How the Cooper kids react to their family dynamics
Throughout most of the novel Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead we see a complicated family dynamic in Benji’s household. His father drinks and often has “flare-ups” where he starts arguments and yells at the kids and his wife. He also called Reggie, Benji’s brother, “shithead” for an entire year. We see throughout the story the different reactions Benji and his siblings have to this complicated family dynamic.
Elena, Benji’s older sister, is rarely in the novel though Benji often speaks of how once she got to college she never comes out to Sag Harbor. Benji tells the reader about how Elena only comes home a couple times a year, if even, to see the family. We learn Elena’s reasoning for this on page 285. “Do me a favor and don’t tell mom and dad you saw me, will you?...They wouldn’t understand,.. “Of course I want to see you and Reggie…You know how it can be in that house. ”. These pieces of the conversation between Elena and Benji show how Elena has fully distanced herself from the family because of the complicated family dynamics created by their father. We can also see in this scene that Benji is hurt by the fact that Elena was in Sag Harbor, but wasn’t coming to see their family. Benji doesn;t quite understand till the end of the book why Elena and Reggie try to get out and try to avoid their parents while Benji stays behind at the house.
Similarly to Elena, Reggie is also not around often. Though he comes out to Sag Harbor still this particular summer he works at Burger King purposefully scheduling shifts on weekends to avoid their parents on weekends when they are here. Because of this Benji also doesn’t see Reggie as often since they are both working. It is clear that similarly to Elena, Reggie is scheduling his shifts to avoid their father who, like I mentioned earlier, called him “shithead” the entire year.
Throughout the novel we see Benji waiting for his father’s “flare-ups” and listening for his father to open the liquor cabinet. We see him struggle with leaving the house feeling trapped with the “flare-ups” until the end of the novel where he eventually starts to understand why Elena and Reggie just want to get out, and feels a new sense of nostalgia.
Elena is such an important character in this novel, even though she only makes a few brief appearances--we can grasp a lot from that one scene outside the restaurant, and her insistence that Benji himself already KNOWS what she's talking about when she refers to "how it can be in that house." She gives him what likely proves to be crucial advice--get out, get into a good school, and find your "tribe"--and from what we can tell, Benji pretty much takes this advice to heart. I like your observations about how in some ways Reggie seems to have already grasped this lesson, as he hides out at Burger King for most of the novel, and we can see a key progression with Benji, when at first he doesn't leave the house in "Flare-ups," but then he DOES leave in "Tonight We Improvise"--and when he closes the door behind him, he realizes how no one else can hear (or cares) what's going on inside. It's quite liberating, when that door closes and he just walks away. We could read this as an early manifestation of Elena's advice.
ReplyDeleteCate, you make some very interesting observations about Benji's individual relationships with his family. While reading your blog, I couldn't help but think that it seems like one by one, each member of Benji's family leaves him forcing him to be more alone. Elena rarely visits, the parents come on the weekends, and Reggie begins fading away into his Burger King job as the novel progresses. This may be one of the many threads which leads Benji to become Ben, just a thought! Very nive blog.
ReplyDeleteHi Cate! I think this was a really insightful blog post that explained the impact of Benji’s father on each sibling really well. I also liked how you showed the contrast between Benji, Elena, and Reggie and how each one handles the family tension differently. It makes you think more about how people cope in their own ways when home doesn’t feel safe. Great post!
ReplyDelete