The Great Escape of Ignatius J. Reilly

 "Well, that certainly was an ending to A Confederacy of Dunces." (I said this, it isn't from the book.)

I am not someone who reads much. I love critical consumption of media, but novels don't quite scratch the same itch as the visual arts do for me in that regard. I'll read a good book for school and say "this was phenomenal, I truly enjoyed it," and while that's true, that doesn't mean I'd read that book for personal enjoyment.

I can say with complete conviction that I regret not reading A Confederacy of Dunces solely for my own enjoyment back when I received a copy of it, because this book scratched my media itch in a way that thoroughly shocked me. It's truly brilliant satire, in the sense that it can be in equal parts hilarious and thought-provoking. I was laughing while Ignatius's status as a pseudo-intellectual buffoon was exemplified by his writing, I was laughing while his strange sense of righteousness shined through as he critiqued modern capitalist society. Ignatius J. Reilly is an incredibly complex character, but the most crucial element of his character is his comedy.

The book ends with Ignatius dreading being dragged away to a mental hospital after his mother decides to get rid of him, when he is suddenly approached by his ex-girlfriend, the eccentric and promiscuous Myrna Minkoff, who he sees as an escape from his house, his mother, and his status as a societal reject. Even this ending sequence is wild and humorous, with Ignatius insisting on smelling Myrna's hair and loudly complaining about buses, as is usual for him. This solidifies Ignatius's status as a strange man, but one who wants progress, one who wants to escape the horrible society he's surrounded with (even if he often has the wrong idea about what's horrible and what isn't.) Ignatius is simultaneously brilliant and backwards, smart yet utterly foolish, a dunce and the individual that dunces confederate against.

The book is full of characters that, despite being societal outcasts, are still capable of doing good and wanting good things for the world. Ignatius's strange social beliefs lead him to attempt to start a political party based around achieving world peace with a gay military, so despite having some questionable ideas, Ignatius ultimately supports world peace and, in a way perhaps he doesn't even understand due to his convoluted thought processes, gay rights.

Jones, the black man forced to work under Lana Lee, a woman repeatedly compared to Hitler, is another example of this. He's the absolute epitome of a social outcast in the 1950's, as throughout America's history, racists (or perhaps dunces is an equally appropriate word here) have beat down on people of color. Despite his status, however, Jones is able to start his own little uprising, cleverly instigating the arrest of his cruel employer, a great and impressive deed. 

Lastly, Gus Levy, the owner of Levy Pants, is in a similar situation. Constantly ridiculed by his wife for being unable to properly run his father's business, Mr. Levy is painted as a fool throughout most of the book, someone who doesn't even have respect from the person closest to him. However, he has a personal triumph near the end of the book: after deciding to lay off the senile Miss Trixie after realizing she can harmlessly be blamed for the letter Ignatius wrote in Levy Pants's name, both literally and metaphorically casting away the old parts of his company as he escapes his wife's desires for him to be just like his father, he IS able to step out of that parental shadow, deciding to rebrand to Levy Shorts and start some major reform in the company. Gus Levy, just like many other characters in this book, is shown to be someone people look down upon who's actually capable of great things.

This book has a lot to take away. Do I want to be like Ignatius? Do I want to avoid being like Ignatius as much as possible? What does society think of me, and am I capable of doing anything about it?

I think the answer to all of these questions is simple: ultimately, we spend too much time thinking about these things. We are all complex human beings with major flaws, which sometimes rise very prominently to the surface, such as with Ignatius's highly emphasized issues. As individuals, we're able to find our own place in society and achieve personal victories, like Ignatius or Jones. Dunces always confederate against people of color, against women, against gay people, against promiscuous people, against all sorts of folks... hell, they might confederate against you or me. However, we can realize this, work hard to not be a part of this problem ourselves, and we can fight for whatever dunceless world we believe in. Me? I believe in a world where more people have read this hilarious book.

The Center of Everything, Ignatius J. Reilly

 ""I'm Patrolman Mancuso. Undercover agent. You're under arrest for soliciting and for possession of pornography."" (Pg 335).

This quote takes place at the climax of the book... 60 pages before it actually ends. The final 100 pages of A Confederacy of Dunces was a truly bizarre few chapters to read. In summary, our "hero" Ignatius heads to the first meeting of the "political party" he planned with Dorian Greene from the French Quarter, which, much to Ignatius's chagrin, turned out to just be a party, one from which he was quickly kicked out. He headed to the Night of Joy to see the performance of "Scarlet O'Hara," a stripper character played by Darlene that Ignatius believes to be an intellectual due to having seen a pornographic photo of her holding a book that had been taken from him. This goes disastrously, Ignatius's earring is attacked by Darlene's bird, and he is nearly hit by a bus before passing out. Officer Mancuso, who was there undercover, used the opportunity to expose Lana Lee's (the owner of the bar) pornography distribution ring, and he was promptly beat up by three angry women from the party Ignatius attended. All of this happened within the span of ten or so pages.

This section is practically the perfect climax to the book--most major characters are directly involved in some way, it intertwines their seemingly separate storylines perfectly as everything comes together for a beautiful, messy sequence of events, described by the quoted description of a newspaper photograph of the incident: "On the right Darlene with her ball gown was holding the cockatoo and smiling a starlet's smile. On the left Lana Lee covered her face with her hands as she climbed into the rear seat of a squad car already filled with the three cropped heads of the members of the ladies' auxiliary of the Peace Party." (Pg 337). This is followed by an unflattering description of the battered Mancuso and unconscious Ignatius. Throwing all of these separate characters into one situation is something that I think is crucial to the novel: the payoff for its overall structure.

This book is structured almost as a series of separate stories, watching different characters from New Orleans go about their ridiculous lives. However, part of the book's fun is watching these stories slowly intertwine, watching all of the characters each find out about Ignatius and be astounded by his ridiculous behavior, watching various characters become aware (or remain blissfully unaware) of Mancuso's undercover actions, seeing this disaster at the Night of Joy unfold. That's what makes the climax work--it's the perfect ending for such a structural style, it conclusively gives almost every character a satisfying ending all at once.

After the climax, there's a particularly long section of the book still remaining, primarily focusing on Gus Levy (the owner of Levy Pants, Ignatius's former employer) and his wife as they try to find the person responsible for forging a letter in Mr. Levy's name (who happens to be Ignatius.) I think that final section deserves a spotlight in my final blog post, while the climax of this book was a beautiful example of John Kennedy Toole's writing style.