Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
getting hit hard by offhand revelations (story discussion)
Jeff Wrangler:
--- Quote from: Front-Ranger on November 30, 2006, 12:32:47 pm ---The story comment makes it clear that Ennis married Alma to prove his masculinity.
--- End quote ---
Does it? Or does it just illustrate that this is what you do when you're a 19- or 20-year-old ranch kid in 1963 Wyoming (and maybe still today)? You find yourself a girlfriend, marry her young, and--'scuse the vulgarity--knock her up immediately? Was Ennis really that self-aware, or was he just fulfilling societal norms?
nakymaton:
--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on November 30, 2006, 01:03:28 pm ---Does it? Or does it just illustrate that this is what you do when you're a 19- or 20-year-old ranch kid in 1963 Wyoming (and maybe still today)? You find yourself a girlfriend, marry her young, and--'scuse the vulgarity--knock her up immediately? Was Ennis really that self-aware, or was he just fulfilling societal norms?
--- End quote ---
Is there a large difference between "fulfilling societal norms" and "proving his masculinity," especially in Wyoming in 1963?
--- Quote ---Maybe the "longing" Annie observed in the older cowboy in the bar wasn't actually desire for the boys shootin' pool. Maybe that longing was actually for a lost love. Perhaps watching those young cowboys brought back memories of a relationship in his own past, when he, himself, was as young as the boys he was watching when Annie noticed him. Perhaps there was an element of simply longing for his own lost youth in there, too.
--- End quote ---
That's how I see it, too.
mlewisusc:
Sorry to keep jumping in and out today, gang. What do we do with the fact that Story Ennis says to Jack he likes doin it with women? Is that just Ennis's way of arguing to himself that he's not "queer"? Or is it about making babies - e.g., he stopped sleeping with Alma when she wanted him to use protection (see also Ennis's desire to have a son - was this discussed above or in another thread?). But then. like Alma thought, what Ennis liked to do didn't make too many babies. As to the story, I believe that Ennis is actually sleeping with "the waitress" later in the story, and I don't believe Jack when he says he's having an affair with a ranch foreman's wife. I realize, however, that my trust in Story Ennis could be misplaced, as noted by Ms. P herself when she writes that the sparks flew up "with their truths and lies . . . " plural of course.
So twice Ennis tells Jack that he (Ennis) sleeps with women, and once comments that he enjoys it. Is he in fact sleeping with the waitress? Does he actually enjoy it? If he's lying, is he trying to prove his heterosexuality to himself or to Jack? I imagine the answer would come back "both."
nakymaton:
I think Ennis sleeps with women to keep trying to prove to himself that he's not "queer." :-\ :(
Actually, that's part of why I think he's NOT bi. I'm bi myself, and raised really homophobic and rural, and, you know... I think that if Ennis really liked doing it with women, he would have managed to live as if he were straight. (Really, being bi... it's not that difficult to pretend to be straight. Soul-destroying to try to bury part of oneself, yes... but easier than it would be if an opposite-sex relationship simply didn't work.)
mlewisusc:
--- Quote from: nakymaton on November 30, 2006, 01:28:39 pm ---I think Ennis sleeps with women to keep trying to prove to himself that he's not "queer." :-\ :(
Actually, that's part of why I think he's NOT bi. I'm bi myself, and raised really homophobic and rural, and, you know... I think that if Ennis really liked doing it with women, he would have managed to live as if he were straight. (Really, being bi... it's not that difficult to pretend to be straight. Soul-destroying to try to bury part of oneself, yes... but easier than it would be if an opposite-sex relationship simply didn't work.)
--- End quote ---
Except he fell in love with Jack.
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