James Baldwin’s The Outing is largely a story about an ostrichsized young boy. Johnnie feels like an outsider in various aspects of his life including his sexuality, religious beliefs, place in his family, and place with his friends.
As we saw in The Rockpile, Johnnie is in a difficult situation because he is Gabriel’s only stepchild; “a stranger, living, unalterable testimony to his mother’s days in sin” (22). Gabriel is a hugely powerful figure who blatantly favors his other children over Johnnie. To his wife, Gabriel says Johnnie’s “pride is running away with him” and “that proud demon is just eating him up. (...) Be the best thing in the world if the Lord would take his soul” (40). With Gabriel’s hatred for him, Johnnie is left ostracized and without a place in his family.
Additionally, Johnnie is confused and lost with his friends. Gabriel completely disregards and disrespects Johnnie when he says David is Roy’s friend, not Johnnie’s. Then, at the end of the story, Elizabeth, Roy, Johnnie, and Sylvia disappear, leaving Johnnie alone. Similarly, Johnnie feels like an outsider in terms of his sexuality. Johnnie and David have a trapped romantic relationship, but in his super religious, conservative context, Johnnie knows this secret would be catastrophic. Finally, Johnnie feels ostracized within his religion. His sexuality coupled with the fact that he doesn’t know if he’s “saved” leaves him questioning his religion in the midst of a group of avid believers. In all of these ways, Johnnie is going through a challenging time in which he feels like an ostrich ized outsider and is struggling to find his place.
I definetely agree that Johnnie feels like an outsider in almost every aspect of his life. He feels both detached from his family and the society around him. John's feelings are almost simiar to Peter in "Previous Condition". In this story, Peter feels like he doesn't belong. He wades around in between white and black societies. With John, he too dosen't feel like he belongs. He wants to belong somewhere where he isn't alone and feels respected.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that Johnnie doesn't even really do anything wrong in this story, but still gets reprimanded by Gabriel, makes us feel even more sympathy for him. For example, when Johnnie makes a simple comment like "don't worry, Roy will make sure I don't misbehave," Gabriel gets furious and demands that his mother raise him properly. He gets so worked up over this simple, slightly sarcastic comment, claiming that if they were not in public he would have harshly struck Johnnie. He's already experiencing such pressure from his father and from the other church members coercing him to be "saved," and his confusion about his sexuality and being alone while David and Roy are off with girls doesn't exactly help.
ReplyDeleteOne part of the story that I found simultaneously troubling and moving is when Johnnie and David are wandering up and down the length of the boat, obviously searching for a moment of solitude—eventually finding it, and that's when we get the boys' confession. It's a captivating moment, but it's sad in the sense that the only relief Johnnie can find from the world (where, as you said, he's an outsider in numerous respects) is in David, and in a relationship that would be rejected by society were anyone to find out about it.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Lilly's comment--that scene where Johnnie and David are alone gives a glimpse of how these guys might interact in a world where they weren't going to be judged (and judged harshly, essentially *damned*) for their feelings. And it's sad in part because David seems more okay with balancing and keeping separate these two sides of himself, while Johnnie seems much more focused solely on him. His feelings are reciprocated, but from what we see, David has a much easier time quelling them and acting straight.
ReplyDeleteYet for all his "outsider" status, I'm struck by how confident Johnnie is in his own feelings and his ability and willingness to communicate them to David. There is this sense that they have a private understanding, and that a good deal of open, emotional expression must have taken place between them before.