Ennis puts himself in the company of the old gay rancher Earl when he thinks of his father doing this to them, too, as well as Earl.)
In a later scene, after Ennis's divorce from Alma, when Ennis & Jack are on one of their "fishing" trips, Ennis asks Jack if he thinks people know who "fellas like us" (homosexual men) are just by the look of them. Ennis also uses the phrase, "boys like you" to describe other men who go to Mexico for the same reason Jack did (for homosexual sex) at the start of their May 1983 argument.
Of course, for whatever reason, Ennis & Jack still talk about having sex with women over their campfire. (Annie Proulx describes their lies as the sparks of quickly fading burning embers caught in the updraft of rising smoke.) Jack says he's cheating on his wife with a Texas ranch neighbor's wife. (Actually, it's probably his Texas ranch neighbor, Randall, whom Jack is cheating with.) Ennis says he's "putting the blocks" on a waitress (Cassie, in the movie).
Ennis's desire to live up to the image of being a "settled" married heterosexual family man (wife and children) prevents him from an earlier recognition of his own homosexuality. The illusions of society's expectations about what is sexually "normal" for everyone destroys Ennis's life.
What struck me the most about what you say here is the importance of appearances for them both -- as if they wish to fit into the world of illusion, of what was decent and "true".
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I do see your point, lamusica. I think there is a lot of truth to what you say. However, I feel that insecurity breeds a kind of hauteur or even flamboyance that only seeke to hide one's weakness. We do see this a lot with very insecure people, no?
You're absolutely right, Thomas. Often what we interpret as extreme pride is nothing more than a shield. It sets up a barrier between the person and all other people. In this case, Ennis set the barrier between himself and Alma, his daughters, Cassie, and maybe other potential friends we didn't know about.
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You're absolutely right, Thomas. Often what we interpret as extreme pride is nothing more than a shield. It sets up a barrier between the person and all other people. In this case, Ennis set the barrier between himself and Alma, his daughters, Cassie, and maybe other potential friends we didn't know about.
You're right,the both of you.Ennis knew very well how to build some shields around him to cover and protect himself,one of them this of proud.With it,he also give a not always real image of security,of self trust,that was very necessary to hide better his fears.And,at the same time,proud made him more sure in his possibilities and conditions,because one of his faults was not having a very high degree of self-esteem,IMO.
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All this makes Ennis very hard to read. It takes a while to realize that conflicting tendencies do coexist with him. Illusion or not, his stoicism hides and hints at an underlying conflict deep within.
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well said :clap: i nearly cried at some parts of your post especially the bits about ennis feelings on the last day on brokeback i often wonder imagine if it had been just a 'on shot deal' imagine if jack never sent ennis that post card if ennis and jack never met up again if ennis and jack had just kept going living their lives never seeing each other again, what would be different how would they live, i suppose it doesnt matter because the fact of the matter was they did meet again.
sorry for being *o)
Nothing is "off topic" on this topic zankou1991! Anything having anything to do with suffering is always of interest to Buddhism (which, of course, is always interested in the elimination of any form of suffering).
In the four years between when Jack left Signal, WY (in August 1963 in his pickup truck after Ennis & Jack came down from Brokeback Mt.) and their reunion (at the bottom of the landing steps leading up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat "four summers later") in 1967 in Riverton, WY, Ennis did continue to live his life without Jack. Even after he had the dry heaves and felt as if his intestines were being pulled out, yard-by-yard, thinking he was suffering an especially bad hangover after Jack left him in Signal, WY (to go to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY), Ennis continued to live his life without Jack.
As Annie Proulx narrates, it took Ennis a long time before he felt better after Jack left. But Ennis did eventually feel better.
In other words, Ennis had overcome the attachment to Jack that was causing his suffering. Ennis had released himself, somehow, from the suffering caused by his desire for Jack.
Again, as Ennis later told Jack in the Siesta Motel, the first night after their 1967 reunion in Riverton, WY, it took Ennis about a year to "figure out" what made him feel so sick in Signal, WY, after Jack left. (Ennis then says that if he knew at the time what he knew now, things could have been different for them. Of course, as Ennis next says to Jack, it was now "too late." They both had wives and children.)
But if Ennis had wanted to (despite now being married to Alma), he could have easily found Jack. He knew where Jack lived (assuming Jack had mentioned his parents's ranch and where it was in all the stories he told Ennis about his life growing up while they were sitting around the campfire on Brokeback Mountain). Jack told Ennis that he was going to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, too, when he left Signal, WY in his truck.
All Ennis had to do find Jack was write a post card, General Delivery, to Jack's parents in Lightning Flat, WY. He could have asked them to tell how he could get in contact with Jack. But Ennis chose not to. He was satisfied having "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack (while married to Alma) in the years before Jack re-entered his life, again, in 1967. Jack said it took him a lot of effort to locate Ennis before he could send him his postcard from Texas.
Ennis, at that point, had been willing to let go of Jack.
He was not willing to do it, again.
But Ennis could have used his first separation from Jack in the years before 1967 to guide him to do it again, at the end of the story when Ennis is left alone in his trailer, without Jack, with only the decaying relics of two bloody scentless shirts from Brokeback Mountain hanging on his closet door and a postcard of Brokeback Mt. attached to them. The world is waiting outside Ennis's trailer bedroom window for him.
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Nothing is "off topic" on this topic zankou1991! Anything having anything to do with suffering is always an interest to Buddhism (which, of course, is always interested in the elimination of suffering).
In the four years between Jack left Signal, WY in August 1963 in his pickup truck after Ennis & Jack came down from Brokeback Mt. and their reunion at the bottom of the landing steps leading up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat "four summers later" in 1967 in Riverton, WY, Ennis did continue to live his life without Jack. Even after he had the dry heaves and felt as if his intestines were being pulled out, thinking he was suffering an especially bad hangover after Jack left him in Signal, WY (to go to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY) that Annie Proulx narrates, took a long time before he felt better, Ennis did eventually feel better.
In other words, Ennis had overcome the attachment to Jack that was causing his suffering. Ennis had released himself, somehow, from a painful desire for Jack.
Again, as Ennis later told Jack in the Siesta Motel the first night after their 1967 reunion in Riverton, WY, it took Ennis about a year to "figure out" what made him feel so sick in Signal, WY after Jack left. (Ennis then says that if he knew at the time what he knew now, things could have been different for them. Of course, as Ennis next says to Jack, it was now "too late." They both had wives and children.)
But if Ennis had wanted to (despite now being married to Alma), he could have easily found Jack. He knew where Jack lived (if Jack had mentioned where his parents's ranch was in all the stories he must have told Ennis about them while they were sitting around the campfire on Brokeback Mountain). Jack told Ennis that he was going to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, too, when he left Signal, WY in his truck.
All Ennis had to do find Jack was write a post card, General Delivery, to Jack's parents in Lightning Flat, WY, asking them to tell how he could get in contact with Jack. But Ennis chose not to. He was satisfied having "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack while married to Alma in the years before Jack re-entered his life, again, in 1967. (Jack said it took him a lot of effort to locate Ennis before he could send him his postcard from Texas.)
Ennis, at that point, had been willing to let go of Jack.
He has that example to use as a model, perhaps, to do it again, at the end of the story.
hmmm true...
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Nothing is "off topic" on this topic zankou1991! Anything having anything to do with suffering is always of interest to Buddhism (which, of course, is always interested in the elimination of any form of suffering).
In the four years between when Jack left Signal, WY (in August 1963 in his pickup truck after Ennis & Jack came down from Brokeback Mt.) and their reunion (at the bottom of the landing steps leading up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat "four summers later") in 1967 in Riverton, WY, Ennis did continue to live his life without Jack. Even after he had the dry heaves and felt as if his intestines were being pulled out, yard-by-yard, thinking he was suffering an especially bad hangover after Jack left him in Signal, WY (to go to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY), Ennis continued to live his life without Jack.
As Annie Proulx narrates, it took Ennis a long time before he felt better after Jack left. But Ennis did eventually feel better.
In other words, Ennis had overcome the attachment to Jack that was causing his suffering. Ennis had released himself, somehow, from the suffering caused by his desire for Jack.
Again, as Ennis later told Jack in the Siesta Motel, the first night after their 1967 reunion in Riverton, WY, it took Ennis about a year to "figure out" what made him feel so sick in Signal, WY, after Jack left. (Ennis then says that if he knew at the time what he knew now, things could have been different for them. Of course, as Ennis next says to Jack, it was now "too late." They both had wives and children.)
But if Ennis had wanted to (despite now being married to Alma), he could have easily found Jack. He knew where Jack lived (assuming Jack had mentioned his parents's ranch and where it was in all the stories he told Ennis about his life growing up while they were sitting around the campfire on Brokeback Mountain). Jack told Ennis that he was going to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, too, when he left Signal, WY in his truck.
All Ennis had to do find Jack was write a post card, General Delivery, to Jack's parents in Lightning Flat, WY. He could have asked them to tell how he could get in contact with Jack. But Ennis chose not to. He was satisfied having "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack (while married to Alma) in the years before Jack re-entered his life, again, in 1967. Jack said it took him a lot of effort to locate Ennis before he could send him his postcard from Texas.
Ennis, at that point, had been willing to let go of Jack.
He was not willing to do it, again.
But Ennis could have used his first separation from Jack in the years before 1967 to guide him to do it again, at the end of the story when Ennis is left alone in his trailer, without Jack, with only the decaying relics of two bloody scentless shirts from Brokeback Mountain hanging on his closet door and a postcard of Brokeback Mt. attached to them. The world is waiting outside Ennis's trailer bedroom window for him.
Interesting thoughts, jetzenpolis, especially the part of Ennis freeing himself from attachment in the end.
In some ways, I can see this, and in other ways, I hesitate. The tears in the end seem to still suggest some form of attachment, no? Or perhaps it was a moment of weakness, even though he was indeed on the journey of releasing himself from the bonds of passion.
It is a very Buddhist thing: to purge oneself of passion and desire by suffering through it.
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Interesting thoughts, jetzenpolis, especially the part of Ennis freeing himself from attachment in the end.
In some ways, I can see this, and in other ways, I hesitate. The tears in the end seem to still suggest some form of attachment, no? Or perhaps it was a moment of weakness, even though he was indeed on the journey of releasing himself from the bonds of passion.
It is a very Buddhist thing: to purge oneself of passion and desire by suffering through it.
I'm not claiming that Ennis is a Buddhist in any way, tpe. I don't think Ennis consciously perceives desire, in general, as the source of suffering in his life, as Buddhism does.
However, Ennis is certainly aware of there is a price he must pay for having a desire for Jack, especially a desire with any sort of sexual component included in it. He fears he & Jack might be murdered for their homosexuality by homophobic vigilantes. He's certainly aware of his rural American Old West's society's repugnance toward his homosexuality.
In the beginning, when they were on Brokeback Mt., he refuses to believe he is homosexual even after having sex the first time with Jack in the cook camp tent after he gets drunk. "I ain't no queer," he tells Jack.
But Ennis also overcomes his ignorance about himself and his sexual nature. Again, he tells Jack - in the Siesta Motel, the first night they are together again in 1967 after they last saw each other after coming down from Brokeback Mt. to Signal, WY, four years ago in 1963 - he thought he had a hangover (with dry heaves) from drinking too much alcohol when Jack left to go to his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY, in the northeast corner of the state. But, a year later, he realized what it was. (He was in love with Jack.)
Ennis seems to accept his own homosexuality in a very matter of fact way, once he realizes he is homosexual. He doesn't seem to fight against this knowledge about himself although it takes him awhile to come to it. ("I wrung it out a hunert times thinking about you...," as he tells Jack at the Siesta Motel in 1967.) Ennis also readily admits that he is in love with Jack, even though he doesn't tell him so in so many words. (It took Ennis a year to figure out what the hangover in Signal, WY was.)
In the short story, Annie Proulx, in describing Ennis's willingness to have sex the first time with Jack (when Jack draws Ennis's hand down to Jack's groin in the cook camp tent), says Ennis is somebody who throws himself "whole heartedly" into whatever he does once he decides to do it. Ennis didn't have a lot of time to make up his mind in that situation, of course.
Whichever way he decides to go, the consequences are likely irreversible. If he refuses Jack's offer to have sex, will Jack ever try again?
Of course, Ennis doesn't have any time either to think any of this through. He simply knows he'd like to do it.
(It's only later that Ennis begins to sort out what happens, very slowly. At first, the evening after he has sex with Jack and comes back from the herd to the cook camp, he tells Jack, "I ain't no queer.")
Ennis's ability to eventually see who and what he is clearly (a homosexual man who is in love with another homosexual man, Jack) is what Zen Buddhism calls "Beginner's Mind." Zen seeks to clear the mind of its (intellectualized, socially instilled, or personally desired) preconceptions. A clear mind, emptied of its preconceptions, sees the world fresh. It starts all over from the beginning, each time, the mind completely open to what lies before it.
Ennis doesn't come to his "Beginner's Mind" right away though. It takes him a little time. But when the realization comes, he accepts it. He doesn't try to fight it off. (At least he is this way as far as his reflections about himself go.)
However, he still attempts to keep a social facade of heterosexual "normality" as long as he can with Alma, for example, or anyone else. Perhaps, for whatever reasons both of them have, he also tries to do this with Jack, even years on into their relationship, even after Ennis's divorce from Alma. Annie Proulx describes Ennis & Jack sitting around the campfire, telling stories to each other. The lies they tell each other are lit, burning sparks flying up in the "smoke" of the campfire. Ennis tells Jack he's putting the "blocks" on a waitress (whatever that is) and Jack tells Ennis he's having an extramarital affair with a Texas ranch neighbor's wife.
In their May 1983 argument, with Jack asking aloud he'd like to know how he can quit Ennis, Annie Proulx describes it as being as if the ground they were standing on was splitting open with vents of steam releasing all the pent-up anxieties, fears, anger, doubts between themselves that they had set aside and pushed out of sight. What they put off into a neglected corner for all these years finally begins to rise besides them. What they had kept hidden from each other was coming into conscious view for them.
But as Annie Proulx adds, it was too late for them (to discuss their differences). Ennis & Jack would simply set aside all their differences to patch things up "almost to the way they were before" (previous to their argument). Perhaps their last chance to talk openly with each other, from the heart, was thrown away. After he leaves, Jack tells his parents in Lightning Flat, WY that he is going to bring in a Texas ranch neighbor to be his ranch partner (no longer talking about Ennis del Mar as his ranch partner on the Twist family ranch).
Jack always had a "Beginner's Mind" when it came to his own homosexuality, I think. Even when he appeared to agree with Ennis on Brokeback Mt., telling Ennis, "Me, too..." when Ennis declared to Jack, the world, and perhaps himself, "I ain't no queer!," there is a reluctance in Jack's voice that says otherwise (the evening after they first had sex in the cook camp tent when Ennis came up silently, grimly to where Jack was lying on his side on the ground anxiously beneath the sunset).
Jack knew at that time that he was, in fact, queer. (He was probably agreeing with Ennis in order to keep Ennis from running away from him.)
Perhaps this is what Ennis loved Jack for (Jack's ability to be honest with himself, right away, in the present moment, without having to think it through, without having to wait). At least, it's a part of what Ennis may have loved Jack for.
It's the young Jack, as he was at 19 years of age on Brokeback Mt. with wavy hair and buck teeth, who makes Ennis happy the day after when he dreams of him at night in his trailer. The young Jack's face is as fresh and clear as mountain snow, his cheeks as red rouge as a rose's fragile, tender, richly colored petals.
But Jack was not even conscious - and, at best, not "fully" conscious - of what his sexless hunger for Ennis was in his favorite memory of him was (with Ennis holding him from behind, rocking him into a trance, humming a song to him). Jack is troubled by the thought (even in his favorite memory of Ennis) that Ennis may be holding him from behind because Ennis does not wish to see that it is Jack he is holding in his arms).
Jack did not have a "Beginner's Mind" about his favorite memory of Ennis. Jack was not willing to examine the doubts that troubled this favorite memory.
The "garish" can of beans with the dirty spoon sticking out of it sitting on the log ruins Ennis's dreams of Jack at night. The pillows are wet on those nights rather than the sheets. (The mature Jack is "garish," perhaps, in comparison to the young Jack. But it is the mature Jack that Ennis perhaps misses most.)
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Thanks jetzenpolis. I do agree with you that the Buddhist sentiment is not especially manifest in the character of Ennis. But I will say that I have tried to elucidate that thr story itself has a very Buddhist point of view. It is the same with how some scholars have claimed an underlying Buddhist subtext to love stories like Genji Monogatari or the Story of the Stone, for instance. The characters are so immersed in the world of the senses, but the story uses this to illustrate a very Buddhist perspective in life, through the exposure of the sense and the underlying passions.
I do like your views on the Beginner's Mind, although I am not sure about how far or (at the very least) at what point Ennis accepted his homosexuality -- and I am aware that even the subject of Ennis's homosexuality is not universally accepted here. Nonetheless, I agree that for Ennis, it was a gradual progression into awareness and acceptance. I do think that Jack's death is pivotal to the realization, and this I think is in keeping with how Buddhist commentators view the story.
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I still have a bit of a problem thinking of Ennis as proud. To me, the explanation of so much in his character relies on the poor self-image Ennis has. I just feel his stoic actions are more out of fear than pride. If he admits he has sexual feelings for another man, he is admitting he is gay and that is dangerous in his eyes, so, the safe thing to do is keep it all inside. He dissembles in order to keep himself safe from public criticism and danger, and also from self-knowledge. If you don't admit to yourself what you are, you cannot hate yourself for it.
...Ennis knew very well how to build some shields around him to cover and protect himself, one of them [built] of pride. With it, he also gives an image [that is not always real] of security, of self trust, that was very necessary to hide his fears [better]. And,at the same time, pride made him more sure in his possibilities and conditions, because one of his faults was not having a very high degree of self-esteem, IMO.
One way of answering the question of whether Ennis sought pride or humility is to look at how the self-images [real or imaginary] he sought for in his culture: rural Wyoming in the Mountain West of the United States. (Brokeback Mountain director Ang Lee associates Ennis's character with the "Old West" and Jack's character with the "New West.")
But the Old West of rural Wyoming is not a single world view without internal conflicts of its own. In other words, the "Old West" culture is not an undivided structural "totality" of consistent ideas (in the terms used by Claude Levi-Strauss, a 20th century French "structural" anthropologist).
"Old West" culture, as an ideological "structure," is splintered by many divisions within itself. As a cultural "structure," the logical consistency of Old West culture can't stand up under its own weight.
Old West culture is not a single unitary mass of cultural ideas, assumptions, habits, traditions, attitudes, etc. that are wholly consistent with each other. Rather, the various cultural ideas within Old West culture are often in conflict with each other. Old West culture, thus, is a house is divided against itself.
(In contrast, the rigorous logic used in mathematics puts together various mathematical formulas in a very formal, logically consistent way. The logical consistency of an assembly of a selection of mathematical formulas provides the "proof" of a new mathematical theorems, such as Einstein's famous equation: energy= the speed of light squared.)
Perhaps the greatest cultural division within Old West culture is the difference (contradiction) between "outlaw" and "settler." In the cultural mythology of the American West, the "outlaw" includes train robbers, stagecoach robbers, banks robbers, etc.; saloon keepers; gamblers; dance hall girls (prostitutes); drunken brawlers; "shoot out" duels (to see who is the "fastest gun in the West," etc.); cattle rustlers; claim jumpers (of prospecters' mine claims); etc. On the opposing side of the cultural divide within Old West culture is the "settler." The settler culture includes all the stable "law-abiding" members of an Old West society that view themselves, collectively, as part of a community. The "settler" includes: town bankers; sheriff; storekeepers; local church congregations; school teachers; ranch owners; husbands; wives; children; families; etc.
As a cultural figure in Old West society, the "cowboy" seems to fall somewhere in-between the "outlaw" and the "settler." As are most outlaws (as perceived in the broader American perspective from which I, too, am viewing the Old West), the "cowboy" is: young, male, single, reckless, wild, adventurous, etc. But the "cowboy" is also seen as vital to the economic health of the settler "community": herding livestock.
Livestock ranching, together with mining and logging, is the traditional foundation of the economic "viability" of the American West. Livestock, timber, and minerals are what the American West "exports" (as "raw," "unfinished" resources) to the rest of the nation and the world. In return for what the "natural resource extraction" economy of the American Mountain West exports, the rest of the world provides it with what are considered in industrialized Western civilization to be the necessities and luxuries of life: manufactured goods (including textiles, etc.). The expansion of railroad tracks into the American West allowed its resource extraction economy to grow to a much larger scale than was possible in previous economic eras.
The "cowboy" in the cultural perception of the American West is often seen as a "proud" figure. By contrast, the "settler" is "humble" (unless the settler is a banker or large cattle rancher or some other "important" figure in the community of great economic means).
Ennis, although a ranch hand, seems to aspire more to the "settler" side of Old West culture than to either the "cowboy" or "outlaw" ideal (in contrast to Jack). For example, Ennis offers an explanation to Alma why she should stay home when Jack first comes to Riverton, WY in 1967 (to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat at the top of the landing steps where the "thing" causes Ennis to initiate his kiss with Jack). Ennis tells her that Jack is not a "restaurant type" of guy.
In other words, Ennis views Jack as lacking the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant. This might be more than just an excuse to convince Alma that she'd have a better time staying at home. Annie Proulx adds that Ennis thinks of all the dirty spoons sticking out of the open cans of beans sitting around the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt. when he thinks of Jack.
This is very much a "settler's" perspective that Ennis takes (upon Jack). The settler wishes to be a part of the wider civilized world. The "cowboy" (just as the "outlaw") would, rather than remain outside of it, left alone, on a permanent frontier, away from other people.
Ennis seeks to project a self-image of himself as a "settler" rather than as a "cowboy." He values his humility.
Alma shares this perspective. She, too, favors the "settler" side of Old West culture. She prefers to be in town where there are people. In town, there are playmates for the girls, their daughters, Alma, Jr. and Jenny. She doesn't want to remain isolated on a "lonely" ranch. She convinces Ennis to move to town by reminding him of his own unhappy "lonely" childhood.
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Perhaps the greatest cultural division within Old West culture is the difference (contradiction) between "outlaw" and "settler." In the cultural mythology of the American West, the "outlaw" includes train robbers, stagecoach robbers, banks robbers, etc.; saloon keepers; gamblers; dance hall girls (prostitutes); drunken brawlers; "shoot out" duels (to see who is the "fastest gun in the West," etc.); cattle rustlers; claim jumpers (of prospecters' mine claims); etc. On the opposing side of the cultural divide within Old West culture is the "settler." The settler culture includes all the stable "law-abiding" members of an Old West society that view themselves, collectively, as part of a community. The "settler" includes: town bankers; sheriff; storekeepers; local church congregations; school teachers; ranch owners; husbands; wives; children; families; etc.
As a cultural figure in Old West society, the "cowboy" seems to fall somewhere in-between the "outlaw" and the "settler." As are most outlaws (as perceived in the broader American perspective from which I, too, am viewing the Old West), the "cowboy" is: young, male, single, reckless, wild, adventurous, etc. But the "cowboy" is also seen as vital to the economic health of the settler "community": herding livestock.
Livestock ranching, together with mining and logging, is the traditional foundation of the economic "viability" of the American West. Livestock, timber, and minerals are what the American West "exports" (as "raw," "unfinished" resources) to the rest of the nation and the world. In return for what the "natural resource extraction" economy of the American Mountain West exports, the rest of the world provides it with what are considered in industrialized Western civilization to be the necessities and luxuries of life: manufactured goods (including textiles, etc.). The expansion of railroad tracks into the American West allowed its resource extraction economy to grow to a much larger scale than was possible in previous economic eras.
The "cowboy" in the cultural perception of the American West is often seen as a "proud" figure. By contrast, the "settler" is "humble" (unless the settler is a banker or large cattle rancher or some other "important" figure in the community of great economic means).
Ennis, although a ranch hand, seems to aspire more to the "settler" side of Old West culture than to either the "cowboy" or "outlaw" ideal (in contrast to Jack). For example, Ennis offers an explanation to Alma why she should stay home when Jack first comes to Riverton, WY in 1967 (to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat at the top of the landing steps where the "thing" causes Ennis to initiate his kiss with Jack). Ennis tells her that Jack is not a "restaurant type" of guy.
In other words, Ennis views Jack as lacking the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant. This might be more than just an excuse to convince Alma that she'd have a better time staying at home. Annie Proulx adds that Ennis thinks of all the dirty spoons sticking out of the open cans of beans sitting around the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt. when he thinks of Jack.
This is very much a "settler's" perspective that Ennis takes (upon Jack). The settler wishes to be a part of the wider civilized world. The "cowboy" (just as the "outlaw") would, rather than remain outside of it, left alone, on a permanent frontier, away from other people.
Ennis seeks to project a self-image of himself as a "settler" rather than as a "cowboy." He values his humility.
Alma shares this perspective. She, too, favors the "settler" side of Old West culture. She prefers to be in town where there are people. In town, there are playmates for the girls, their daughters, Alma, Jr. and Jenny. She doesn't want to remain isolated on a "lonely" ranch. She convinces Ennis to move to town by reminding him of his own unhappy "lonely" childhood.
I find this very interesting, especially the part about your interpretation of Ennis saying that Jack was not a "restaurant type".
I wonder if we should split this from the current topic and make it into a separate thread.
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One way of answering the question of whether Ennis sought pride or humility is to look at how the self-images [real or imaginary] he sought for in his culture: rural Wyoming in the Mountain West of the United States. (Brokeback Mountain director Ang Lee associates Ennis's character with the "Old West" and Jack's character with the "New West.")
But the Old West of rural Wyoming is not a single world view without internal conflicts of its own. In other words, the "Old West" culture is not an undivided structural "totality" of consistent ideas (in the terms used by Claude Levi-Strauss, a 20th century French "structural" anthropologist).
"Old West" culture, as an ideological "structure," is splintered by many divisions within itself. As a cultural "structure," the logical consistency of Old West culture can't stand up under its own weight.
Old West culture is not a single unitary mass of cultural ideas, assumptions, habits, traditions, attitudes, etc. that are wholly consistent with each other. Rather, the various cultural ideas within Old West culture are often in conflict with each other. Old West culture, thus, is a house is divided against itself.
(In contrast, the rigorous logic used in mathematics puts together various mathematical formulas in a very formal, logically consistent way. The logical consistency of an assembly of a selection of mathematical formulas provides the "proof" of a new mathematical theorems, such as Einstein's famous equation: energy= the speed of light squared.)
Perhaps the greatest cultural division within Old West culture is the difference (contradiction) between "outlaw" and "settler." In the cultural mythology of the American West, the "outlaw" includes train robbers, stagecoach robbers, banks robbers, etc.; saloon keepers; gamblers; dance hall girls (prostitutes); drunken brawlers; "shoot out" duels (to see who is the "fastest gun in the West," etc.); cattle rustlers; claim jumpers (of prospecters' mine claims); etc. On the opposing side of the cultural divide within Old West culture is the "settler." The settler culture includes all the stable "law-abiding" members of an Old West society that view themselves, collectively, as part of a community. The "settler" includes: town bankers; sheriff; storekeepers; local church congregations; school teachers; ranch owners; husbands; wives; children; families; etc.
As a cultural figure in Old West society, the "cowboy" seems to fall somewhere in-between the "outlaw" and the "settler." As are most outlaws (as perceived in the broader American perspective from which I, too, am viewing the Old West), the "cowboy" is: young, male, single, reckless, wild, adventurous, etc. But the "cowboy" is also seen as vital to the economic health of the settler "community": herding livestock.
Livestock ranching, together with mining and logging, is the traditional foundation of the economic "viability" of the American West. Livestock, timber, and minerals are what the American West "exports" (as "raw," "unfinished" resources) to the rest of the nation and the world. In return for what the "natural resource extraction" economy of the American Mountain West exports, the rest of the world provides it with what are considered in industrialized Western civilization to be the necessities and luxuries of life: manufactured goods (including textiles, etc.). The expansion of railroad tracks into the American West allowed its resource extraction economy to grow to a much larger scale than was possible in previous economic eras.
The "cowboy" in the cultural perception of the American West is often seen as a "proud" figure. By contrast, the "settler" is "humble" (unless the settler is a banker or large cattle rancher or some other "important" figure in the community of great economic means).
Ennis, although a ranch hand, seems to aspire more to the "settler" side of Old West culture than to either the "cowboy" or "outlaw" ideal (in contrast to Jack). For example, Ennis offers an explanation to Alma why she should stay home when Jack first comes to Riverton, WY in 1967 (to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat at the top of the landing steps where the "thing" causes Ennis to initiate his kiss with Jack). Ennis tells her that Jack is not a "restaurant type" of guy.
In other words, Ennis views Jack as lacking the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant. This might be more than just an excuse to convince Alma that she'd have a better time staying at home. Annie Proulx adds that Ennis thinks of all the dirty spoons sticking out of the open cans of beans sitting around the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt. when he thinks of Jack.
This is very much a "settler's" perspective that Ennis takes (upon Jack). The settler wishes to be a part of the wider civilized world. The "cowboy" (just as the "outlaw") would, rather than remain outside of it, left alone, on a permanent frontier, away from other people.
Ennis seeks to project a self-image of himself as a "settler" rather than as a "cowboy." He values his humility.
Alma shares this perspective. She, too, favors the "settler" side of Old West culture. She prefers to be in town where there are people. In town, there are playmates for the girls, their daughters, Alma, Jr. and Jenny. She doesn't want to remain isolated on a "lonely" ranch. She convinces Ennis to move to town by reminding him of his own unhappy "lonely" childhood.
this is really intresting, thanks for sharing with us :)
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Amazing post Jetz, and I agree with everything except the part about Jack and the restaurant.
I think that Jack has the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant!! Jack liked people and he was used to deal with them. He was the one who wanted to live his love for Ennis in a more open way, he wanted to live with Ennis and not only hidden in the middle of nowhere.
Jack liked travelling too, and he used to take drinks in bars, do rodeos, and meet new people. Jack, was a free spirit, yeah, but we saw him having dinner with Randall, Lureen and Lashauwn, and he was talking and dancing. Jack was for sure the restaurant type, and even more town boy than Ennis. Jack could be the shelter type because he wanted to leave those times with Ennis in the mountain and he wanted to do a normal life living with him in a house of their own, and he was living with Lureen in a town bigger than Riverton, and he was in more contact with people than Ennis. He talked a lot and he could make friends if he wanted. Ennis was the solitary cowboy type, not Jack.
Ennis thinks of all the dirty spoons sticking out of the open cans of beans sitting around the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt. when he was dreaming about Jack, not thinking about him as you said. He always dreamt about Brokeback Mountain, and I think he did it not because he didn't see Jack in a certain way (restaurant type) but because he was dreaming about the time he was the happiest in his life, the time he met Jack Twist, the time that branded him for the rest of his life.
Ennis said: "You know me, Jack, the only travelling I've done is going around a teapot looking for the handle...", or something like that. And that was true. Ennis wouldn't go anywhere outside of a small frame of reference he could hold on to. It was a great leap for him to move to the apartment over the laundromat- he didn't want to do that. It was Alma who wanted that. Ennis was happy living somewhere out of the town and he said to Jack up in BBM that he was saving to get his own ranch. Ennis didn't feel confortable with people around him, he was alone in the bars and diners (we see that at least twice in the film) and he didn't speak much. Ennis wouldn't get a job at the power company, making more money. Jack did, he worked as a salesman making good money, dealing with people. That's why I don't think that Ennis wished to be a part of the wider civilized world, as you said. He wanted to have a "normal" life with a wife and kinds, that's true, but he didn't want to make social life, and you see that he didn't want to move to the town and later he didn't want to go with Alma to the church social events. You said that the "cowboy", just like the "outlaw", would left alone, on a permanent frontier, away from other people. And that's the exactly picture of Ennis we got from the film. Ennis wanted to met Jack in the middle of nowhere and then when he divorced Alma, he lived in a cabin far from town, alone, with no people near, and then, at the end, in a trailer, not in a house in town.
I think that Jack was the restaurant type and Ennis not. Maybe Jack was not exactly the Shelter type because he was a dreamer, but Ennis, for me, wasn't that type neither. He was the cowboy type. Jack in his beliefs and way of living became almost a city boy, while Ennis was always a cowboy, the perfect picture of that.
Just my humble opinion. Thank you. ^f^
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god thats such a beautiful post tammy ^f^
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Amazing post Jetz, and I agree with everything except the part about Jack and the restaurant.
I think that Jack has the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant!! Jack liked people and he was used to deal with them. He was the one who wanted to live his love for Ennis in a more open way, he wanted to live with Ennis and not only hidden in the middle of nowhere.
Jack liked travelling too, and he used to take drinks in bars, do rodeos, and meet new people. Jack, was a free spirit, yeah, but we saw him having dinner with Randall, Lureen and Lashauwn, and he was talking and dancing. Jack was for sure the restaurant type, and even more town boy than Ennis. Jack could be the shelter type because he wanted to leave those times with Ennis in the mountain and he wanted to do a normal life living with him in a house of their own, and he was living with Lureen in a town bigger than Riverton, and he was in more contact with people than Ennis. He talked a lot and he could make friends if he wanted. Ennis was the solitary cowboy type, not Jack.
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Very good points, Tammy.
I do think that Ennis openly acknowledged Jack's greater social mobility as well as his greater finesse as far as other people are concerned. "Some high class entertainment" is one example where we see Ennis poking fun at Jack's world -- a world that Ennis felt he didn't belong.
Lureen definietly felt that Jack was someone she could be seen with in public occasions, such as the one when Jack met Randall.
I do think that Ennmis's excuse to Alma was purely a spur of the moment response, in the same way as "He's from Texas" was. To bring back the Buddhist vein into this, I must say that Ennis being oblivious to Alma while he was packing for the fishing trip is one of those "Zen" moments in the film, where we see Ennis in a totally different plane of consicousness. It is telling that such as state is rooted on the element of desire.
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Amazing post Jetz, and I agree with everything except the part about Jack and the restaurant.I think that Jack has the proper social manners to be taken out to a restaurant!! Jack liked people and he was used to deal with them. He was the one who wanted to live his love for Ennis in a more open way, he wanted to live with Ennis and not only hidden in the middle of nowhere. Jack liked travelling too, and he used to take drinks in bars, do rodeos, and meet new people. Jack, was a free spirit, yeah, but we saw him having dinner with Randall, Lureen and Lashauwn, and he was talking and dancing. Jack was for sure the restaurant type, and even more town boy than Ennis. Jack could be the shelter type because he wanted to leave those times with Ennis in the mountain and he wanted to do a normal life living with him in a house of their own, and he was living with Lureen in a town bigger than Riverton, and he was in more contact with people than Ennis. He talked a lot and he could make friends if he wanted. Ennis was the solitary cowboy type, not Jack.Ennis thinks of all the dirty spoons sticking out of the open cans of beans sitting around the cook camp tent on Brokeback Mt. when he was dreaming about Jack, not thinking about him as you said. He always dreamt about Brokeback Mountain, and I think he did it not because he didn't see Jack in a certain way (restaurant type) but because he was dreaming about the time he was the happiest in his life, the time he met Jack Twist, the time that branded him for the rest of his life.Ennis said: "You know me, Jack, the only travelling I've done is going around a teapot looking for the handle...", or something like that. And that was true. Ennis wouldn't go anywhere outside of a small frame of reference he could hold on to. It was a great leap for him to move to the apartment over the laundromat- he didn't want to do that. It was Alma who wanted that. Ennis was happy living somewhere out of the town and he said to Jack up in BBM that he was saving to get his own ranch. Ennis didn't feel confortable with people around him, he was alone in the bars and diners (we see that at least twice in the film) and he didn't speak much. Ennis wouldn't get a job at the power company, making more money. Jack did, he worked as a salesman making good money, dealing with people. That's why I don't think that Ennis wished to be a part of the wider civilized world, as you said. He wanted to have a "normal" life with a wife and kinds, that's true, but he didn't want to make social life, and you see that he didn't want to move to the town and later he didn't want to go with Alma to the church social events. You said that the "cowboy", just like the "outlaw", would left alone, on a permanent frontier, away from other people. And that's the exactly picture of Ennis we got from the film. Ennis wanted to met Jack in the middle of nowhere and then when he divorced Alma, he lived in a cabin far from town, alone, with no people near, and then, at the end, in a trailer, not in a house in town.I think that Jack was the restaurant type and Ennis not. Maybe Jack was not exactly the Shelter type because he was a dreamer, but Ennis, for me, wasn't that type neither. He was the cowboy type. Jack in his beliefs and way of living became almost a city boy, while Ennis was always a cowboy, the perfect picture of that. Just my humble opinion. Thank you. ^f^
Thanks for the compliment on the post Tammy!
Part One: "Settler" vs. "Outlaw" (Wild West Frontier) Culture; "Old" vs. "New" World
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I think the primary difference between Old West "settler" culture and Old West ("wild" frontier) "outlaw" culture is that the settler culture's main value is "permanence." Stability, continuous growth, multi-generational habitation of the same place are all included in the Old West settler's ideal of geographic "permanence" (staying put in one place, long term).
In order to do this, settler culture requires an economy with sustainable "viability" (over the long term). In other words, it has to be multi-generational. It's a place where families can be successfully raised, generation after generation.
"Settlement" includes both town and country. It includes both urban and rural residence. It's the intention of permanently remaining in a place that's most important to Old West "settler" culture, not that it be solely "urban" rather than "rural."
The "Wild West" frontier "outlaw" culture is less interested in economic sustainability. It's often associated with a "gold rush" mentality, for example, and a "boom and bust" economy.
"Wild West" frontier culture is often violent. Its shoot outs, robberies, duels, brawls, etc. are legendary and even a celebrated as part of America's cultural mythology of the Old West's "wild frontier." (It's no place to raise a family, in other words.)
Is the contradiction between "settler" and (frontier) "outlaw" the primary contradiction within Old West culture? In other words, are "settlers" and (frontier) "outlaws" the two most important cultural ideals dividing Old West culture into opposing sides?
Such differences between people's thinking (especially within a culture) not only divide them against each other but can also against themselves. People are torn apart, within themselves, by conflicting attitudes toward politics, religion, sexuality, etc. In other words, the same person within Old West culture can be part "settler," part "outlaw," all at the same time.
There could be other types of contradictions within Old West culture that might also be important.
One avenue of examining what the most important contradictions (differences of opinion) within Old West culture are might start at what is (culturally perceived as) the "opposite" of Old West culture. This can be a little complicated because the phrase "Old West" contains two terms (of reference): namely, "old" and "west."
First, break down the differences between "West" and "East" in American culture. The "West," in American geographical terminology, is used to define one of the most important "regional" differences within American culture.
The opposite of the "West," of course, is the "East."
The American "West" - different in its natural environment, geology, culture, history, climate, economy, etc. than the East - encompasses both the "Old West" and the "New West." In other words, it's an overall category of geographical description that includes both the "Old" and "New" West.
From the Western perspective, the "East" is seen as a "settled" culture.
Interestingly, America, as a whole, looks to Europe (Britain in particular), to find its "old" country of (European ancestral) origin. For Americans of any ancestry (Europe, Africa, Asia, South America, etc.), Europe is the standard example of a settled "Old World" civilization that America compares itself to (and measures itself by).
Europe is the original source of what is now American culture.
For example, the birth of eighteenth century ideals of American political democracy is closely tied to precedents in seventeenth century English political history. The English Civil War between King Charles I and Parliament in the 1640s, resulting in the (temporary) overthrow of the monarchy by Oliver Cromwell, parallels the end of monarchy in the independent American republic declared in 1776. The Ascendency of Parliament in 1689, permanently limited the prerogative of English royal power with a Bill of Rights in the "Glorious Revolution" when William of Orange (King William III) became king. A century later, in 1789, the U.S. Constitution attached a Bill of Rights of its own.
Of course, American culture is also influenced by cultural contributions from other continents. For example, Buddhism (a cultural "derivation" from Asia, if you wish to describe it that way) influenced Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and other members of the Beat Generation in the America of the 1950s.
Americans of all ancestry, of course, share a knowledge of American history, politics, customs, habits, etc. (However, these are also seen from many opposing perspectives, of course.)
All of American culture has a sort of "split personality" in regard to the issue of "settlement" vs. "frontier." This might go back to the differences in the two original permanent English-language colonial settlements on the North American continent: Jamestown, Virginia (1607) and Plymouth, Massachusetts (1620).
A PBS television documentary series, Secrets of the Dead, discusses the differences between the Jamestown colonists and the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock on the Mayflower (in the case of "Death at Jamestown"). The Jamestown colonists were primarily commercial in their motivations for coming to the New World. They were looking for gold. When the search for that precious metal failed, Virginia's earliest colonists turned to tobacco to "get rich quick." They also begin to import African slaves to work their plantation fields very early in the 1600s. The Pilgrims were primarily religious in their motivations for colonizing a New World, rather than commercial.
However, the Puritans and Pilgrims who inhabited what would become Massachusetts also sought economic prosperity, too. Settlers in both Virginia and Massachusetts took land away from the original native tribes inhabiting them.
Thus, from its very beginning, America has always been split between two purposes: the "sacred" (religious devotion, political idealism, cultural advancement, etc.) vs. the "profane" (money, the market economy, profit motive, power, competition, etc.).
Characterized by this division (contradiction) within American culture, the differences between the American East and West are often perhaps not so much a matter of type but rather of degree.
That is, both the American East and West pursue the same dual purposes (the "sacred" and the "profane"). But they each pursue these two different purposes to a different degree.
The American East, within American culture, is regarded as more "settled" because its English language settlement stretches back to the 1600s, far longer than it does in the American West.
Nevertheless, both East and West also share a "wild" (frontier, outlaw) side. In the American East, this wild side is found in its gangsters, teenage gangs, drug addicts, prostitutes, and other "outlaws" and "outcasts" beyond the fringe of a "mainstream" society.
But the American West's frontier "wild" side is much more prominent. It is one one of the West's most cherished cultural values. The American East may romanticize such historical figures as the gangster Al Capone in Chicago. But it is much more ambivalent in its attitude toward its "outlaws" than the American West is (even in Chicago). The East keeps its outlaws at a greater arm's length distance from its everyday life.
Part Two: "Old" vs. "New" West
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The Old West embraces both a "settler" and a wild frontier "outlaw" cultural mentality. What separates the "Old" from the "New" West is not one having only a "wild frontier" culture and the other only a "settler" culture.
Perhaps, instead, the most important difference between the "New" and "Old" West is how the "New" West seeks the preservation of the "wild frontier" as an environmental, scenic, and even cultural characteristic of the American West.
The Old West sees its natural resources (including its scenic beauty) as "limitless." It allows itself a more romantic capitalist view of the world, in which the market economy can exploit natural resources forever, without limit, without regulation.
In order to save the West, the New West knows it needs to set priorities about what it thinks is "best" about the West (and, thus, worth preserving). In other words, the New West knows that it has to choose between competing values to "save" the American West. (The New West knows it is not a "limitless" frontier, in other words.)
The New West is "practical" in the measures it's willing to use in order to preserve the "wildness" threatened by overlogging, overgrazing, strip mining, pollution, uncontrolled growth, dams (water reallocation), etc. (Doesn't that also make the New West more "devout," or "spiritual," with a greater interest in advocating what's "sacred" in American life: protecting scenic beauty, saving the wild natural environment for future generations?)
The New West is not willing to hold onto those traditional Old West values that threaten to destroy all that the New West finds best in the West. The New West does not wish to exploit itself solely for the commercial purposes of business and profit.
Part Three: Cowboys (Two Versions of an American "Heroic" Masculine Legend)
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Ang Lee, the director of Brokeback Mountain regards Ennis as an embodiment of the "Old West," while he finds Jack to be "New West." The most important contradiction within "Old West" culture is the difference between the "settler and "outlaw" (frontier). In his pursuit of his ideal of being a "family man," Ennis stands on the side of the "settler" not the "outlaw" (nor the cowboy).
I'm certain that Ennis belongs to the "settler" side of Old West culture. Annie Proulx describes him as having a "cattleman's" pleasure in the smell of the dirty diapers of his very young daughters. These remind him of "fertility" and "fecundity" (of a cattle barn, etc.)
Ennis enjoys being a father. He insists upon remaining one - to the best of his ability and to the full extent of his legal rights for custody of his children - after his divorce from Alma. (However, after the trauma of his Thanksgiving kitchen argument with Alma, where she accuses Ennis of having sex with Jack on "fishing trips," Annie Proulx says Ennis did not see his daughters for a very long time.)
There seems to be some cultural confusion about what the American ideal of a "cowboy" is. In one version, the "ideal" cowboy is a man "strong" enough to stand on his own, a "rugged individualist." He is somebody who doesn't allow others to persuade him to give up his own opinions (just so that he can be in "agreement" with a group of his peers).
Ennis appears alternately fearful and conformist in regard to his own homosexuality. Thus, Ennis fails to measure up to the first version of the cowboy "ideal" that says he should be a "individualist" willing to go it "alone" (as a "lone" cowboy) in order to do either:
1.) what he wants (without regard for other's opinions);
2.) or what he thinks is "right" (without letting others decide this for him.
The first legendary version of the cowboy - the "lone cowboy" - is an ambivalent, complex masculine hero of the American West. As a hero, he remains embittered, cynical, ornery, and proud. He's not expected to be otherwise. (Here, as a Marxist might point out, the psychology of the "lone" cowboy often closely resembles the "rugged" competitive individualism of a nineteenth century robber baron big industrial capitalist titan of industry.)
A second version of the American ideal of a "cowboy," however, places the cowboy within a group of his cohorts (fellow cowboys). He is given a social life. He becomes a member of a group of cowboys who herd together out on the range. They come into town on Saturday nigh in "high spirits": drinking, gambling, brawling, and whoring together.
Cowboys, as a group, in this second view of a cowboy, are raucous. They seek excitement, such as participating in rodeo events: bull riding, calf roping, etc. They are expected to "whoop it up" for joy during such events. They are supposed to be so enthusiastic about participation in dangerous events (sports or otherwise) that they ignore the possibility of their suffering the injuries that typically occur during such events.
Because "wild" cowboys - as a group - provide work that has been historically vital to the cattle ranching and the other agricultural livestock "industries" of the American West, their leisure pursuits seem to be tolerated by the settler culture of the American West - much more than they might otherwise be. Cowboys are seen as "boys being boys," in other words, as opposed to being thought of as "dangerous" lawbreakers.
Jack quit the rodeo because he was already "busted up" and wanted to get out while he was still able to walk away from it. Ennis, like his father, was never interested in the "8-second ride" (on the back of a bull or "bucking bronco") the rodeo offers its participants.
But Jack starts out as a "cowboy" - in spirit, at least. Only then does he begins to move away from it, perhaps often unconsciously.
Yet, when Jack becomes frustrated (and lonely) at not being able to spend as much time with Ennis as he would like, he seeks solace in Mexico - with "boys like you, Jack" - as Ennis puts it. Mexico, in Ennis's & Jack's time (the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s) is the late 20th century's version of the modern wild frontier - with all of that Latin American nation's corruption, vice, and Third World poverty.
Ennis, perhaps never that much interested in the rodeo, enjoys all the ribald, exuberant antics of Jack on Brokeback Mt. Ennis frequently follows Jack's lead and joins in.
Part Four: San Francisco & "Wild West" Tolerance; Conformity of "Settler" Society
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The Old West's "settler" culture side is perhaps more communal than its "Wild West" frontier culture side. "Settler" culture presumably has greater "community spirit."
There is a larger concern for others within the settler community reaching beyond the self. The well-being of family and neighbors are important. At its highest ideal, "settler" culture is not limited to relations of pure mutual self-interest, such as a business deal in the capitalist market economy (for example, a card game in a frontier town saloon or a mining prospectors' partnership with a town bank or merchant).
But "settler" culture may also be more conformist than what's typically associated with a "Wild West" frontier town. For example, San Francisco, as the ultimate gold rush city (a type of Wild West frontier town), dates its rapid growth dating from the California gold rush of 1849. San Francisco has a cultural heritage of independent thought and tolerance for the differences between people. This tolerance, of course, has long included those who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender.
Obviously, San Francisco has always been very different than the cultural world that Ennis perceives himself as being part of: the conservative rural Wyoming of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.
For Buddhism, the "settler" and "outlaw" cultures of the Old West probably each have separate advantages and disadvantages of their own. Certainly, Buddhism would be cautious about the high passions released on the lawless, violent, wild frontier of the Old West.
Uncontrolled passions run riot in the wild frontier of Old West legend. These often lead to violent confrontations in shoot outs, pistol duels, hangings, etc.
Gold fever, for example, is an uncontrolled desire to find that precious metal. It consumes those who fall to prey to it. Miners and "claim jumpers" kill each other over it.
But the frontier Wild West is also free of the moribund social traditions of Old West "settler" culture. Such stagnant traditions trap people in lives of "quiet desperation."
Obviously, the conformist character common to a homophobic culture would lead many to deny their own sexual orientation in order to "fit in" and be "just like everybody else." When people attempt to believe they are something they are not, they become stricken within anxiety. They inevitably fail to fill the expectations they've set for themselves (in order to achieve some impossible social ideal imposed upon them).
In Zen Buddhism, "beginner's mind," releases the mind from its preconceptions about what society says is the "proper" way for people to live. Thus, Buddhism might find at least something comendable in the "freedom" offered by the American West's "outlaw" culture.
But, again, Buddhism would not accept the criminality or licentiousness of Old West frontier culture, either. "Beginner's mind" does not release you from the obligation to follow a "right" path in your life, whatever it might be.
Jack stares at Ennis on Brokeback Mountain. Ennis says, "What?" ("What's on your mind now, Jack?").
Jack tells Ennis that he's taken by surprise: Ennis is suddenly willing to open up and start talking to him: "Friend, that's more words than you've spoke in the past two weeks."
Ennis replies, "Hell, that's the most I've spoke in a year."
Ennis, in the past year, has been living with his brother. But there was "no room" for him any longer when his brother got married.
Ennis also found himself engaged to Alma. His silence toward his fiancé, Alma, during that past year is telling. He hasn't spoke much in the past year. He probably hasn't spoken much to Alma in that past year.
There certainly seems to be a lack of enthusiasm in Ennis about his pending marriage to Alma (maybe a sense of foreboding, too). Perhaps Ennis is already aware that he lacks a (sexual) interest in women that "everyone" else seems to have.
That makes Ennis different from others, in his own mind. He doesn't know what to think about this. Isn't "everyone" supposed to fall in love, get married, settle down, and have children? That's what Old West "settler" culture tells him.
This self-doubt about not being the "same" (normal), as everyone else, reappears in Ennis throughout the years.
After the first night Ennis & Jack have sex together in the cook camp tent, Ennis comes back the next evening. He finds Jack lying on his side looking out over the sunset. He tells Jack, "You know I ain't queer." Jack responds, "Me neither."
It's interesting that instead of simply declaring, "I ain't queer," Ennis prefaces his declaration (of not being queer) with an additional qualification of: "You know..." He seeks reassurance from others, including Jack, that they "know" he's not "queer." That is, Ennis worries about how he appears to other people, even Jack.
Identifying himself with Old West settler culture (in his aspirations to be a "family man," etc.), it is probably no accident that Ennis worries so much about how others perceive him. "Can people tell who fellas like us are?," as he confides his fears to Jack.
Jack seems taken by surprise by Ennis's worries (about whether people can "tell" who "fellas" like Ennis & Jack are). Then again, Jack also takes precautions against the revelation of his own homosexuality. He keeps all the names and telephone numbers of his "friends" in his head, as Lureen tells Ennis when Ennis calls Jack's number in Childress, TX, long distance from Wyoming.
Part Five: Ennis as "Settler" Introvert; Jack as "Outlaw" Extrovert
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Ennis is an introvert. But introversion shouldn't be mistaken for either a rejection of human contact or a lack of emotion toward others.
Ennis does not seek to escape people's company to live his life, alone, as the classic "lone" cowboy. Rather, he fears the hurt he suffers when others disappoint him.
You can sense Ennis feels abandoned by his brother when his brother got married. It left "no room" for Ennis, anymore, in his own words. He had been living together with his brother until then. Ennis responds warmly to Jack, as a friend, when "none was expected" on Brokeback Mt. It's Alma who sues for divorce, not Ennis.
In the end, as Larry McMurty & Diana Ossana describe it in their Feb. 28, 2006 interview in The Advocate, Ennis chooses his daughter over his usual "workaholic" escapes into his ranch hand job. In fact, Ennis says his boss can find a new "cowboy" - if he's not going to give Ennis time off to go to his daughter's wedding.
Again, just because somebody is an introvert doesn't mean they don't want to have other people in their lives. Introverts care about others - as little or as much - as extroverts do. In other words, introverts don't have a psychological "problem" that needs to be overcome.
Introverts are as mentally healthy as extroverts according to the personality theory developed in the Myers-Briggs (Personality) Type Indicator (MBTI). "Introversion" and "extroversion" (alternately spelled as "extraversion") are simple variations in human personality, to be accepted rather than "cured."
Jack is an extrovert. His wife, Lureen, tells him he's most successful salesman in the farm implement dealership. (Obviously, for sales of any sorts, being an extrovert can be a great occupational advantage.)
Furthermore, as an extrovert, Jack probably knows how to get along better with people (especially strangers) than Ennis does, especially on social occasions. But having good social skills doesn't necessarily make you a better human being.
When Jack & Lureen go to a community social event in Childress, TX, Lureen complains that husbands never ask their wives to dance. Instead of responding to Lureen's hint (that must have been obvious to Jack), he turns to Randall's wife, LaShawn, and asks her to dance, instead.
Ennis had asked Jack how things were between Jack & Lureen in their marriage. In the end, Jack said their marriage could be conducted over the telephone. Jack adds, "for what it's worth," he found humor in Lureen's busyness at the office, running here and there as a jackrabbit might.
Of course, it wasn't Lureen whom Jack wanted to spend his life with. In his marriage to Lureen, Jack was left with a pale shadow of the life he wanted for himself (and Ennis).
But Jack's neglect of Lureen contributed to the lack of psychological intimacy in his marriage. These are the highly predictable consequences of neglect. If you hurt others, they are more likely to avoid you. If you neglect others, they are more likely to respond with a lack of interest of their own.
It is possible to imagine Ennis - if he had been there - taking Jack quietly aside and objecting to his neglect of Lureen. Of course, Ennis never even took Alma to the church dance, when she asked.
Ennis preferred to stay at home to watch TV: a program featuring a dark-haired man with 1970s-style long side burns, dressed in a suit, presumably an urbanite. Perhaps he drew Ennis's sexual interest. (Alma might have seen this, too, perhaps prompting her to ask Ennis to take her to the church dance, in the first place, in order to distract Ennis from what - or who - he was so intently watching on the small black & white television set in their apartment over the laundromat.)
The conversation between Lureen and Randall Malone - left stranded together at their table while Jack dances with a very talkative Lashawn - ends uncomfortably in awkwardness before it even starts. Perhaps seeing Jack's seeming indifference to Lureen's wish to dance with her husband tells Randall that Jack might not be that interested in his marriage. Randall might take this further: if Jack is not particularly interested in women, Jack might be open to a sexual invitation from a another man.
Perhaps Jack would also recognize that Randall, too (an especially quiet husband), would rather be someplace else than with his wife.
Ennis and Jack regard their married lives very differently. Ennis, at least theoretically, takes his marital obligations between husband and wife more seriously than Jack does.
At the Siesta Motel in Riverton, WY in 1967, Ennis says that if he had understood in Signal, WY (the last day Ennis & Jack were together after they came down from Brokeback Mt.) what he did now, "things might have been different" between him and Jack. (Of course, "might have been" is not the same as "would have been.")
But since both of them now had wives and children, they had to be "decent." Of course, Ennis subsequently also "cheats" on Alma, too. He goes on frequent "fishing trips" with Jack.
Being a "decent" member of the community is how "settlers" viewed their lives in the Old West. "Outlaws" and "cowboys" were less concerned about this sort of "decency." They, or course (as "outlaws") seem disinterested in most of the other sorts of "decency" law-abiding society demands.
The most important difference (contradiction) between "settler" and "outlaw" is not whether all settlers are "urban" and all outlaws are "rural." "Outlaws" on the Wild West frontier, such as saloon keepers, dance hall girls, gamblers, etc. are often found in "town." (Of course, all cowboys are "rural," by definition, since their economic profession is an agricultural occupation.)
It's also not even a question of whether all settlers are "extrovert" and all outlaws are "introvert." Again, many outlaws, including drunken brawlers, six gun duelers, even train robbers - as well as saloon keepers, dance hall girls, and gamblers - are "extroverts," too.
Nor, again, are all cowboys "introverts," either. Jack, herding sheep out in the open on Brokeback Mountain, remains an "extrovert." He enjoys talking, roughhousing, and joking with Ennis, encouraging an introverted Ennis to open up.
Rather, the primary difference between the Old West "settler" and the Old West "outlaw" is how they view themselves in regard to their society (community). As a "settler" - even though preferring to be settled on an isolated ranch far from town - Ennis still takes keen interest in being a father to his daughters, Alma, Jr. and Jenny.
In contrast, Jack, seems willing to walk away from his wife, Lureen, and his son, Bobby. While he may have enjoyed letting his young son drive a big tractor in the farm implement dealership parking lot, he would have left both Lureen and Bobby without a second thought, without a glance backwards, in order to have a "sweet life" together with Ennis.
Jack is a rebel. The "outlaw" side of his character can be found in his willingness to make a "deal" with Lureen's father, L.D. Newsome. In exchange for leaving Lureen, Jack thinks her father will offer him a sum of money. Jack proposes in the Siesta Motel in 1967 that he and Ennis can use this money to start up a ranch of their own.
There lies the contrast between Ennis (as an admittedly introverted) "settler" (who's also terrified of public exposure of his homosexuality) and Jack (as a cowboy "outlaw"). It can be found in their differing priorities in their romantic lives (as homosexual lovers) for doing what might be in the best interest of their wives and children.
Even for married men in the heterosexual "mainstream," promiscuity is viewed as a questionable way to lead your "social" life, at best. (A sexual double standard about promiscuity continues to exist in the heterosexual mainstream. It encourages men to be promiscuous - at least to some degree. But women are supposed to be in love with their sexual partners. In the Victorian era of the 19th century, women were supposed to "keep" themselves virgins until they got married, too.)
Jack is very promiscuous.
Furthermore - as Ennis well knows - it's not women with whom Jack is promiscuous. However good Jack keeps up an appearance of heterosexual masculinity, Jack's homosexuality will always place him outside of the heterosexual mainstream, of course.
Jack, if anything, is far removed the "settler" values of (heterosexual) family, stability, etc. (Yet Jack, more than anything else, also seeks a stable, long term cohabitation with his male lover, Ennis. When Jack decides this is no longer possible - on their last day together, the May 1983 argument - he seeks it with Randall.)
Of course, as Ennis sees it, Jack is caught by the "thing" between them. Jack is so emotionally overwhelmed with Ennis, he finds it difficult, if not impossible to have any thoughts to spare for the wife and son he has in Childress, TX.
In the Siesta Motel, Ennis declares - to Jack - that he's "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking (fantasizing) about Jack. He's never thought of anyone else (another man).
Jack, telling a lie, says he's never thought of anyone else, either. (Annie Proulx adds in the short story that Jack rode the bulls rather than rolled his "own.")
In a contest between "settlers" and "outlaws," Ennis's preferred cultural identity is his being a "settler." Ennis's declaration of himself as committed to his marriage to Alma in the Siesta Motel (even as a pretense of homosexual monogamy) would place him outside the "outlaw" camp.
Ennis tells Jack they have to remain "decent" in Riverton, WY in 1967 (the first night they are together since Brokeback Mt.). In the movie, before Jack comes back into his life in 1967, Ennis fought against "outlaw" bikers who used "rough language" in the presence of wives and children at a 4th of July "family" event.
Ennis also chooses a (presumably genuine) homosexual monogamy for himself. (He says he only thinks of Jack, not other men.)
Gay culture, in general, is very tolerant of most, if not all, types of sexual activities between consenting adults. Ennis might not choose homosexual promiscuity for himself but I don't think he'd be morally judgmental about it in others (with the possible exception of his lover, Jack).
In the Siesta Motel, Ennis says that in order for he and Jack to remain decent, they have to remain apart (except once in a while, when and where the "thing" can't harm them). They need to be careful in case they become overpowered by their emotions for each other, again. "If you can't fix it, you have to stand it."
Of course, Ennis is also afraid of the public exposure of his homosexuality. But fear is not what Ennis aspires to. Ennis, in part, aims to do what he feels is "right." That's a "settler's" perspective, as opposed to an "outlaw's" wild frontier perspective.
At the very least, Ennis is probably much more attracted to men, members of his own gender, rather than to women. But any degree of bisexuality in Ennis would probably be small, in my opinion. (Women don't seem to excite him. But Jack does.)
So, what must he do to be "right" by Alma and his daughters? Ennis may be sexually attracted to men rather than women. Nevertheless, he is married to Alma. He has a commitment to her.
Ennis does not see her as his ideal romantic partner (since she does not belong to his own gender, the one most sexually exciting to Ennis). But he knows that she, too, has made a commitment to him (as her romantic ideal).
It's not easy for Ennis to just walk away from his marriage, as Jack seems very willing to do from his marriage to Lureen. Furthermore, Ennis's commitment as a father to his daughters, if anything, is even more important to him than his marriage.
Ennis also likes being a father.
He tells Jack that he would have like to have had a boy, just as Jack and Lureen do, with their son, Bobby. Although he said nothing, Ennis must have been taken aback when Jack said he wanted neither sons nor daughters: "none of neither" (in the Siesta Motel, in 1967, that night on the day they had first seen each other in four years).
Again, even though Ennis loves Jack, he does not feel free to leave his family. All he feels he can offer Jack is their getting together "once in a while, way the hell out in the middle of nowhere, but..." (Jack then cuts in, "Once in a while? Every four fu**in' years?")
For Ennis, Jack (a cowboy "outlaw") may represent a side of himself that he is attracted to. But, as a "settler," Ennis sets being a stable "family man" as his ideal. He won't allow this attraction to deter him from what Ennis sees as the "right" course to take in his life.
Ennis, here, is torn by contradictory emotions and values. (Ennis does agree to see Jack more than every four years, going on frequent "fishing" trips with him while he remains married to Alma and Jack remains married to Lureen.)
Something similar also happens in Jack but in reverse. Perhaps attracted to Ennis's settler side, Jack begins to fantasize about how the two of them can begin to spend the rest of their lives together.
This is not something Jack ever discusses openly (as far as we know) on Brokeback Mountain. It is the young Jack - 19 yrs. old, with wavy hair and buck teeth - whom Ennis dreams about when he awakes with wet sheets. But even the young Jack asked Ennis directly, in Signal, WY after they came down from Brokeback Mountain, if Ennis was coming back next year to herd.
The young Jack, when next year came, asked Joe Aguirre if Ennis del Mar had been around. (Whereupon, in typically bruising words, Joe Aguirre says he doesn't want either of them since they were too busy "stemming the rose" to take care of the sheep.)
Yet, without Ennis (to keep him from becoming so lonely he can hardly stand it), Jack is promiscuous ("riding the bulls, rather than roll his own"). Perhaps that changed when Randall asks Jack if he wants to spend a weekend in a cabin.
After telling Jack they have to remain decent (by staying with their wives and families), Ennis concludes, "If you can't fix it, Jack, you gotta stand it." Jack responds, "For how long?" Jack may be attempting to get Ennis to comprehend the magnitude of this decision. They will be apart for long periods of time. They will be together only briefly, then separated again, back to living the pretense of a heterosexual life, a prospect that excites neither of them.
Ennis tries to reassure Jack that they can "ride it" for as long as they can. (Ennis is saying he won't abandon Jack, even if they can only see each other only briefly, on rare occasions.)
Ennis adds, as a declaration, "There ain't no reins on this one." It's almost as if he's telling Jack that he won't put any reins on his love for Jack (just as Jack has decided not to put any reins on what Ennis calls the "thing").
But Ennis has done just the opposite. He's tightened the reins severely on the "ride" he's having with Jack. If they were tightened anymore, he'd choke the horse and kill the "ride." (In other words, he'd have to become completely abstinent from all sex with Jack.)
Ennis attempts to restrain the "thing" from ever taking hold of him (and Jack) in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Public exposure of their homosexuality could expose them to Old West "vigilante" justice. (It would not have been surprised Ennis if his father had practiced this sort of justice against Earl, the old gay rancher, whose body lay in the irrigation ditch. Ennis's father had showed it to Ennis and his older brother, K.E., when they were 9 years and 11 years old.)
Of course, Ennis is afraid of what could happen to him and Jack. He sought to avoid the risks the "thing" posed to them. He feared a recurrence of the overwhelming emotions that took over their "good judgment" when Ennis initiated his kiss with Jack at the bottom of the landing steps up to the apartment over the laundromat in Riverton, WY.
Ennis had looked to see if anybody was watching them, before letting himself being taken over by the "thing" take over, too, at the bottom of the landing steps. He may have never realized that he hadn't been careful enough. Alma saw what happened from behind the apartment screen door.
Part Six: "If You Can't Fix It, You Gotta Stand It"; Stoicism; Buddhist 8-Fold Path
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"If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it" is as good of a summation of stoic philosophy as you might find anywhere. It defies desire. It stands for doing what's "right," no matter how much emotion (desire) says to do otherwise.
It spurns the happiness that desire offers us an illusion (a deceiving appearance that turns us back toward our experiencing still more suffering). If we succumb to desire, Buddhism says it will lead us to the opposite result we hope for.
Buddhism offers the "8-fold path" as a precursor to a way of understanding the world that can end our suffering in it.
These 8 points are:
1.) Right Speech
(speak in a non-hurtful, non-exaggerating, truthful way)
2.) Right Actions
(wholesome action, avoiding action that would do harm)
3.) Right Livelihood
(not harmful in any way to oneself or others; directly or indirectly)
4.) Right Effort/Exercise
(make continuing efforts to improve)
5.) Right Mindfulness/Awareness
(know things for what they are in a clear, conscious way)
6.) Right Concentration/Meditation
(examining the present reality within oneself, without craving, without aversion)
7.) Right Understanding
(understand reality as it is, not just as it appears to be)
8.) Right Thoughts
(change the pattern of thinking, to correct erroneous or wrong thoughts)
Secrets of the Dead (PBS)
"Death at Jamestown"
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/previous_seasons/case_jamestown/index.html
Wikipedia: Saddle bronc and bareback riding
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddle_bronc_and_bareback_riding
Memorable Quotes for Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Internet Movie Data Base (imdb.com)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0388795/quotes "Brokeback's big secrets"
Anne Stockwell interview with "Brokeback Mountain" screenwriters: Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
The Advocate (February 28, 2006)
http://www.advocate.com/issue_story_ektid25277.asp
"Myers-Briggs Type Indicator" (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers_Briggs_Type_Indicator "Buddhism" (Wikipedia)
The Noble Eightfold Path
Main article: Noble Eightfold Path
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism
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Very good points, Tammy.
I do think that Ennis openly acknowledged Jack's greater social mobility as well as his greater finesse as far as other people are concerned. "Some high class entertainment" is one example where we see Ennis poking fun at Jack's world -- a world that Ennis felt he didn't belong.
Lureen definietly felt that Jack was someone she could be seen with in public occasions, such as the one when Jack met Randall.
I do think that Ennmis's excuse to Alma was purely a spur of the moment response, in the same way as "He's from Texas" was. To bring back the Buddhist vein into this, I must say that Ennis being oblivious to Alma while he was packing for the fishing trip is one of those "Zen" moments in the film, where we see Ennis in a totally different plane of consicousness. It is telling that such as state is rooted on the element of desire.
I agree, Ennis' body may have been there with Alma but his spirit was elsewhere with Jack and I think it was this way many times during that marriage.
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Thanks jetzenpolis. There is a lot of materia in your last post, and perhaps I would want to pick up on a few elements for starters. I think you or someone else had elucidated a number of points before -- no?
There is one crucial element where stoicism diverges from Buddhism: in that virtue in the former is the same as right reason, whereas in the latter, all reason (and therefore virtue itself) is illusion.
Hence, Seneca:
Quare non est ullum bonum altero maius? quia non est quicquam apto aptius, quia plano nihil est planius. Non potes dicere hoc magis par esse alicui quam illud; ergo nec honesto honestius quicquam est. Quod si par omnium virtutum natura est, tria genera bonorum in aequo sunt. Ita dico: in aequo est moderate gaudere et moderate dolere. Laetitia illa non vincit hanc animi firmitatem sub tortore gemitus devorantem: illa bona optabilia, haec mirabilia sunt, utraque nihilominus paria, quia quidquid incommodi est vi tanto maioris boni tegitur. Quisquis haec imparia iudicat ab ipsis virtutibus avertit oculos et exteriora circumspicit. Bona vera idem pendent, idem patent: illa falsa multum habent vani; itaque speciosa et magna contra visentibus, cum ad pondus revocata sunt, fallunt. Ita est, mi Lucili: quidquid vera ratio commendat solidum et aeternum est, firmat animum attollitque semper futurum in excelso. illa quae temere laudantur et vulgi sententia bona sunt inflant inanibus laetos; rursus ea quae timentur tamquam mala iniciunt formidinem mentibus et illas non aliter quam animalia specie periculi agitant. Utraque ergo res sine causa animum et diffundit et mordet: nec illa gaudio nec haec metu digna est. Sola ratio immutabilis et iudicii tenax est; non enim servit sed imperat sensibus. Ratio rationi par est, sicut rectum recto; ergo et virtus virtuti; nihil enim aliud est virtus quam recta ratio. Omnes virtutes rationes sunt; rationes sunt, si rectae sunt; si rectae sunt, et pares sunt. Qualis ratio est, tales et actiones sunt; ergo omnes pares sunt; nam cum similes rationi sint, similes et inter se sunt. Pares autem actiones inter se esse dico qua honestae rectaeque sunt; ceterum magna habebunt discrimina variante materia, quae modo latior est, modo angustior, modo illustris, modo ignobilis, modo ad multos pertinens, modo ad paucos. In omnibus tamen istis id quod optimum est par est: honestae sunt. Tamquam viri boni omnes pares sunt qua boni sunt, sed habent differentias aetatis: alius senior est, alius iunior; habent corporis: alius formosus, alius deformis est; habent fortunae: ille dives, hic pauper est, ille gratiosus, potens, urbibus notus et populis, hic ignotus plerisque et obscurus. Sed per illud quo boni sunt pares sunt.
(Why is no good greater than any other good? It is because nothing can be more fitting than that which is fitting, and nothing more level than that which is level. You cannot say that one thing is more equal to a given object than another thing; hence also nothing is more honourable than that which is honourable. Accordingly, if all the virtues are by nature equal, the three varieties of goods are equal. This is what I mean: there is an equality between feeling joy with self- control and suffering pain with self-control. The joy in the one case does not surpass in the other the steadfastness of soul that gulps down the groan when the victim is in the clutches of the torturer; goods of the first kind are desirable, while those of the second are worthy of admiration; and in each case they are none the less equal, because whatever inconvenience attaches to the latter is compensated by the qualities of the good, which is so much greater. Any man who believes them to be unequal is turning away from the virtues themselves and is surveying mere externals; true goods have the same weight and the same width. The spurious sort contain much emptiness; hence, when they are weighed in the balance, they are found wanting, although they look imposing and grand to the gaze. Yes, my dear Lucilius, the good which true reason approves is solid and everlasting; it strengthens the spirit and exalts it, so that it will always be on the heights; but those things which are thoughtlessly praised, and are goods in the opinion of the mob merely puff us up with empty joy. And again, those things which are feared as if they were evils merely inspire trepidation in men's minds, for the mind is disturbed by the semblance of danger, just as animals are disturbed. Hence it is without reason that both these things distract and sting the spirit; the one is not worthy of joy, nor the other of fear. It is reason alone that is unchangeable, that holds fast to its decisions. For reason is not a slave to the senses, but a ruler over them. Reason is equal to reason, as one straight line to another; therefore virtue also is equal to virtue. Virtue is nothing else than right reason. All virtues are reasons. Reasons are reasons, if they are right reasons. If they are right, they are also equal. As reason is, so also are actions; therefore all actions are equal. For since they resemble reason, they also resemble each other. Moreover, I hold that actions are equal to each other in so far as they are honourable and right actions. There will be, of course, great differences according as the material varies, as it becomes now broader and now narrower, now glorious and now base, now manifold in scope and now limited. However, that which is best in all these cases is equa]; they are all honourable. In the same way, all good men, in so far as they are good, are equal. There are, indeed, differences of age, one is older, another younger; of body, one is comely, another is ugly; of fortune, - this man is rich, that man poor, this one is influential, powerful, and well-known to cities and peoples, that man is unknown to most, and is obscure. But all, in respect of that wherein they are good, are equal. The senses do not decide upon things good and evil; they do not know what is useful and what is not useful. They cannot record their opinion unless they are brought face to face with a fact; they can neither see into the future nor recollect the past; and they do not know what results from what. But it is from such knowledge that a sequence and succession of actions is woven, and a unity of life is created, a unity which will proceed in a straight course. Reason, therefore, is the judge of good and evil; that which is foreign and external she regards as dross, and that which is neither good nor evil she judges as merely accessory, insignificant and trivial. For all her good resides in the soul. )
In this sense, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it" is truly closer to stoicism in the classic sense, and that the purging of desires in this case only approximates the Buddhist view. For Ennis looks upon this as a necessary (or necessitated) virtue, rather than as a rejection of all things illusionary...
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I agree, Ennis' body may have been there with Alma but his spirit was elsewhere with Jack and I think it was this way many times during that marriage.
So true. Alma and the marriage often looked like an illusion, and that all reality was in his interior love for Jack.
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Thanks jetzenpolis. There is a lot of material in your last post, and perhaps I would want to pick up on a few elements for starters. I think you or someone else had elucidated a number of points before -- no?
There is one crucial element where stoicism diverges from Buddhism: in that virtue in the former is the same as right reason, whereas in the latter, all reason (and therefore virtue itself) is illusion.
Hence, Seneca:
(...Accordingly, if all the virtues are by nature equal, the three varieties of goods are equal. This is what I mean: there is an equality between feeling joy with self- control and suffering pain with self-control. The joy in the one case does not surpass in the other the steadfastness of soul that gulps down the groan when the victim is in the clutches of the torturer; goods of the first kind are desirable, while those of the second are worthy of admiration...The spurious sort [of "good" (or seemingly "desirable") qualities, "good" (or seemingly "desirable") character traits, "good" (or seemingly "desirable") events, (or seemingly "desirable") "good" (or seemingly "desirable") material conditions, (or seemingly "desirable") good "emotions," etc.] contain much emptiness; hence, when they are weighed in the balance, they are found wanting, although they look imposing and grand to the gaze. Yes, my dear Lucilius, the good which true reason approves is solid and everlasting; it strengthens the spirit and exalts it, so that it will always be on the heights; but those things which are thoughtlessly praised, and are goods in the opinion of the mob merely puff us up with empty joy. And again, those things which are feared as if they were evils merely inspire trepidation in men's minds, for the mind is disturbed by the semblance of danger, just as animals are disturbed. Hence it is without reason that both these things distract and sting the spirit; the one is not worthy of joy, nor the other of fear. It is reason alone that is unchangeable, that holds fast to its decisions. For reason is not a slave to the senses, but a ruler over them....Virtue is nothing else than right reason. All virtues are reasons...For since they resemble reason, they also resemble each other. Moreover, I hold that actions are equal to each other in so far as they are honourable and right actions... that which is best in all these cases is equal; they are all honourable. In the same way, all good men, in so far as they are good, are equal. There are, indeed, differences of age, one is older, another younger; of body, one is comely, another is ugly; of fortune, - this man is rich, that man poor, this one is influential, powerful, and well-known to cities and peoples, that man is unknown to most, and is obscure. But all, in respect of that wherein they are good, are equal. The senses do not decide upon things good and evil; they do not know what is useful and what is not useful. They cannot record their opinion unless they are brought face to face with a fact; they can neither see into the future nor recollect the past; and they do not know what results from what. But it is from such knowledge that a sequence and succession of actions is woven, and a unity of life is created, a unity which will proceed in a straight course. Reason, therefore, is the judge of good and evil; that which is foreign and external she regards as dross, and that which is neither good nor evil she judges as merely accessory, insignificant and trivial. For all her good resides in the soul. )
In this sense, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it" is truly closer to stoicism in the classic sense, and that the purging of desires in this case only approximates the Buddhist view. For Ennis looks upon this as a necessary (or necessitated) virtue, rather than as a rejection of all things illusionary...
Thanks tpe
I absolutely agree with you that Ennis's philosophy in "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it," more closely approximates Seneca's classical stoicism than Buddhism, although both seek to move past "desire" (craving). As I understand it, Seneca is saying - in this quote -that "right" reason poses solutions (paths of actions) that may require great suffering for people to successfully traverse their pursuit of what's "good." The victim of torture refuses to talk, for example.
In Seneca's stoicism, Ennis must decide, one way or the other, whether the "good" is found in either staying married to Alma and keeping his family intact or sharing his life with Jack (or some combination of the two). There is pain associated with either decision for Ennis. But the "good" (decision), according to Seneca, "is what it is," whatever it might be. Ennis must choose it and abide by the consequences. In other words, since he "can't fix it" (by making everyone happy, including himself), he must "stand it" (live with the pain following upon taking one course of action in life rather than another).
In fact, Buddhism claims that there is always a "fix" to the situation (no matter what it is): the end of "desire." The cessation of (craving) desire is the end of suffering. In other words, Buddhism says that once Ennis's (craving) desires ceases, there would be no need for him to have to "stand it" any longer because his situation (his predicaments) would no longer cause him suffering. The subsequent clearing of his mind would enable him to obtain greater mental capacities (intellectually, emotionally, intuitively) to find the "right path" (best solution) to the problems and questions facing him.
Ennis struggles to find a "balance" between achieving the "good" (an ideal point which can satisfy the competing claims on him of his marriage to Alma; his being a "decent" parent to Alma, Jr. & Jenny; and his love for Jack) that causes the least amount of emotional harm (suffering) to each of them.
It's a difficult balance that, in the end, fails. Alma decides she's had "enough" and divorces Ennis.
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Thanks tpe
I absolutely agree with you that Ennis's philosophy in "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it," more closely approximates Seneca's classical stoicism than Buddhism, although both seek to move past "desire" (craving). As I understand it, Seneca is saying - in this quote -that "right" reason poses solutions (paths of actions) that may require great suffering for people to successfully traverse their pursuit of what's "good." The victim of torture refuses to talk, for example.
In Seneca's stoicism, Ennis must decide, one way or the other, whether the "good" is found in either staying married to Alma and keeping his family intact or sharing his life with Jack (or some combination of the two). There is pain associated with either decision for Ennis. But the "good" (decision), according to Seneca, "is what it is," whatever it might be. Ennis must choose it and abide by the consequences. In other words, since he "can't fix it" (by making everyone happy, including himself), he must "stand it" (live with the pain following upon taking one course of action in life rather than another).
In fact, Buddhism claims that there is always a "fix" to the situation (no matter what it is): the end of "desire." The cessation of (craving) desire is the end of suffering. In other words, Buddhism says that once Ennis's (craving) desires ceases, there would be no need for him to have to "stand it" any longer because his situation (his predicaments) would no longer cause him suffering. The subsequent clearing of his mind would enable him to obtain greater mental capacities (intellectually, emotionally, intuitively) to find the "right path" (best solution) to the problems and questions facing him.
Ennis struggles to find a "balance" between achieving the "good" (an ideal point which can satisfy the competing claims on him of his marriage to Alma; his being a "decent" parent to Alma, Jr. & Jenny; and his love for Jack) that causes the least amount of emotional harm (suffering) to each of them.
It's a difficult balance that, in the end, fails. Alma decides she's had "enough" and divorces Ennis.
I agree with your distinction, jetzenpolis. Indeed, Ennis equates the virtuous path to what is rational or reasonable, and the consequences must be borne, because reason is above feeling. The fact that he pretty much confesses to failure or near-failure ("I can't stand this any more, Jack") does not change his determination to "stand" it even at that painful moment. There is virtue even in suffering and defeat.
The "fix" in Buddhism is certainly different from this. And you know, I wonder whether in the end, Ennis moves closer to this, although the tears in the end would suggest that he is still far from perfect in the Buddhist sense. The tears would seemingly imply that he is still "standing" it, and that suffering had not ceased.
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Hence, Seneca:
(Why is no good greater than any other good? It is because nothing can be more fitting than that which is fitting, and nothing more level than that which is level...Accordingly, if all the virtues are by nature equal, the three varieties of goods are equal. This is what I mean: there is an equality between feeling joy with self- control and suffering pain with self-control. The joy in the one case does not surpass in the other the steadfastness of soul that gulps down the groan when the victim is in the clutches of the torturer; goods of the first kind are desirable, while those of the second are worthy of admiration; and in each case they are none the less equal, because whatever inconvenience attaches to the latter is compensated by the qualities of the good, which is so much greater. Any man who believes them to be unequal is turning away from the virtues themselves and is surveying mere externals...)
...Indeed, Ennis equates the virtuous path to what is rational or reasonable, and the consequences must be borne, because reason is above feeling. The fact that he pretty much confesses to failure or near-failure ("I can't stand this any more, Jack") does not change his determination to "stand" it even at that painful moment. There is virtue even in suffering and defeat.
You said it perfectly, tpe! ...
I think Ennis's stoicism, along with his compassion, his ability to remain cool-headed when faced with the aggressions (verbal and otherwise) of "stud ducks," is one of the qualities I most admire about him. His determination to "stand it" is remarkable.
It flies in the face of certain attitudes, at their most popular in the 1960s "sexual revolution," that equate the conscious release of libido to "love." ("Make love, not war," is an example of a popular slogan of the time containing this idea.) In other words, if we just had sex, we would "liberate" ourselves (from the constraints of a repressive, anti-creative, war-like, violence-prone, profit-obsessed exploitive society).
Obviously, gay rights benefited tremendously from the liberations that the sexual revolution did offer. After all, it was the sexual revolution that successfully promoted the view that all sexual relations between consenting adults (as long as these don't involve violence) was "permissable."
But the proponents of the sexual revolution claimed too much on behalf of its possibilities of human "liberation." Yes, it's good to reclaim sensual pleasure from a rigid moral code that seeks to contain sexuality within a very tightly enforced set of boundaries (sex only within heterosexual marriage, only for the sake of producing children, etc.). But having lots of sex, as much as you want, whenever you want it, with whomever you want it does not "guarantee" you will become a better human being. (The world is filled with lots of cruel, narrow-minded people, who care nothing about others, but who - nevertheless - have had lots of sex.)
A complete abandonment to sensuality risks sexual addiction, too. Within the gay community - whether it's the gay mainstream or "butch" gay masculinity - there is often a celebration of a sort of blind, wrong-headed, thrill-seeking, constant pursuit of (sexual) "excitement."
It's not only gay men who fall prey to these obsessive-compulsive attitudes about sex but also heterosexual men. In fact, in American society, men often seem traditionally limited to only two emotions: 1.) anger; 2.) excitement (thrill-seeking).
In many ways, Ennis provides a counterpoint to all of this. He's often emotionally vulnerable. (He regrets the loss of the sheep's life to wild predators when he returns to the herd camp the next day after he first has sex with Jack in the cook camp tent, for example. He nervously, humbly rests his head on Jack's chest the second night he returns to their tent.)
But he's also strong and exacting - at least, in his own mind - about what his remaining "decent" requires of him.
The "fix" in Buddhism is certainly different from this. And you know, I wonder whether in the end, Ennis moves closer to this, although the tears in the end would suggest that he is still far from perfect in the Buddhist sense. The tears would seemingly imply that he is still "standing" it, and that suffering had not ceased.
Very few of us have achieved complete "enlightenment," in the Buddhist sense. As far as I might understand it, enlightenment is a full conscious awareness of: (craving) desire as the source of suffering.
(Buddhism is very hesitant about descriptions of "enlightenment." It warns us not to trust claims of enlightenment. Zen says those who are enlightened will never claim to be "enlightened," for example. There is a Zen koan that says, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.")
But if we are not fully rid of desire, we can still move ourselves forward in that direction. Of course, overcoming desire may require us to face the pain of a sense of loss. Thus, there may be many tears and groans as we pull ourselves away from that we clutch at desperately to hold tightly within our grasp. (Ennis still cries because he still craves the companionship of his lover, Jack.
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I think Ennis's stoicism, along with his compassion, his ability to remain cool-headed when faced with the aggressions (verbal and otherwise) of "stud ducks," is one of the qualities I most admire about him. His determination to "stand it" is remarkable.
It flies in the face of certain attitudes, at their most popular in the 1960s "sexual revolution," that equate the conscious release of libido to "love." ("Make love, not war," is an example of a popular slogan of the time containing this idea.) In other words, if we just had sex, we would "liberate" ourselves (from the constraints of a repressive, anti-creative, war-like, violence-prone, profit-obsessed exploitive society).
Obviously, gay rights benefited tremendously from the liberations that the sexual revolution did offer. After all, it was the sexual revolution that successfully promoted the view that all sexual relations between consenting adults (as long as these don't involve violence) was "permissable."
But the proponents of the sexual revolution claimed too much on behalf of its possibilities of human "liberation." Yes, it's good to reclaim sensual pleasure from a rigid moral code that seeks to contain sexuality within a very tightly enforced set of boundaries (sex only within heterosexual marriage, only for the sake of producing children, etc.). But having lots of sex, as much as you want, whenever you want it, with whomever you want it does not "guarantee" you will become a better human being. (The world is filled with lots of cruel, narrow-minded people, who care nothing about others, but who - nevertheless - have had lots of sex.)
A complete abandonment to sensuality risks sexual addiction, too. Within the gay community - whether it's the gay mainstream or "butch" gay masculinity - there is often a celebration of a sort of blind, wrong-headed, thrill-seeking, constant pursuit of (sexual) "excitement."
It's not only gay men who fall prey to these obsessive-compulsive attitudes about sex but also heterosexual men. In fact, in American society, men often seem traditionally limited to only two emotions: 1.) anger; 2.) excitement (thrill-seeking).
In many ways, Ennis provides a counterpoint to all of this. He's often emotionally vulnerable. (He regrets the loss of the sheep's life to wild predators when he returns to the herd camp the next day after he first has sex with Jack in the cook camp tent, for example. He nervously, humbly rests his head on Jack's chest the second night he returns to their tent.)
But he's also strong and exacting - at least, in his own mind - about what his remaining "decent" requires of him.
There is always that tension between the Apollonian and Dionysian tendencies of human nature, no? Ennis is perhaps a great embodiment of this tension, as much as Jack is a subtle embodiment of the Dionysian nature, IMO. The tension is of course very much a part of the sexual revolution and the resulting reaction. From this same tension also arises Ennis's implicit stoicism, and it also enobles him, in a way -- in spite of his many weaknesses. It does give him the "decency" that we refer to.
Very few of us have achieved complete "enlightenment," in the Buddhist sense. As far as I might understand it, enlightenment is a full conscious awareness of: (craving) desire as the source of suffering.
(Buddhism is very hesitant about descriptions of "enlightenment." It warns us not to trust claims of enlightenment. Zen says those who are enlightened will never claim to be "enlightened," for example. There is a Zen koan that says, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.")
But if we are not fully rid of desire, we can still move ourselves forward in that direction. Of course, overcoming desire may require us to face the pain of a sense of loss. Thus, there may be many tears and groans as we pull ourselves away from that we clutch at desperately to hold tightly within our grasp. (Ennis still cries because he still craves the companionship of his lover, Jack.
Yes, I think this is the best way of understanding the older Ennis in the Buddhistic context. It is a movement towards enlightenment, brought out through the "dream" of pain and suffering -- a spiritual cleansing of sorts.
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...There is one crucial element...from Buddhism:...whereas in the latter, all reason (and therefore virtue itself) is illusion...
In this sense, "If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it" is truly closer to stoicism in the classic sense, and that the purging of desires in this case only approximates the Buddhist view. For Ennis looks upon this as a necessary (or necessitated) virtue, rather than as a rejection of all things illusionary...
Reason and illusion is a big topic!
I'm not certain if Buddhism regards reason, itself, as an illusion. Rather than that, I think Buddhism might say that the premises of what we (as conscious beings) assume about the composition of (our) reality - as a cultural or even personal "structure" of things, events, etc. - are limited forms of knowledge.
For example, in a well-known Buddhist argument about the illusionary nature of "existence" (as it's perceived by the mind, in its conscious perception of "reality"), an ox-cart is examined. Start pulling the ox-cart apart. Take off the wheels. Take away the axle. Take away the bed of the ox-cart, etc. At what point does the ox-cart stop being an "ox-cart"?
Jean-Paul Sartre, the mid-twentieth century French "existentialist" philosopher, asks a similar question. He distinguishes his existentialism from philosophy, in general, by saying that "existence" precedes "essence." In Sartre's opinion, this reverses the position that non-existential philosophy took: that all things have an "essence" (that can be defined with a set of carefully described abstract principles).
Sartre says there is a "real life" example (an ideal version) of whatever sort of "thing" you might choose to contemplate upon. For example, if you are contemplating the "tea cup," you would have a picture of an ideal "tea cup" in your mind (the perfect example of a tea cup): against which all other examples of a "tea cup" are compared (and to some degree presumably found wanting).
In other words, a "tea cup" is not careful composition based upon a strict set of abstract principles, such as a tea cup being required to have a "handle," a (round) bowl, a saucer beneath it, etc. Rather there is the picture of an "ideal" (original) tea cup in our mind - against which all other things are compared. If we find these other things similar enough to our original "perfect" tea cup, we include them among those things (phenomena) we have previously categorized as also being a "tea cup."
Going further, we can ask how we decide to categorize reality into discrete phenomenon (that we then label as being "different" things from each other).
"You can't see the forest but for the trees." Here is an example of how our categorization of things (phenomena) as being different from each other can obstruct our perception of "reality." We see a bunch of separate trees. Our categorization of reality, here - at its most simple - is limited to an assessment of things (phenomena) as being either: a "tree" or "not a tree." Our perception of reality is limited because it does not include the category of "forest" (as a collective assembly of trees in a single location).
Our perception of reality is limited because there is a finite number of ways into which we categorize perception, in other words.
Scientific advancement is often a matter of breaking through, going beyond old categorical perceptions of the natural world, either though direct observation or mathematical calculation. Einstein's theory of relativity connected the heretofore separate categories of "time" and "space" into "space-time" - with his equation: energy = mass x the squaring of the speed of light. As you approach the speed of light, time slows (in "relative" comparison to things moving less fast) and space compresses (in "relative" comparison to things moving less fast) in the direction you travel in.
Ennis's perception of what being "queer" was (after he talked to Jack the next evening after the first night they had sex together on Brokeback Mt.) is an example of limited perception. His idea of who was homosexual did not seem to include somebody like himself, in other words. (Or he sought to believe that about himself.)
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Ennis's categorization of being queer is certainly a fine example of limited perception. I would even go further to say that the categorization seems to put himself in a separate space, while using Jack as an archetype for everyone else in the sense of queerness.
I think compartmentalization is just one element in Ennis's distinction between himself and the rest of "queerdom."
For one, there is a certain logic to his way of thinking -- in the sense that he takes his love for Jack as the anomaly, and hence of limited/restricted import. It would seem like the anomaly is tantamount to an illusion, and hence can be compartmentalized as such -- if you ignore it, it will go away. The distinction between reality and illusion becomes confused, such that he takes reality for illusion and pretense for reality...
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Ennis's categorization of being queer is certainly a fine example of limited perception. I would even go further to say that the categorization seems to put himself in a separate space, while using Jack as an archetype for everyone else in the sense of queerness.
I think compartmentalization is just one element in Ennis's distinction between himself and the rest of "queerdom."
For one, there is a certain logic to his way of thinking -- in the sense that he takes his love for Jack as the anomaly, and hence of limited/restricted import. It would seem like the anomaly is tantamount to an illusion, and hence can be compartmentalized as such -- if you ignore it, it will go away. The distinction between reality and illusion becomes confused, such that he takes reality for illusion and pretense for reality...
wow! well said...really really really well said. i had to read it a few times to take it all in. marvelouse.
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Quote from: tpe on Jun 23, 2008, 09:07 AM
...I do think that Ennis's excuse to Alma was purely a spur of the moment response, in the same way as "He's from Texas" was. To bring back the Buddhist vein into this, I must say that Ennis being oblivious to Alma while he was packing for the fishing trip is one of those "Zen" moments in the film, where we see Ennis in a totally different plane of consciousness. It is telling that such as state is rooted on the element of desire.
[/quote]I agree, Ennis' body may have been there with Alma but his spirit was elsewhere with Jack and I think it was this way many times during that marriage.
Ennis's categorization of being queer is certainly a fine example of limited perception. I would even go further to say that the categorization seems to put himself in a separate space, while using Jack as an archetype for everyone else in the sense of queerness.
I think compartmentalization is just one element in Ennis's distinction between himself and the rest of "queerdom."
For one, there is a certain logic to his way of thinking -- in the sense that he takes his love for Jack as the anomaly, and hence of limited/restricted import. It would seem like the anomaly is tantamount to an illusion, and hence can be compartmentalized as such -- if you ignore it, it will go away. The distinction between reality and illusion becomes confused, such that he takes reality for illusion and pretense for reality...
Ennis's may have been there with Alma, as you point out rimasworld, but his spirit, his mind was off and away with Jack. Still, Ennis, as you pointed out, tpe, stays with Alma, no matter what. Ennis is set upon doing what his intellect (his rational mental faculties) tells him his "right."
Is it his gut, more than his head, that warns him away from the "thing" he and Jack feel toward each other (Ennis afraid of losing control over themselves at the wrong place, at the wrong time)? Perhaps it is also his intuition - his gut, as opposed to his heart (emotions) - which tells him to stay with Alma (rather than runaway - far, far away - with Jack).
Ennis finds himself in love with Jack. He's never aware of it while he's on Brokeback Mt. (Ennis remains unconscious of the true character of his emotions for Jack.) But these emotions emerge in full force when Jack departs for his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY - after they come down off Brokeback Mt. and fix Jack's truck in Signal, WY. (Ennis finds himself having "dry heaves." He feels as if his intestines are being pulled out "yard by yard" as soon as Jack leaves him behind.) Ennis doesn't feel better for a long time. But, as he tells Jack in the Siesta Motel in Riverton, WY in 1967 (after the "thing" takes hold of them earlier in the day and Ennis initiates his kiss with Jack at the bottom of the landing steps up to Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat), he figured out (a year later?) what it was (what he felt in Signal, WY: the dry heaves, feeling as if his intestines were being pulled out "yard by yard").
Obviously, this "anomaly" holds a big place in Ennis's life. But, precisely as an "anomaly," Ennis finds it difficult to integrate the reality of his homosexuality with his intellectual preconceptions of what (he believes) his life should be (a heterosexual "family" man of the Old West). He lacks what Zen calls "beginner's mind" toward his own homosexuality.
Jack, too, suffers from illusions. In Jack's favorite memory (dream) of him, Ennis holds Jack from behind, rocking Jack into a trance, humming Jack a song from childhood. A "sexless hunger" is satisfied in Jack. But Jack is not fully conscious (according to Annie Proulx's author's narration of the short story) of what this "sexless hunger" is. Jack, in other words, is not "fully conscious" of the emotions he feels for Ennis even at the time of their May 1983 argument. In other words, Jack remains in illusion (about his love for Ennis) very late in the day.
What his gut tells Ennis to do about Jack may be more - a lot more - than just a queston of whether Ennis can accept his own homosexuality. I agree that Ennis, at least in the beginning (19 years of age, on Brokeback Mt.), places himself outside the type of men he thinks of as being "queer."
(Annie Proulx has pointed out that these two young men at age 19 years in conservative rural Wyoming in the homophobic early 1960s didn't have many homosexual "role models" in their personal lives from which to draw their perceptions of themselves. Of course, Ennis had Earl's example - the "tough old bird" gay rancher, who lived with another old gay rancher, Rich. Ennis suspects his own father might have been committed Earl's murder.)
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Thanks Matt. :)
Quote from: tpe on Jun 23, 2008, 09:07 AM
Obviously, this "anomaly" holds a big place in Ennis's life. But, precisely as an "anomaly," Ennis finds it difficult to integrate the reality of his homosexuality with his intellectual preconceptions of what (he believes) his life should be (a heterosexual "family" man of the Old West). He lacks what Zen calls "beginner's mind" toward his own homosexuality.
Jack, too, suffers from illusions. In Jack's favorite memory (dream) of him, Ennis holds him from behind, rocking him into a trance, humming him a song from childhood. A "sexless hunger" is satisfied in Jack. But Jack is not fully conscious (according to Annie Proulx's author's narration of the short story). Jack, in other words, is not "fully conscious" of the emotions he feels for Ennis even at the time of their May 1983 argument. In other words, Jack remains in illusion (about his love for Ennis) very late in the day.
What his gut tells Ennis to do about Jack may be more - a lot more - than just a queston of whether Ennis can accept his own homosexuality. I agree that Ennis, at least in the beginning (19 years of age, on Brokeback Mt.), places himself outside the type of men he thinks of as being "queer."
(Annie Proulx has pointed out that these two young men at age 19 years in conservative rural Wyoming in the homophobic early 1960s didn't have many homosexual "role models" in their personal lives from which to draw their perceptions of themselves. Of course, Ennis had Earl's example - the "tough bird" old gay rancher, who lived with another old gay rancher, whose murder Ennis suspects might have been committed by his father.)
Wonderful post here, jetzenpolis! To be sure, Jack suffers as much from illusions. In fact, one can say that by the intensity of his passions, his possible end could be taken for a Buddhist moral, with Ennis as the recipient. It is through Jack that Ennis reaches a deeper realization of things, as much as death was the moment of the dreamer's (i.e., Jack's) awakening.
What his gut tells Ennis to do about Jack may be more - a lot more - than just a queston of whether Ennis can accept his own homosexuality -- very well said. The conflict between this reality and Ennis's intellectual preconceptions is the foundation on which the world of Illusion (as far as Ennis is concerned) is built on. It is the source of his pain and his mental and spiritual anguish. In many ways, the pain and the passion had become more real than anything else. For why should there be such pain and anguish -- given that what was only needed was his acceptance of who he was?
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Thanks Matt. :)
Wonderful post here, jetzenpolis! To be sure, Jack suffers as much from illusions. In fact, one can say that by the intensity of his passions, his possible end could be taken for a Buddhist moral, with Ennis as the recipient. It is through Jack that Ennis reaches a deeper realization of things, as much as death was the moment of the dreamer's (i.e., Jack's) awakening.
What his gut tells Ennis to do about Jack may be more - a lot more - than just a queston of whether Ennis can accept his own homosexuality -- very well said. The conflict between this reality and Ennis's intellectual preconceptions is the foundation on which the world of Illusion (as far as Ennis is concerned) is built on. It is the source of his pain and his mental and spiritual anguish. In many ways, the pain and the passion had become more real than anything else. For why should there be such pain and anguish -- given that what was only needed was his acceptance of who he was?
thanks for the compliments, tpe! (flattery is always appreciated...)
There are several different ways in which the illusions that fueled the "intensity" of Jack's passions lead possibly to not only his physical demise (at the hands of the "killer mechanics" - as the actors are credited, at the end of the movie) but also to the end of his 20 year long romance with Ennis. "Sexual addiction," in my view, is an influence on the level of passion that occurs between them.
It is Jack who suffers from sexual addiction. Ennis is different. During the agony of his Thanksgiving kitchen argument with Alma, in the house Alma shares with her new grocer husband, Monroe, Alma points out that Ennis used to return "all perky" (not just "perky" but "all" perky, too) from his "fishing trips" with Jack when she and Ennis were married. Alma knows what Ennis did on his "fishing trips" with Jack (in which no fish were caught and Ennis never opened the new tackle box Alma bought him).
Obviously, Ennis came back happy from his many "fishing trips" with Jack. (It was a time, Jack later said in their May 1983 argument, when Ennis "used to come away easy" to spend time together with him). But his satisfaction upon coming back home to Alma and the girls (in the apartment over the laundromat) also shows that he wasn't having any great feelings of loss after his departure from Jack, either. (Ennis didn't suffer any of the "loneliness" that Jack did sometimes when they were apart for long.)
In some ways, it's as if Jack's sexual addiction (indicated by his homosexual promiscuity that lasted throughout most, if not all, of his adult life) was a psychological substitute for love (or a lack of love?) in his life. Jack heatedly responds to Ennis in their May 1983 argument by saying:
"...Tell you what, we coulda had a good life together! fu**in' real good life! Had us a place of our own. But you didn't want it, Ennis! So what we got now is Brokeback Mountain! Everything's built on that! That's all we got, boy, fu**in' all. So I hope you know that, even if you don't never know the rest! You count the damn few times we have been together in nearly twenty years and you measure the short !@#$ leash you keep me on - and then you ask me about Mexico and tell me you'll kill me for needing somethin' I don't hardly never get. You have no idea how bad it gets! I'm not you... I can't make it on a coupla high-altitude fucks once or twice a year! You are too much for me Ennis, you sonofawhoreson bitch! I wish I knew how to quit you."
Time spent on feeding a sexual or any other type of addiction is time spent away from doing other things, such as time spent on loving others. Addictions (perhaps a form of obsessive/compulsive behavior) absorb all the thoughts of those who have them.
We don't what sexual experience (including homosexual sex) Jack might have had before he met Ennis on Brokeback Mt. (Jack had worked on Brokeback Mt. the year before he herded with Ennis.)
When Jack contacts Ennis again in 1967, finding Ennis in Riverton, WY, Annie Proulx's short story narration describes Jack as having ridden the "bulls" rather than "rolled his own." (Ennis has just declared he's "wrung it out a hunert times" thinking about Jack. Ennis says that he never thought of anyone else but Jack. In response, Jack lies and says he's never thought of any other men, either.)
At the start of their May 1983 argument (initiated by Ennis in response to Jack's complaints that he doesn't get to see Ennis frequently enough), Ennis tells Jack that he knows "what boys like you, Jack, do in Mexico!"
Finally, when Ennis calls long distance to Childress, TX, after his post card to Jack is returned, Lureen explains that she couldn't contact him because Jack kept the names of all his (presumably male) friends "in his head." (He kept the names of the men he knew private. Lureen wouldn't be able to know them, in other words. My guess is that he didn't want her to know the names of the men he might be having sex with.)
Perhaps what troubles Ennis about Mexico isn't that Jack doesn't remain faithfully monogamous to him as a homosexual lover (since it goes without saying that Ennis has never felt threatened by Jack's wife, Lureen, or even the ranch neighbor's wife Jack claims to be having an affair with). Rather Ennis may feel that if he ever finds out about "what he doesn't know about," his intimacy with Jack will be reduced to the same level of anonymous sex Jack has with other men.
Even in his favorite memory of Ennis (with Ennis on Brokeback Mt. holding him from behind before the campfire, rocking him into a trance), Jack was not "fully conscious" of the "sexless hunger" in him that had been satisfied by Ennis. While Jack remains unconscious of it, he loves Ennis. He tells Ennis that the truth is that he feels so lonely sometimes without Ennis that he can hardly "stand it."
Yet, despite these obviously strong feelings for Ennis - so large that they compel Jack to seek ways in which they can live together, whether working Jack's parents' ranch in Lighting Flat, WY or moving to Denver to the greater safety of a more tolerant, more anonymous urban life - Jack remains, "at best" less than fully conscious of what he feels for Ennis.
Jack is certainly conscious of the physical pleasure sex with Ennis gives him. He exclaims that Ennis must have gotten his great sexual skill from being such an excellent horseback rider.
Certainly, Ennis - an acute observer of himself and others - must have been aware of Jack's lack of self-consciousness about his own emotions.
Jack seemed to have known there was something wrong between him and Ennis. Perhaps this is what caused Jack to feel that Ennis was turning away even in his favorite memory of him.
Jack feared that Ennis held him from behind (in his favorite memory of Ennis) so that Ennis wouldn't have to see that it was Jack he was holding in his arms. Perhaps Ennis did this because he wished to repress the idea that he was sexually attracted to men, rather than women. But Ennis also preferred anal sex with Alma. (Presumably he held Alma from behind, too, when he had anal sex with her.)
What if Jack feared - even in his favorite memory of Ennis - wasn't just that Ennis didn't want to admit he was homosexual? What if Jack feared that - as the narration says - it was "Jack" whom Ennis didn't want to see he was holding? In other words, was there some sort of rejection of Jack, as a lover (regardless of the issue of homosexuality), mixed in with Ennis's love for Jack?
In other words, there might be more to Ennis's ambivalence toward Jack than just the question of Ennis being faced with his own homosexuality. There is some deeper conflict in their personalities and code of values that lie deeper between them in their view of each other that remains unresolved, unseen.
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Again, good insights here.
I must admit that -- for me -- there is something Zen-like in Jack's sexual appetite. It reflects on the aspect of what the eccentric or non-conformist masters of Zen had been known for, which is the path to enlightenment is though worldly preoccupations and attachments. One can argue that it is Jack's sensuality and periodic failures to gratify it that keeps him grounded about the true meaning of his love for Ennis. "Let be, let be" can therefore be looked upon as an encompassing response to the inability to perfectly attain fulfilment of one's desires. I doubt that he would have realized this in the end, if notfor the 20 years of ungratified/unperfected desire.
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Again, good insights here.
I must admit that -- for me -- there is something Zen-like in Jack's sexual appetite. It reflects on the aspect of what the eccentric or non-conformist masters of Zen had been known for, which is the path to enlightenment is though worldly preoccupations and attachments. One can argue that it is Jack's sensuality and periodic failures to gratify it that keeps him grounded about the true meaning of his love for Ennis. "Let be, let be" can therefore be looked upon as an encompassing response to the inability to perfectly attain fulfilment of one's desires. I doubt that he would have realized this in the end, if notfor the 20 years of ungratified/unperfected desire.
I agree very much with you, tpe, that Jack's frustrations with Ennis lead him, grudgingly, to a willingness to let go of Ennis. Even his favorite memory of Ennis is no longer enough to prevent him from leaving Ennis in the end, after their May 1983 argument (in which, as Annie Proulx describes it, all the disagreements between them set aside over the years and studiously ignored suddenly appear as "clouds of steam" venting from the ground beneath their feet). Here, Jack lets go of his desire for Ennis. He's saddened by it but he does it. (There is a memory flashback to Ennis holding Jack from behind on Brokeback Mt., putting him in a trance, humming to him. Jack watches Ennis leaving in his truck.)
Jack then (almost?) instantly replaces his desire for Ennis with a similar desire for Randall in Childress, TX, another gay married man. Presumably, Jack still plans to abandon his wife, Lureen, and his son, Bobby, as soon as he can get Randall to join him on his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY.
But something goes terribly wrong before this can happen. The "tire iron", in Ennis's view, finally strikes Jack down as did the old gay rancher, Earl.
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I agree very much with you, tpe, that Jack's frustrations with Ennis lead him, grudgingly, to a willingness to let go of Ennis. Even his favorite memory of Ennis is no longer enough to prevent him from leaving Ennis in the end, after their May 1983 argument (in which, as Annie Proulx describes it, all the disagreements between them set aside over the years and studiously ignored suddenly appear as "clouds of steam" venting from the ground beneath their feet). Here, Jack lets go of his desire for Ennis. He's saddened by it but he does it. (There is a memory flashback to Ennis holding Jack from behind on Brokeback Mt., putting him in a trance, humming to him. Jack watches Ennis leaving in his truck.)
Jack then (almost?) instantly replaces his desire for Ennis with a similar desire for Randall in Childress, TX, another gay married man. Presumably, Jack still plans to abandon his wife, Lureen, and his son, Bobby, as soon as he can get Randall to join him on his parents' ranch in Lightning Flat, WY.
But something goes terribly wrong before this can happen. The "tire iron", in Ennis's view, finally strikes Jack down as did the old gay rancher, Earl.
The point about Randall is interesting. This ties in to the question of was he truly willing to replace Ennis and live a life with Randall, or was this a form of renunciation whereby the dreamer goes through the motions, knowing full well that he is at the cusp of awakening? I had always wondered about this -- whether his willingness to live with Randall was meaningful only in that it signified a renunciation...
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The point about Randall is interesting. This ties in to the question of was he truly willing to replace Ennis and live a life with Randall, or was this a form of renunciation whereby the dreamer goes through the motions, knowing full well that he is at the cusp of awakening? I had always wondered about this -- whether his willingness to live with Randall was meaningful only in that it signified a renunciation...
My personal take on Brokeback Mt. has always been that, in Jack's eyes, Randall (the "Texas ranch neighbor" in Annie Proulx's short story) was a second male lover. The Texas ranch neighbor (Randall) replaced Ennis, as someone whom Jack sought to live with.
Jack's father seems almost gleeful in his malice pointing out that, during the last time Jack visited the Twist family ranch in Lightning Flat, WY (immediately after his May 1983 argument with Ennis), Jack no longer talked about bringing in Ennis del Mar to partner on the Twist family ranch. Instead, Jack was going to have a "Texas ranch neighbor" as his partner.
It's interesting to note that Jack's father had little concern for what might happen to Jack's wife, Lureen, or their son, Bobby, in Jack's plans to partner with the "Texas ranch neighbor" (who is never mentioned by name in the short story). Jack's father only says (in the movie), "he" (Jack) plans to "split up" with his wife and "come back" to the family ranch:
John Twist: Jack used to say, "Ennis Del Mar," he used to say; "I'm gonna bring him up here one of these days, and we'll lick this damn ranch into shape. Had some half-baked notion the two of you was gonna move up here. Build a cabin, help run the place.
[pause]
John Twist: Then this spring, he got another fella gonna come up here with him. Build a place, help run the ranch. Some ranch neighbor o' his down in Texas. Was gonna split up with his wife and come back here. But like most of Jack's ideas... never did come to pass.
If Jack's father was trying to stab a dagger into Ennis's heart, he could probably find no better weapon than to tell Ennis that Jack had found someone else to be his "ranch partner" (lover). To his credit, Ennis does not react angrily to what Jack's father says. He's already lost Jack. There's nothing he can do to bring him back.
Did Jack's parents know that their son was homosexual? They know Jack is willing to abandon his wife and son, leave them in Texas, and move in with a "ranch partner" on the family ranch in Lightning Flat, WY.
Jack's father complains that Jack thought he was "special" because he wanted his ashes strewn on Brokeback Mt. (his favorite place that he always talked about). Maybe Jack's father thought that since Jack was an (unrealistic) "dreamer," Jack also thought he was something "special."
Until Lureen talked to Ennis long distance on the telephone, she always thought Brokeback Mt. was just another place Jack alcoholically dreamed about - where the "bluebirds sing at the whiskey springs." Jack's father also thought Jack was a "dreamer" who never accomplished anything (by bringing his plans to fruition).
But in what other ways might Jack have seen himself as "special," in his father's eyes? Perhaps Jack's father thought that Jack shouldn't draw attention to the fact of his homosexuality. Rather, in his father's eyes, Jack should keep a "low profile," even in death.
Jack's ashes were to be buried in the family cemetery plot rather than scattered in the place Jack loved best (on Brokeback Mt.). Jack's father sought to frustrate his son's wishes (his son's dreams, his son's plans) even in death. Jack was not to be allowed any sense of an independent self, in his father's eyes.
As Jack saw it, he was viewed as the "property" of his father - ranch livestock branded with the "property mark" of his circumcision. Jack comprehends his father's view of him at a very young age, in boyhood. After that, things could "never be right" between him and his father.
The use of the phrase "short leash" by Jack - to describe his relationship with Ennis (in the end), at the beginning of their May 1983 argument - is similar to Jack's view of how his father sees him (as livestock ranch property branded by circumcision). In other words, Jack doesn't feel as if Ennis sees him as fully "human," either. He feels as if he's at Ennis's beck and call. The decisions they make together aren't mutually arrived at, through "give and take." They are dictated by Ennis, who sets the boundaries of the relationship.
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I also think that Randall was someone that Jack meant to "replace" in his dream for the sweet life, although I wonder whether he himself knew that it was doomed from the start... Did he perhaps know of the futility to go against fate? His resignation after the final confrontation (again, so Buddhist in its implications) would seem to suggest this.
THis is, of course, in marked contrast to Jack's father -- when we see him in the final scenes. I should note that some members have considered some of us here to be too harsh on jack's father. But honestly, I see him as someone who remains in the world of illusion -- the world of the passions and of disillusionment. His would seem to be the fate of the unenlightened -- that they would not only hate that which is intrinsically good, but have lost all meaning. Did the father and/or the son die in the end?
quicumque quaesierit animam suam salvare perdet illam et qui perdiderit illam vivificabit eam
And of course, the short leash is tethered to illusion -- the same illusion where Jack's father pinned so much of his hopes and dreams on...
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I also think that Randall was someone that Jack meant to "replace" in his dream for the sweet life, although I wonder whether he himself knew that it was doomed from the start... Did he perhaps know of the futility to go against fate? His resignation after the final confrontation (again, so Buddhist in its implications) would seem to suggest this.
This is, of course, in marked contrast to Jack's father -- when we see him in the final scenes. I should note that some members have considered some of us here to be too harsh on jack's father. But honestly, I see him as someone who remains in the world of illusion -- the world of the passions and of disillusionment. His would seem to be the fate of the unenlightened -- that they would not only hate that which is intrinsically good, but have lost all meaning. Did the father and/or the son die in the end?
quicumque quaesierit animam suam salvare perdet illam et qui perdiderit illam vivificabit eam
And of course, the short leash is tethered to illusion -- the same illusion where Jack's father pinned so much of his hopes and dreams on...
Hey! We've past the 100th post on this topic. Thanks everyone for your participation: posters and readers, alike, all of you!
I've asked myself, too, tpe, whether Jack was repeating with Randall Malone all that went wrong with Ennis del Mar. Had he found in Randall's character another Ennis? It wouldn't surprise me. Jack is, thus, "fated" to repeat (his own personal) history where he has left it unexamined.
Yet, Jack, to some degree, has made progress in understanding himself and the darker side of his relationship to Ennis by the time of his last confrontation with him (the May 1983 argument). Jack has begun to question the "short leash" Ennis keeps him on. Naturally, he's troubled that his lover no longer wishes to see him as frequently - even on trips into a cold, high altitude wilderness where nobody else is ever likely to see them. Jack puts forward his wishes to go someplace warmer (Mexico) with Ennis, perhaps the first time he's ever done this.
In the argument, itself, Jack puts it as baldly as possible, Ennis didn't want the "sweet life" together Jack proposed:
"Tell you what, we coulda had a good life together!...Had us a place of our own. But you didn't want it, Ennis! So what we got now is Brokeback Mountain! Everything's built on that! That's all we got, boy, fu**in' all..."
Jack doesn't see Ennis as being afraid of having a "sweet life" together (as homosexual lovers). He says Ennis doesn't "want it."
Jack finally sees the limits of his "ride" with Ennis. He's dissatisfied with Ennis's constraints upon it. It's not the life he wants.
Perhaps Jack has always known underneath something was wrong between him and Ennis: he wanted Ennis "too much." There is an imbalance in a romantic affair between two lovers when one is more captivated by the romance than the other. There is a feeling of expectations not be reciprocated by the less captivated lover.
Anytime you feel you want something "too much," it never feels "right" with you.
It could be argued that Jack hadn't made up his mind about replacing Ennis with Randall at the time of their May 1983 argument. It's also possible that Jack hadn't even taken up Randall's offer to spend a weekend in the cabin, yet.
I think that's unlikely, though. Jack tells Ennis over a campfire on an earlier trip into the wilderness together that he's cheating on Lureen with a "Texas ranch neighbor's wife." Ennis jokes that if the Texas rancher catches them, Jack will get what he deserves.
Jack might be "testing the waters," here, by broaching the topic of infidelity. Jack may be talking to Ennis in a roundabout way of cheating on Ennis with Randall, the "Texas ranch neighbor," himself. I think that Ennis & Jack are often in the habit of speaking to each other in a language of hidden truths.
Somehow, Ennis picks up that something is different with Jack during their last trip (the May 1983 argument), I think. Things between them are "more wrong" than usual, perhaps.
Their argument starts after Ennis responds to Jack's suggestion they go to Mexico by saying, "Mexico? Hell Jack, you know me, about all the travelin' I ever done is round a coffee pot lookin' for the handle..." Ennis responds to Jack's suggestion with self-deprecating humor (intended to deflect his lover's suggestion for change through charm). He responded to Alma's suggestion that he get a job with the county utilities as an electric lineman with similar self-deprecation by saying that he was "all thumbs" and would probably get electrocuted.
What if it suddenly occurs to Ennis that he's just responded to Jack in the same way (with self-deprecating humor) that he did to Alma - in what, in retrospect, might have been one of the turning points in their marriage that led to Alma's eventual decision to divorce him. (Annie Proulx said that Ennis felt "vaguely cheated" by his divorce from Alma. Perhaps this was one of the things that might have lead Alma to cheat on Ennis with her grocer employer, Monroe - assuming she did have an extramarital affair with Monroe).
In that case, did Ennis suddenly become aware of the possibility that Jack might be "cheating" on him, too?
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I love your discussion guys I've learned so much. I just have one question. Do you think that Jack was becoming Ennis, as far as his relationship with Randall.
I can almost see Randall wondering why they can't move beyond any point in their relationship. I can see Randall going to Jack, but not Jack going to him, but not refusing to lay with him. I can see Randall confusion, and hurt. Like old man Twist said of them "like all of Jack's ideas nothing come of it". Ennis's mark was on Jack, like being branded, Jack was tied to him, physically and emotionally. This bond could not be broken.
So Jack became Ennis, Randall became Jack, it's repeating itself.
Just a thought.
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Hey! We've past the 100th post on this topic. Thanks everyone for your participation: posters and readers, alike, all of you!
I've asked myself, too, tpe, whether Jack was repeating with Randall Malone all that went wrong with Ennis del Mar. Had he found in Randall's character another Ennis? It wouldn't surprise me. Jack is, thus, "fated" to repeat (his own personal) history where he has left it unexamined.
Yet, Jack, to some degree, has made progress in understanding himself and the darker side of his relationship to Ennis by the time of his last confrontation with him (the May 1983 argument). Jack has begun to question the "short leash" Ennis keeps him on. Naturally, he's troubled that his lover no longer wishes to see him as frequently - even on trips into a cold, high altitude wilderness where nobody else is ever likely to see them. Jack puts forward his wishes to go someplace warmer (Mexico) with Ennis, perhaps the first time he's ever done this.
In the argument, itself, Jack puts it as baldly as possible, Ennis didn't want the "sweet life" together Jack proposed:
"Tell you what, we coulda had a good life together!...Had us a place of our own. But you didn't want it, Ennis! So what we got now is Brokeback Mountain! Everything's built on that! That's all we got, boy, fu**in' all..."
Jack doesn't see Ennis as being afraid of having a "sweet life" together (as homosexual lovers). He says Ennis doesn't "want it."
Jack finally sees the limits of his "ride" with Ennis. He's dissatisfied with Ennis's constraints upon it. It's not the life he wants.
Perhaps Jack has always known underneath something was wrong between him and Ennis: he wanted Ennis "too much." There is an imbalance in a romantic affair between two lovers when one is more captivated by the romance than the other. There is a feeling of expectations not be reciprocated by the less captivated lover.
Anytime you feel you want something "too much," it never feels "right" with you.
It could be argued that Jack hadn't made up his mind about replacing Ennis with Randall at the time of their May 1983 argument. It's also possible that Jack hadn't even taken up Randall's offer to spend a weekend in the cabin, yet.
I think that's unlikely, though. Jack tells Ennis over a campfire on an earlier trip into the wilderness together that he's cheating on Lureen with a "Texas ranch neighbor's wife." Ennis jokes that if the Texas rancher catches them, Jack will get what he deserves.
Jack might be "testing the waters," here, by broaching the topic of infidelity. Jack may be talking to Ennis in a roundabout way of cheating on Ennis with Randall, the "Texas ranch neighbor," himself. I think that Ennis & Jack are often in the habit of speaking to each other in a language of hidden truths.
Somehow, Ennis picks up that something is different with Jack during their last trip (the May 1983 argument), I think. Things between them are "more wrong" than usual, perhaps.
Their argument starts after Ennis responds to Jack's suggestion they go to Mexico by saying, "Mexico? Hell Jack, you know me, about all the travelin' I ever done is round a coffee pot lookin' for the handle..." Ennis responds to Jack's suggestion with self-deprecating humor (intended to deflect his lover's suggestion for change through charm). He responded to Alma's suggestion that he get a job with the county utilities as an electric lineman with similar self-deprecation by saying that he was "all thumbs" and would probably get electrocuted.
What if it suddenly occurs to Ennis that he's just responded to Jack in the same way (with self-deprecating humor) that he did to Alma - in what, in retrospect, might have been one of the turning points in their marriage that led to Alma's eventual decision to divorce him. (Annie Proulx said that Ennis felt "vaguely cheated" by his divorce from Alma. Perhaps this was one of the things that might have lead Alma to cheat on Ennis with her grocer employer, Monroe - assuming she did have an extramarital affair with Monroe).
In that case, did Ennis suddenly become aware of the possibility that Jack might be "cheating" on him, too?
I love your discussion guys I've learned so much. I just have one question. Do you think that Jack was becoming Ennis, as far as his relationship with Randall.
I can almost see Randall wondering why they can't move beyond any point in their relationship. I can see Randall going to Jack, but not Jack going to him, but not refusing to lay with him. I can see Randall confusion, and hurt. Like old man Twist said of them "like all of Jack's ideas nothing come of it". Ennis's mark was on Jack, like being branded, Jack was tied to him, physically and emotionally. This bond could not be broken.
So Jack became Ennis, Randall became Jack, it's repeating itself.
Just a thought.
Thanks friends! I apologize for the delayed response, as I had a lot on my mind lately here at work...
I have highlighted a few passages that made a deep impression on me.
First to what jetzenpolis has said, the remembrance of Proust's La prisonniere immediately came to my mind.
The feeling of excess -- of wanting/loving too much -- is certainly intertwined with the element of renunciation in the last confrontation. It was very insightful of you, jetzenpolis, to bring up this connection. I do think that you are right. One can certainly understand renunciation against the backdrop of a surfeit of desire, and a realization of this in the case of Jack -- who eptomizes at times the sensual and emotive aspects of love -- should be considered a kind of awakening. The possible decision to move on with Randall perhaps reflects a desire to break from the bonds of wanting too much: to explore, if not bring to fruition, the possibility of life after desire. It is an interesting proposition, to say the least. Proust, in the final books of Recherche comes close to touching this subject, especially at the moment when he discusses with Gilbertine the mechanics of the "death" of love, as in the case of someone who sees a former lover after a long separation... I try to find the english trannsaltion of this passage, as I think it is quite meaningful to the current discussion, But I can't find it right now... I will continue to try to locate it online...
MG's elaborated proposition of Jack becoming Ennis, and Randall becoming Jack brings us one step further -- again with heavy Buddhist connotations. Is it a form of rebirth -- back to the world of illusion?
Very provocative...
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I love your discussion guys I've learned so much. I just have one question. Do you think that Jack was becoming Ennis, as far as his relationship with Randall.
I can almost see Randall wondering why they can't move beyond any point in their relationship. I can see Randall going to Jack, but not Jack going to him, but not refusing to lay with him. I can see Randall confusion, and hurt. Like old man Twist said of them "like all of Jack's ideas nothing come of it". Ennis's mark was on Jack, like being branded, Jack was tied to him, physically and emotionally. This bond could not be broken.
So Jack became Ennis, Randall became Jack, it's repeating itself.
Just a thought.
hi manhattangirl!
It's interesting how much the characters switch positions in their different relationships to each other and may also be adopting parts of each other's personalities over time. Perhaps this shouldn't be surprising, since we (sometimes) better understand each other in our personal lives given enough time (and interest). We borrow parts of each other's personalities and adopt them to our own lives, as a result.
Whereas Jack was the one who pursued Ennis, it is Randall initiates an invitation to Jack - to spend a weekend in the cabin. Thus, Jack finds himself in Ennis's position of being (sexually?, romantically?) pursued.
Jack was the one who seemed most eager in romance with Ennis, initiating plans for them to live together. But, over time, he finds Ennis more reluctant to spend time with him. (Jack tells Ennis in their last confrontation - the May 1983 argument - that Ennis used to "come away easy" but now will see him only a couple of...times per year.)
But I also think are a lot of similarities between Randall and Ennis, too (even though the character of Randall appears only briefly, toward the end of the movie, and not at all - as a named character - in Annie Proulx's short story). I suspect that Jack would fall for another "Ennis" all over again, complete with all the ambiguity of Ennis toward Jack in their relationship.
We can't be sure what Randall now wants from Jack, either. Maybe it's only a physical attraction. Perhaps Randall only wants "getaway" weekends, once in awhile, as a respite from the demands an appearance of heterosexual marriage makes upon both him and Jack. Or, Randall, too, might not be "fully" conscious of what emotions he might be capable of toward another man (such as love).
Thus, Randall might have been completely taken by surprise if Jack proposed they both leave their wives (and families) behind in Texas and ranch together in Lightning Flat, WY. Randall might not want to do that with Jack anymore than Ennis did.
In his essay about depression, "Mourning and Melancholia," Sigmund Freud found the effects of depression similar to mourning. But whom did melancholic (the depressed patient) miss? Freud thought that those suffering depression might be transferring characteristics from people whom they were close to in their personal life onto themselves. Not only was there a transference of others' personality characteristics onto their own (now false) interpretation of their own personal psychology, but the depressed also repressed conscious knowledge about the identity of whom these personality characteristics did belong to. That is, the depressed fail to see in others, close to them, the same characteristics they misinterpret themselves as having.
Thus, Ennis fears the "thing" in himself. (Admittedly, he also sees it in Jack, too.) Ennis fears what might happen to them if the "thing" finds them at the wrong place, at the wrong time.
But, if anything, Ennis is not somebody who easily falls prey to his emotions. He never lets himself be carried away by emotion (at least not too far, anyway). Yet, he thinks the "thing" (the emotions that seemingly overpowered them beyond all possible "self-control" at the bottom of the landing steps of Ennis's & Alma's apartment over the laundromat in Riverton, WY in 1967) poses a constant threat to his & Jack's physical safety. (After all, Ennis did look first to see if anybody was watching them before he initiated the kiss with Jack at the bottom of the landing steps.)
Isn't it Jack, though, who's the one who lets himself be carried away by his emotions?
Similarly, gregarious Jack finds himself so "lonely" at times, when he misses Ennis, he can hardly stand it. Yet, it isn't' Jack who lives alone. Jack, the best salesman at the farm implement dealership according to Lureen, meets lots of new people, all the time. He has many (presumably male) friends, whose names he keeps in his head (where they can't be found by his wife, Lureen).
Rather, it is Ennis who leads life alone, in his trailer, often moving from one place to another to follow ranch hand jobs from ranch to ranch (according to the short story). It's Ennis who doesn't see his daughters for a "long time" after his Thanksgiving kitchen argument with his ex-wife, Alma.
Buddhism also talks about such Freudian psychoanalytic concepts as "transference" and "projection" (in which personality attributes of one person is placed into the personality of another person). In the movie, "Kundun" (1997), directed by Martin Scorsese, about the life of the Dalai Lama, the head of Tibetan Buddhism, the Dalai Lama says all the honors people give him as a "divine soul" are only a "projection" of what is actually in their own personality. That is, people only see good attributes in others' personality because a part of themselves is the same way - however unconscious they are of it. We are all capable of things we can't imagine (both good and bad, probably).
imdb: Kundun (1997), director: Martin Scorsese
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119485/
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I would assume that "projection" here is equivalent to the concept of "manifestation" or "emanation".
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I would assume that "projection" here is equivalent to the concept of "manifestation" or "emanation".
No, I think, as it was portrayed in the movie, "Kundun," the view of the Dalai Lama was precisely the same as the psychoanalytic view, whether Sigmund Freud's or Carl Jung's. That is, we see in others a reflection of ourselves. The characteristics we see in others are often our own, especially those we are most emotionally struck by, either moving our hearts, in wonder, or disturbing us.
Carl Jung talked about a "shadow" self in much the same way. Carl Jung described as a "repressed" sense of self that he declared was 90% "pure gold" because we transfer onto our "heroes" what we, ourselves, embody deep within our own personalities.
In his book: "Ex-Friends, Falling Out with Allen Ginsberg, Lionel and Diana Trilling, Lillian Hellman, Hannah Arendt, and Norman Mailer," Norman Podhoretz, now a cultural (and political) conservative describes how Allen Ginsberg came to regard Norman Podhoretz as a "sacred vessel." As Norman Podhoretz describes it, Allen Ginsberg seems to have developed something of an obsessive dislke for Norman Podhoretz. The man got under Allen Ginsberg's skin, in other words. Without fully explaining (or perhaps even understanding it), Norman Podhoretz said that Allen Ginsberg later took this dislike and used it as part of his Buddhist practice to begin viewing Norman Podhoretz as a "sacred vessel." Whether he like him or not, there was something about Norman Podhoretz's personality that was important for Allen Ginsberg to learn to gain a deeper self-understanding.
This concept of Norman Podhoretz being a "sacred vessel" was taken from Tibetan Buddhism, if I remember the book correctly.
What research I've been able to do quickly on the Internet led to me a quote taken from Jack Kornfeld's "A Path With a Heart":
The genuineness of teacher and teachings becomes a sacred vessel that holds the truth that leads us to awaken our heart. The respected Zen master Suzuki Roshi was described by his student Trudy Dixon in this way: "Because he is just himself, he is a mirror for his students. When we are with him, we feel our own strengths and shortcomings without any sense of praise or criticism from him. In his presence we see our original face and the extraordinariness we see is only our own true [Buddha] nature."
But other entries in wikipedia about "sacred vessel" and "Buddhism" also describe a "tulka" (sacred vessel): as a bodhisattva who has the ability to choose which life he will be reborn into again through reincarnation.
I also found some interesting discussion about the Dalai Lama's view of homosexuality. The head of Tibetan Buddhism is criticized for his conservative views on homosexuality by the ex-Marxist Christopher Hitchens, an iconoclastic social critic who is - at various times, although usually not simultaneously - radically at odds with the political Right, Left, and Center (managing to offend everybody, at one time or another, in other words). But in an OUT magazine article (Feb./March 1994), the Dalai Lama says that it is OK for two women or two men to have mutually consenting sex with each other.
Amazon.com: "Ex-Friends: Falling Out with Allen Ginsberg, Lionel and Diana Trilling, Lillian Hellman, Hannah Arendt, and Norman Mailer" (Norman Podhoretz)
http://www.amazon.com/Ex-Friends-Falling-Ginsberg-Trilling-Lillian/dp/1893554171/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1222734700&sr=1-6
Booknotes.com ("Booknotes," C-SPAN2): Norman Podhoretz author interview about "Ex-Friends" (March 28, 1999)
http://www.booknotes.org/Program/?ProgramID=1508
Google.com: "Essential Buddhism: A Complete Guide to Beliefs and Practices" (Jack Maguire, 2002) - Google Books 288 pages
http://books.google.com/books?id=RgYeSM_savwC&pg=PA145&lpg=PA145&dq=Buddhism+%22sacred+vessel%22&source=web&ots=kgzhF24lU7&sig=vOBwOeYLJP8JN1zFdWJfkl3y5mo&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=10&ct=result#PPA145,M1
Jack Maguire quotes: "A Path With A Heart" (Jack Kornfeld)
The genuineness of teacher and teachings becomes a sacred vessel that holds the truth that leads us to awaken our heart. The respected Zen master Suzuki Roshi was described by his student Trudy Dixon in this way: "Because he is just himself, he is a mirror for his students. When we are with him, we feel our own strengths and shortcomings without any sense of praise or criticism from him. In his presence we see our original face and the extraordinariness we see is only our own true [Buddha] nature.
Wikipedia: tulku
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulku
Wikipedia: Christopher Hitchens' critiques of specific individuals
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens%27_critiques_of_specific_individuals
Wikipedia: Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenzin_Gyatso,_14th_Dalai_Lama
Sexuality [views on homosexuality, wikipedia entry for: Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama]
In his view, oral, manual and anal sex (both homosexual and heterosexual) is not acceptable in Buddhism or for Buddhists, but society otherwise should tolerate gays and lesbians.[56] He explains in his book Beyond Dogma: "homosexuality, whether it is between men or between women, is not improper in itself. What is improper is the use of organs already defined as inappropriate for sexual contact". In 1997 he explained that the basis of that teaching was unknown to him and that he at least had some "willingness to consider the possibility that some of the teachings may be specific to a particular cultural and historic context".[57] In a 1994 interview with OUT Magazine, the Dalai Lama explained "If someone comes to me and asks whether homosexuality is okay or not, I will ask 'What is your companion's opinion?'. If you both agree, then I think I would say 'if two males or two females voluntarily agree to have mutual satisfaction without further implication of harming others, then it is okay'".[58]
[57] Dalai Lama Urges 'Respect, Compassion, and Full Human Rights for All', including Gays. Conkin, Dennis. Bay Area Reporter, June 19th, 1997
[58] OUT Magazine February/March 1994
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Yes, Many forms of Buddhism certainly don't object to homosexuality per se. They pretty much put it on the level of other worldly attachements -- the attachments of the heart and of the passions. It is of course the aim of every sentient being to free oneself from this cycle of rebirth -- but homosexuality is in no way different from any other attachments that may impede one's attainment of true buddhahood.
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...I can almost see Randall wondering why they can't move beyond any point in their relationship. I can see Randall going to Jack, but not Jack going to him, but not refusing to lay with him. I can see Randall confusion, and hurt....
So Jack became Ennis, Randall became Jack, it's repeating itself.
Just a thought.
I've found myself wondering about this sort of contradiction in Jack's & Randall's relationship. Randall is pursuing Jack, much as Jack pursued Randall. Then, all of a sudden, everything changes. Jack is now talking about having a "Texas ranch neighbor" come up to Lightning Flat, WY and splitting from his wife.
What if Randall wasn't Jack's only male lover in Childress, TX? What if there was a triangle between Jack, Randall, and some other man?
After all, Jack told Ennis in their May 1983 arguement (final confrontation), "...you don't know the half of it."
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I've found myself wondering about this sort of contradiction in Jack's & Randall's relationship. Randall is pursuing Jack, much as Jack pursued Randall. Then, all of a sudden, everything changes. Jack is now talking about having a "Texas ranch neighbor" come up to Lightning Flat, WY and splitting from his wife.
What if Randall wasn't Jack's only male lover in Childress, TX? What if there was a triangle between Jack, Randall, and some other man?
After all, Jack told Ennis in their May 1983 arguement (final confrontation), "...you don't know the half of it."
New Topic? jetzenpolis, would you want us to create another thread for this subject?
I think that it would have been inconvenient for Jack, given that it was in a small home town where his family resided. People are bound to talk, and perhaps were already talking about Jack and Randall. It would seem that Jack was a bit more discreet about casual hookups, and must have gone to the Mexican side in order to gratify himself. Randall would seem to be the exception, since he was, after all, a "family" friend. It would be possible that there could also be other family "friends", but Randall would certainly have noticed, given his unfettered access to Jack (i.e., with the knowledge of his and Jack's wife.)
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New Topic? jetzenpolis, would you want us to create another thread for this subject?
I think that it would have been inconvenient for Jack, given that it was in a small home town where his family resided. People are bound to talk, and perhaps were already talking about Jack and Randall. It would seem that Jack was a bit more discreet about casual hookups, and must have gone to the Mexican side in order to gratify himself. Randall would seem to be the exception, since he was, after all, a "family" friend. It would be possible that there could also be other family "friends", but Randall would certainly have noticed, given his unfettered access to Jack (i.e., with the knowledge of his and Jack's wife.)
I was thinking the same thing, tpe! This should be its own topic...
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I would assume that "projection" here is equivalent to the concept of "manifestation" or "emanation".
I'm not well-enough informed about Buddhist philosophy to address the topic of "emanation" with much certainty. From the two sources below, "The Ontodynamics of Emanation: An Exercise in Speculative Metaphysical" (by M. Alan Kazlev) and the Wikipedia entry for "Emanationism," an emanation is: a particular, specific, finite form of what is called the "Absolute" in philosophy - whether Eastern or Western, religious or nonreligious philosophy.
I'm most familiar with the early nineteenth century German "Idealist" philosopher, Georg Hegel's idea of the Absolute. As I understand it, "change" ("becoming") is viewed as the Absolute (since nothing is permanent.)
The Absolute is a form of "being" that can't be "contradicted" by an opposite idea. When philosophy talks about "being," it is talking about existence in its broadest possible sense. Philosophy uses the word "being" as a starting point in its taxonomy of all existence, much as a botanist might divide the plant "kingdom" into a taxonomic universe of particular species of plants, as the Swedish botanist, Carl von Linné (Carl Linnaeus), divided the plant Kingdom into 25 classes in 1754.
"Being," therefore, is the most general term possible that includes anything and everything which has an "existence." (It may also includes anything and everything that once existed but no longer exists, or has the potential for existence, or even once had the potential for existence.)
But this generalization of "being" makes no distinction between separate forms of being - into which everything in the universe might be divided into, as specific instances of "being" (on all possible planes of existence). This general, Absolute form of "being" remains undifferentiated, non-specific, amorphous. It is a broad, bland, homogeneous form "being" that turns all being into an intellectual monolith: an unbroken "totality" of being.
Any sort of differentiation between one thing and another gives each of them a "separate" form of "being." Thus, going back to Carl Linnaeus, the eighteenth century Swedish botanist, for example, the separation of groups of plants into a "taxonomy" of different species gives each of those species a separate identity (a separate form of "being," in other words). Further distinction between things are always possible, perhaps infinitely so. Once Carl Linnaeus divided the plant kingdom into different species, these species could be further divided within themselves into the individual plants (specimens) that belong to a particular group of plants botany has classified together as a "species."
Jean-Paul Sartre, the mid-twentieth century French Existentialist philosopher points out that "being" is contradicted by "non-being" ("nothingness," in other words). Since there is always a possibility of negation of "being" - since it can always be contradicted by "non-being" (nothingness) - he is led to question whether there can be an Absolute form of "being."
"Manifestation" is the particular form that finite forms of being take in the world. Again, using botany as an example, the "manifestations" of the plant kingdom would be individual specimens of any particular species of plant. (But I'm not precisely certain how Buddhism uses the term, "manifestation," though. I think it might be applied to both: 1. any of the specific forms that a more general principle "manifests" itself in and 2. the specific forms our "Buddhist nature" shows - or "manifests" - itself within us.)
The Ontodynamics of Emanation: An Exercise in Speculative Metaphysical
(text content by M.Alan Kazlev)
http://www.kheper.net/topics/emanation/emanation.html
Before defining the laws of emanation, a basic proviso needs to be stated. And that is that emanation does not pertain to the Absolute Reality....all of the stages of manifestation of the Supreme are complementary or non-contridictory with each other. Nor can there actually be a coming into (or a passing out of) being, because all aspects of the Absolute are eternal in any case, and at the level of the Absolute there is nothing else but the Absolute, so there is nothing for the Emanator to emanate into. Emanation can only occur within the realm of duality itself.
How then does one get from unity and plenum of Being, as represented by the Absolute or Supreme Godhead/Reality, to the duality of Being and Non-being, and the fact of separate existence, as representative of ordinary (and not only ordinary, but also psychic, spiritual, and even higher) reality?
The answer - and on this point our various sources seem to be in full agreement - is that the Absolute Reality, the Absolute or Supreme Godhead, forms within Itself (all this is speaking metaphorically of course; remember that, ultimately, there is nothing else but the Absolute) a duality, a set of polar opposites. In this way the One becomes Two, and there is "room" for emanation.
Hence we have the division of the Tao or Tai Chi into Yin and Yang, the division of Paramashiva or Parasamvit into Shiva and Shakti, the division of The One into the Finite and the Infinite, the division of the Light of the En Sof into Hesed and Gevurah...., no matter how many examples are given, they all present the same basic principle, although often approached in different ways and from different perspectives. For example, the Tantric Shakti is by no means the same as the Taoist Yin (although both are identified with the female principle). But both Tantricism and Taoism agree that the One becomes Two, and that this is the beginning of creation...
It is at this same level that the process of emanation occurs. The pure Monistic teaching (for example Advaita Vedanta or Prajnaparamita Buddhism) is beyond emanation, but if the origin and nature of the cosmos and finite existence is to be taken into account (which most of these Monists are not interested in doing, because of their single-minded dedication to Liberation) then the theory of emanation has to be considered.
My own understanding of the original Polarisation of the Absolute - the One becoming Two - is that it is the polarisation of the Absolute or Supreme into the Absolute Itself, and the self-veiling of the Absolute. In other words, into infinite Being and infinite Non-being, or Light and Dark, Spirit and Matter, Abundance and Lack, Self and Not-self.
So we have the two polarities, the two aspects, each infinite. On the one hand, the Supreme revealing Itself as Itself; as infinite Consciousness, Light, Love, Power, Bliss, Divinity, Perfection, Creativity, etc; the pole of Absolute Spirit. On the other hand, the Supreme veiling or conceiling Itself; as infinite non-consciousness, deprivation, formlessness, receptivity, and non-being; what Plotinus would have called hyle. The Supreme in Its own transcendent nature is of course beyond, but also includes, both these poles, in total unity and harmony.
From the polarity of the Supreme revealing Itself as Itself, the Supreme emanates or radiates out as infinite plenitude all the gods, worlds, beings, and evolutions, into the Supreme veiling Itself as non-consciousness or hyle.
That radiation out from the positive to the negative pole of the Absolute constitutes the process of emanation, and it follows specific laws. These laws have been elaborated in a number of different occult and philosophical teachings: Neoplatonism, Kabbalah, Theosophy, and elsewhere. In the rest of this chapter I will present a brief and unavoidably incomplete definition of these laws of creation. Incomplete, because it would require a weighty volume, and many many philosophical statements and definitions, to do justice to this subject. The Neoplatonist Proclus for example wrote a large book, The Elements of Theology, which thankfully has survived to the present day, in which he attempts a comprehensive definition of the laws of Emanation. But even that work, invaluable as it is, is not complete, because it is only written from a specifically Neoplatonic perspective, and hence does not cover the other equally valid perspectives of different esoteric teachings on this subject.
Wikipedia: Emanationism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emanation
Emanationism is Platonic monism, and an idea in the cosmology or cosmogony of certain religious or philosophical systems. Emanation from the Latin 'emanare' meaning "to flow from", is the mode by which all things are derived from the First Reality, or Principle. All things are derived from the first reality or perfect god by steps of degradation to lesser degrees of the first reality or god, and at every step the emanating beings are less pure, less perfect, less divine. Emanationism is a transcendent principle from which everything is derived, and is opposed to both Creationism (wherein the universe is created by a sentient God who is separate from creation) and evolutionism/materialism (which posits no underlying subjective and/or ontological nature behind phenomena, being immanent).
Key Principles
That complex things are created in nature is not in question...Rather, the two principles that are in question are the locus for creation and whether a sentient, self-aware Absolute (‘God’) is a necessity for creation. Emanationists such as Pythagoras, Plotinus, Gotama, and others argued that complex patterns in nature were a natural consequence of procession from the One (Hen, Absolute).
According to Emanationism, the Absolute, its nature and its activity must be inseparably one thing only, namely will, such that the nature and activity of the Absolute is both one and the same (again, will) and by its very nature is also its activity ‘to will’ and wills things to be or occur, thereby maintaining the center of the logical system of Emanationism...
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I was thinking the same thing, tpe! This should be its own topic...
OT: Sorry for the late response, jetzenpolis (I was in Brussels last week. :)) Would you want to start the new thread, perhaps quoting the above in the starting post?
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I'm not well-enough informed about Buddhist philosophy to address the topic of "emanation" with much certainty. From the two sources below, "The Ontodynamics of Emanation: An Exercise in Speculative Metaphysical" (by M. Alan Kazlev) and the Wikipedia entry for "Emanationism," an emanation is: a particular, specific, finite form of what is called the "Absolute" in philosophy - whether Eastern or Western, religious or nonreligious philosophy.
Thanks jetzenpolis. I have a lot to catch up on in the forum, but I need to read this more carefully before I respond. I will get back to you on this one I have thought about this a bit more deeply.
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...The Absolute is a form of "being" that can't be "contradicted" by an opposite idea. When philosophy talks about "being," it is talking about existence in its broadest possible sense. Philosophy uses the word "being" as a starting point in its taxonomy of all existence...
"Being," therefore, is the most general term possible that includes anything and everything which has an "existence." (It may also includes anything and everything that once existed but no longer exists, or has the potential for existence, or even once had the potential for existence.)
But this generalization of "being" makes no distinction between separate forms of being - into which everything in the universe might be divided into, as specific instances of "being" (on all possible planes of existence). This general, Absolute form of "being" remains undifferentiated, non-specific, amorphous. It is a broad, bland, homogeneous form "being" that turns all being into an intellectual monolith: an unbroken "totality" of being.
Any sort of differentiation between one thing and another gives each of them a "separate" form of "being." Thus, going back to Carl Linnaeus, the eighteenth century Swedish botanist, for example, the separation of groups of plants into a "taxonomy" of different species gives each of those species a separate identity (a separate form of "being," in other words). Further distinction between things are always possible, perhaps infinitely so...
Jean-Paul Sartre, the mid-twentieth century French Existentialist philosopher points out that "being" is contradicted by "non-being" ("nothingness," in other words). Since there is always a possibility of negation of "being" - since it can always be contradicted by "non-being" (nothingness) - he is led to question whether there can be an Absolute form of "being."...
Hegel's "Absolute"
In Hegel's philosophical system, the dialectic method builds up a sort of pyramid of thought over time (either personally or within the history of various human cultures). At the bottom, are the most specific forms (the division of Being into the various things we find in the World, in the Universe, in Existence: according to how we culturally divide them into their most simple, indivisible forms - as specified within the limits of our conscious thought). At the top, is the most generalized universal principle within Hegel's thought: the Absolute.
In order to get from the bottom to the top of this pyramid, Hegel employs the dialectic to reveal the ever greater "unities" that encompass the smaller ideas (the identities of more specific things) within ever larger ideas. Furthermore, the smaller ideas are each paired with their opposite - before they are brought together under a larger, unifying principle.
For example, "tall" and "short" are opposite ideas. But these two smaller opposing principles are then unified under the larger concept of "size."
In turn, Hegel might match the idea of "size" with its opposite - perhaps "weight." These two larger principles are encompassed within an ever larger principle, such as "mass" - which in physics is measured as "mass = weight X volume".
This enlargement of ideas into ever more general, more universal forms must eventually lead to an end point (for Hegel): the Absolute.
As I understand it, Hegel thought he found the Absolute in the idea of the "beginning." Of course, every "beginning" [of one thing] is necessarily the "ending" [of another thing]. "Beginning" and "Ending" are nothing more than two sides of the same coin: "change."
Thus, for Hegel, "change" (or "beginning") becomes the ultimate principle of the Absolute.
Needless to say, critics might point out that "change" can be paired with an opposite idea of "permanence." Presumably, again employing Hegel's dialectic, a unity (a "unifying" principle, in other words) must be found that encloses within its grasp both the idea of "change" and "permanence." Perhaps "change" and "permanence" can both be described (categorized) as "forms of being that occur within the dimension of time."
We come back to "Being," again. ("Time," itself, is a specific form of the greater, larger, more inconclusive concept [principle] of "being.")
Again, as the French Existentialist philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre says, "being" is contradicted by "nothingness" ("non-being").
Wikipedia: "Absolute idealism" [Hegel's Absolute Idealism]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_idealism
Absolute idealism is an ontologically monistic philosophy attributed to G.W.F. Hegel. It is Hegel's account of how being is ultimately comprehensible as an all-inclusive whole. Hegel asserted that in order for the thinking subject (human reason or consciousness) to be able to know its object (the world) at all, there must be in some sense an identity of thought and being. Otherwise, the subject would never have access to the object and we would have no certainty about any of our knowledge of the world. To account for the differences between thought and being, however, as well as the richness and diversity of each, the unity of thought and being cannot be expressed as the abstract identity "A=A". Absolute idealism is the attempt to demonstrate this unity using a new "speculative" philosophical method, which requires new concepts and rules of logic. According to Hegel, the absolute ground of being is essentially a dynamic, historical process of necessity that unfolds by itself in the form of increasingly complex forms of being and of consciousness, ultimately giving rise to all the diversity in the world and in the concepts with which we think and make sense of the world.
Teachings
For Hegel, the interaction of opposites generates in dialectical fashion all concepts we use in order to understand the world. Moreover, this development occurs not only in the individual mind, but also through history. In the Phenomenology of Spirit, for example, Hegel presents a history of human consciousness as a journey through stages of explanations of the world. Each successive explanation created problems and oppositions within itself, leading to tensions which could only be overcome by adopting a view that could accommodate these oppositions in a higher unity. At the base of spirit lies a rational development. This means that the absolute itself is exactly that rational development. The assertion that "All reality is spirit" means that all of reality rationally orders itself and while doing so creates the oppositions we find in it. Even nature is not different from the spirit since it itself is ordered by the determinations given to us by spirit. Nature, as that which is not spirit is so determined by spirit, therefore it follows that nature is not absolutely other, but understood as other and therefore not essentially alien.
The aim of Hegel was to show that we do not relate to the world as if it is other from us, but that we continue to find ourselves back into that world. With the realisation that both my mind and the world are ordered according to the same rational principles, our access to the world has been made secure, a security which was lost after Kant proclaimed the 'Ding an sich' ['Thing in-itself'] to be ultimately inaccessible.
The Absolute Idealist position should be distinguished from Berkeleyan idealism (Berkeley), Transcendental Idealism (Kant), subjective idealism (Fichte), and Objective idealism (Schelling).
Wikipedia: "Monism"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monistic
Monism is any philosophical view which holds that there is unity in a given field of inquiry, where this is not to be expected. Thus, some philosophers may hold that the Universe is really just one thing, despite its many appearances and diversities: or theology may support the view that there is one God, with many manifestations in different religions.
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WE should nonetheless note that Hegel's notion of the Absolute was, in hindsight, fraught with problems. Witness what some philosophers and historians had interpreted (in his "De orbitis Planetarum") to be his implied "proof" of 7 planets in the solar system. While people continue to argue as to whether or not this was really what he intended to put forth, it is reasonable to say that Heidegger's reaction to the Hegelian view of the Absolute is also called for. Phenomenology (i.e., Heidegger's Fundamental Ontology) also has it's place, and I think that BBM has a very similar world view to this.