Closing Thoughts

    When I went into this project choosing to read A Confederacy of Dunces, I knew only a little about the book´s story and inspiration. The author, John Kennedy Toole, lived a life fairly similar to that of Ignatius--a man in his early 30s with a good education yet living with his mother, struggling to put write about his beliefs that he feels so urgently bear hearing. It's not hard to understand the unhappiness that the protagonist lives in, but it is a very effective means by which to understand the unhappiness that Toole himself lived in.

    A major question that surrounded the novel during its writing and publishing 11 years after Toole's suicide was that of whether or not it was an autobiography. His mother, Thelma Toole, vehemently opposed the idea that it was an autobiography when interviewed about it, and Toole himself described it as more of something that existed in the space between autobiography and invention. Thelma Toole played a major and noteworthy role in the publishing of the novel, as she spent over a decade trying to get her son's manuscript to even be considered by a publishing company. Though, watching interviews of her and her very firm opposition to calling it an autobiography will make one see Toole's mother as almost the exact opposite of Ignatius's mother. Where Mrs. Reilly is frail, neurotic, and used to her wants and needs being trampled by the whims of her son, Thelma Toole is a well educated and articulate woman with a strong presence that seems almost nothing like her supposed literary counterpart. Her argument for the validity of the novel's fictional status relies on this kind of fact--to her, the nihilistic and helpless Ignatius is nothing like the intelligent and caring son she raised. 

     This is where the novel starts to get interesting as a character-driven plot meant to question the thoughts and actions of the people in the story. Essentially all of the events and characters of the story connect back to Ignatius in some way, and the story ending with Ignatius simply outrunning responsibility to reinforce his lack of character development cements the fact that the ultimate purpose of featuring Ignatius's point of view is to act as a case study in character. He never allows the reader a satisfying conclusion to his awful behavior, but we get to see the true extent of the pain that he carries with him in his soul, wrapped tightly in a bitter shell of egoism and unfounded superiority. By laying bare the almost comically intense dysfunction of Ignatius's ego, we can see the way that Toole is the one doing the poking a prodding of his own self, the true dirty work, on our behalf. 

    It is made clear very early on that the last thing you are should want to do with this text is be on Ignatius's side. Even when he is emotionally vulnerable and has the chance to change, watching him completely disregard the opportunity to do so makes only makes you all the more critical of his refusal for change. This is exactly what this book is--a criticism of the self. Much like Ignatius's plans for the indictment of the century, A Confederacy of Dunces stands to criticize the complex flaws in everyone´s characters and the way that we deal with them. From The Night of Joy Bar to the Levy Pant Company to the city of New Orleans at large, the majority of the cast of characters share a common disconnect from the world by being disconnected from themselves. Ignatius acts as the most extreme example of this, but we can contrast the way that people like Mrs. Reilly, Jones, Miss Trixie, or Dorian Greene all are helpless victims to the general, well, dunce-ry of the people who control their lives. They all in their own way seem to be some of the only people aware of the true extent to which the people around them treat themselves and each other cruelly. This level of self-awareness in these characters demonstrates Toole's understanding and awareness of this dynamic in our daily lives. 

    This may not have been the greatest book that I've read this year, and it may not be a book without its own weak points, but as the sole text from a young author, it stands to be a book worth reading in my opinion. I can't speak to their accuracy, but the way that Toole creates caricatures of the people in his life, including himself, make valid criticism of the way that we treat others and ourselves by making the reader potentially see some of their own flaws reflected in its cast and question why that is. Parts of the story where Ignatius writes his lengthy, cringe-worthy, and almost Aspirin-necessitating soliloquies are especially worth revisiting for their meta-textual discussion of Ignatius's awareness of his actions and the general display of his character. 

    By the time I finished the book, I felt that I had come away from it with a better of understanding of Toole's worldview and the way that he wanted others to think of themselves. Flaws are unavoidable in human nature, but I feel that a larger concept that the story conveyed was that the true measure of our flaws is if we are willing to face them and make them ours for the changing, or if we are simply willing to outrun them without looking back.