Friday, July 30, 2010

Luck and Finn

One thing I often wondered about while reading: What are we supposed to make of Jake's luck (and the role of luck in life)? He seemed to luck out several times: the two winning horse-race episodes, the potentially sweet house-sitting gig with Sadie, the generous job offer from Madge in Paris, getting the hospital gig so easily, the offer from Hugo to share some of his wealth. He never seemed truly down and out, because opportunities just seemed to fall in his lap. If he didn't avail himself of one, another soon came along. This seemed significant somehow, but I'm not really sure what Murdoch meant for us to make of it.

Also, what did you think of Finn and how he ended up back in Ireland?
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3 comments:

cl said...

Good question about the luck, kc. Like Jake's unemployment until his orderly days, I didn't know if that kind of freedom was part of the good life, part of some greater theme or just a contrivance to put him wherever, whenever the author wanted. Like it would be sort of hard to achieve Great Things on a 9-to-5 schedule. So in turn I didn't read much more into his luck, but I'll need to chew on that.

I liked the lack of closure about Finn. It was essential for Jake's maturity for his second fiddle to vanish. Jake really might have been Finn's second fiddle, and when he no longer proved interesting or expedient, Finn cut his losses. It's a little harsh but not unlike how Jake had behaved.

I think scores of romantic comedies would end better that way -- the grand finale, the interrupted wedding and whatnot -- instead of all the supporting cast standing around teary-eyed and approving, they all went out for eggs and coffee and leave the hero and heroine to themselves: Oh, our problems aren't that interesting after all.

8:26 AM, August 01, 2010
kc said...

Yeah, Finn is such a cipher — kind of a Jeeves-like character without the force of personality/humor — that you feel he's better off alone in the end, in a position where he's forced to do and be more in his own right.

Good point about the ending. It's certainly more realistic for a character to end up relatively alone on the stage with his thoughts — Murdoch's point about how we live only in the interstices of each other's lives.

5:34 PM, August 01, 2010
Erin said...

I thought of Jake's remarkable luck as sort of a comic device. It seems like I've seen a lot of silly comedy movies where the hero falls backwards into one fortunate situation after another. It's possible I didn't read enough into it, though.

Finn was interesting. I thought it was kind of sweet that he yearned for Ireland and finally made it back. Jake clearly took him for granted, just assuming that Finn's concerns were the same as his own. I agree it was really important for Jake's development that he no longer have Finn around to bail him out or do his bidding.

10:36 AM, August 02, 2010

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