Monkey Beach Analysis

Lieutenant Jimmy Cross was a character with many layers that he never actually showed. He had emotions that he kept inside him, and he was never truly focused on the war. He rarely talked to the other soldiers about how he felt about the war. Cross was burdened with responsibility and guilt. He blamed himself for the death of his soldiers, and he blamed himself for Martha not loving him the way he loved her. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is a important character that is seriously affected by the war, and has conflicted

There is death that strikes to Mick while on a fishing trip and is partially eaten by seals. Lisa’s grandmothers house also catches fire, and because of her old age, she does not escape but dies inside instead. She leaves about two hundred thousand dollars to her granddaughter, Lisamarie as an inheritance. The elements of ghosts and supernatural are highly amplified within this novel. However, Robinson makes Lisa’s connection with the spiritual world seem to be a gift rather than a curse. Lisa is haunted by a little man who could appear to her every time there was something bad about to happen. But Sasquatch also referred to as B’gwus is another creature that was said to be on the money beach, which made the island, have some ambiguity.

Majorly, the decisions we make in life have to do with what our feelings show. Love is an important matter of our life because it helps motivate us in different ways. O’Brien references Jimmy’s romance with Martha, which was not mutual. Martha was a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. Even though Cross is extremely in love with her, Martha did not feel

Abuse can have a large psychological effect on an individual. Both Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson and The Death of Jayson Porter by Jaime Adoff demonstrate that abuse leads to mental instability within the characters. This is evident through the literary criticism of the psychological lens shown in the behaviour of the characters in relation to many of Freud’s theories. Some of these theories included the Oedipus complex, the interpretation of dreams and the unconscious mind (Britannica Encyclopedia, 2014). Both authors demonstrate this through three types of abuse; substance abuse, verbal abuse and neglect.

Jimmy Cross carries a picture of his love, Martha, with him every step he takes has he fights in the Vietnam War. He has a picture of her playing volleyball and a picture of her leaning against a wall. As he daydreams about Martha, Jimmy Cross feels hope and motivation to fight through the war and make it home to see his love. Martha does not love him back but Jimmy still fantasies about all the things he wants to experience with Martha. Because of Jimmy’s love for Martha and how he can look at the photos all night and day, these pictures symbolize hope and motivation but also distraction. The photos are a distraction to Jimmy. While he is thinking about the photos and dreaming of Martha, his men have died due to his distraction. The morning after Ted Lavender died he burned the pictures and the letters, but he knew he “couldn’t burn the blame” (494). After he burned the letters he remembers that, “...his

In “Monkey Beach” by Eden Robinson, the author uses a wide variety of supernatural and predictable symbols and images to display death throughout the course of the novel surrounding Lisa and her coming of age. Examples of symbols Robinson uses in the novel to relate back to death includes, water of some sort, animals (crows and ravens) and imaginary supernatural creatures. The importance of animals and supernatural creatures is shown throughout the story with Lisa and death.

Trying to make ends meet, he turns to selling drugs. By the time Jimmy finds love ones more and decides to settle down tragedy occurs. Trying to escaping from a drug bust at a friend’s house his attempts end up with a conviction for murder. Due to his illiteracy, Jimmy couldn’t read the false accusations he never committed.

Instead it is a gift. For instance, “…I told her about the little man and she gave me a hug and said everyone had bad dreams and not to be scared of them – they were just dreams, and they couldn’t hurt me” (21) expresses the interactions that Lisamarie encounters with the spirit world that she can not yet understand due to the dismissal from her mother Gladys. Later, Lisamarie’s curiosity influences her to seek the reason behind her visions and has the following conversation with her Ma-ma-oo, to define what is occurring: “…Ah, you have a gift, then. Just like your mother. Didn’t she tell you about it?... When Gladys was very young, lots of death going on. T.B. Flu. Drinking. Diseases. She used to know who was going to die next. But that kind of gift, she makes people nervous, hey?” (153).

Jimmy's transformation begins when he decides to burn the pictures and letters of his girlfriend, Martha. To be a leader in war was meaningless to Jimmy Cross compared to the love he had for Martha. Cross' subsequent burning of Martha's letters suggests that he's determined to put such romantic ideas behind him. He repeatedly convinces himself that there will be no more fantasies about Martha. The burning of Martha’s things is symbolically used by O’Brien to signify a turning point in Cross’ development. Cross realizes that Martha's feelings for him were not those of love, for she is an English major, a girl who lives in the world of words. Cross was rationalizing his un-requiting love for Martha to create a “home world” inside his mind so that he could mentally escape from the war when he needed to.

Just like O’Brien, Jimmy in “Midnight Movie” also has guilt for someone he killed, but not like O’Brian where he killed a man, Jimmy killed a woman. Like O’Brien

One of the biggest problems that Jimmy struggled with, was focusing, his mind was constantly thinking of Martha, the woman he believed to be in love with. Even when he was marching with his soldiers, he was daydreaming about her. “Jimmy's thoughts are consumed by Martha and he often daydreams about her when he should be paying attention to leading his men through the villages of Vietnam” (Overview: “The Things They Carried” par.2). Tim O’Brien states this, “On occasion he would yell at his men to spread out the column, to keep their eyes open, but then he would slip away into daydreams, just pretending, walking barefoot along the Jersey shore, with Martha, carrying nothing” (599). This lack of focus has a huge impact on Jimmy’s squad, they need a real leader to guide them, provide them with physical and emotional support, and assume the

Jimmy Cross, they met at a college in New Jersey but nothing sparked between them besides a friendship. There isn't any hope of them ever being together but Jimmy Cross still thinks about her constantly everyday. In one particular letter she sends him a good-luck-pebble. "Martha wrote that she had found the pebble on the Jersey shoreline and carried it in her breast pocket for several days" (8). Jimmy Cross reads the letter spends hours wondering who she was at the beach with, if she was with a man, if they were a couple. When the women sent letters home, it really helped keep the morale of the soldier's. Although Martha continues to kind of mislead Jimmy when she signs the letters "love." "Ted Lavender was shot in the head on his way back from peeing. He lay with his mouth open" (12).

When he was just a sophomore in college, Cross signed up to join the Reserve Officers Training Corps. At the time he did not fully understand the effects that this decision would have on him and only registered to gain some credits. His friends signing up for the course also greatly influenced his decision to become an officer. Once on the battlefield in Vietnam however, his inexperience is obvious and Jimmy Cross second-guesses almost everything he does. In the early stages of the war, Cross is very distracted by his daydreams and fantasies about a girl back home, Martha. They were dating, and Jimmy Cross imagines talking to her and staring at her pictures more than he actually focuses on the war. His distracted nature and lack of focus leads to platoon members being killed. After the death of Ted Lavender, Jimmy Cross realizes that he has been selfish and must help his men to survive the war. He shows a lot of maturity by destroying the photos and letters that he received from Martha and also throwing the good-luck pebble she gave him away. After he does this, Jimmy Cross becomes stricter on the men, but also a better leader. His failure to protect Ted Lavender causes Jimmy Cross to feel more determined to excel as a leader and protector to his troops. In The Things They Carried, Jimmy Cross represents all of

Not only are Lisamaries supernatural visions part of her Haisla culture; they are also seen as being a gift by some; and completely misunderstood by others. Some people decide to view these visions as a curse, due to many different reasons. Lisamaries mother, Gladys is one of those people who sees the gift as a curse. Gladys fears Lisas visions because when Gladys was a kid they were suppressed out of her through bullying and fear. Gladys doesn’t want this happening to Lisa so she also wants to suppress the visions

"Then at full dark he would return to his hole and watch the night and wonder is Martha was a virgin." He recognizes the ideas that she may not be a virgin, and even acknowledges that there are other men in her life. Jimmy knows that Martha has many boyfriends, and when he receives a picture from her in the mail, wonders who the photographer was. He treasures the picture and takes it everywhere with him, and yet the small shadow in the picture of the man taking it seems to be his focal point. He wants to focus purely on his unrequited love for Martha, but he can't. He seems to force himself to understand that she does not actually love him. She will never be his, and he knows that somewhere inside him, but continues to imagine that the love that she signs at the end of her letters is really a romantic love.