12 Contemporary Literature, 1970 to Present
Hawthorne puts it, “Wonderful escape!” Escape takes many, many forms here:
as Houdini-style magic tricks; as Jews fleeing from the Nazis; as escapist
entertainment offered by comic books; as emotional and/or literal abdica-
tion, running away from commitment; as attempting to escape your sexual
identity, or attempting to escape society’s disapproval of that sexual identity;
or even, as stated at the beginning of the novel, “It was never just a question
of escape. It was also a question of transformation.” Bernard Kornblum, Josef
Kavalier’s magic teacher, tells him, “Never worry about what you are escaping
from. Reserve your anxieties for what you are escaping to .” Yet, of course, Joe
cannot forget the family he left behind when he escaped from Czechoslo-
vakia, nor can Sammy forget the father who “escaped” life with him and his
mother. Toward the end of the novel, reflecting on comic books, Joe thinks,
“Having lost his mother, father, brother, and grandfather, the friends and foes
of his youth, his beloved teacher Bernard Kornblum, his city, his history—his
home—the usual charge leveled against comic books, that they offered merely
an easy escape from reality, seemed to Joe actually to be a powerful argument on
their behalf.... The escape from reality was, he felt—especially right after the
war—a worthy challenge.” Students could find fruitful trajectories for topics
by following any one of these tropes of escape in the novel. For an extra-textual
topic, advanced students might explore comic-book history and assess Joe
Kavalier’s argument that this kind of escapist entertainment is valuable. The
articles by Hillary Chute and Lee Behlman should be useful, along with the
history by Gerard Jones. At the end of Kavalier and Clay Chabon offers a list
of histories and biographies he consulted while writing the book; students will
find there sources on Houdini, the Holocaust, comic-book history, and gay life
in mid-twentieth-century New York City.
- One of Sammy’s comic-book-artist friends refers to their creations as “wishful
figments” (a malapropism for “wish fulfillment”), pointing out that Sammy,
who is lame from polio, gave his creation, the lame Tom Mayflower, a magic
key that made him strong and whole, able to walk without a limp. Sammy
“wondered what other wishes he might have subsumed unknowingly into the
character.” Another example of a wishful figment is Joe’s first cover, depicting
the Escapist delivering a powerful punch to the jaw of Adolf Hitler. In what
ways does Chabon play with the notion of wish fulfillments in this novel?
How does it serve as an investigation of the relationship between desire and
imagination? How are Kavalier and Clay’s many character creations alter egos
for them, and in what ways does each young man’s creations speak to his fears,
desires, and perceived shortcomings? Another approach would be to focus on
Luna Moth, Joe’s imagining of Rosa Saks. In what way is the Luna Moth
character a “wishful figment,” and in what ways does Luna Moth accurately
represent the character of Rosa? Advanced students might tackle this question
in relation to the psychological impact of escapist art.
- Chabon has demonstrated a steadily increasing interest in the mixing of
genres, as well as in genre fiction itself. (Genre fiction refers to romance, sci-
ence fiction, fantasy, horror, westerns, and mystery.) For instance, The Final
Solution narrates a mystery being investigated by a figure clearly meant to be
