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The Pugilist at Rest Characters - eNotes.com. by Thom Jones. Start Free Trial. Characters. PDF Cite Share. Lance Corporal Hanes is an experienced Marine with two Purple Hearts who has...
Oct 24, 2016 · The platoon waited at parade rest while Sergeant Wright came out of the duty hut and took command of the situation. An ambulance was called, and it came almost immediately. A number of corpsmen squatted down alongside the fallen man for what seemed an eternity.
Mar 28, 2012 · The pugilist at rest. by. Jones, Thom. Publication date. 1995. Topics. Modern fiction, Short stories, Fiction, English fiction Short stories, United States. Publisher. London : Faber.
- Introduction
- Author Biography
- Plot Summary
- Characters
- Themes
- Topics For Further Study
- Style
- Historical Context
- Compare & Contrast
- Critical Overview
"The Pugilist at Rest," by Thom Jones, was first published in the New Yorkerin 1992 and then reprinted as the title story in Jones's first collection of short stories in 1993. The collection was widely praised by reviewers, who regarded Jones as an exciting new voice in American fiction. The story is told by a first-person narrator who is a decorat...
Thomas Douglas Jones was born in Aurora, Illinois, on January 26, 1945, the son of Joseph Thomas Jonesand Marilyn Faye (Carpenter) Graham. His father was a boxer, and Jones took up the sport as a teenager. He said in a 1995 interview in Poets & Writers Magazinethat he had conflicts with his father and later his stepfather and did not take kindly to...
"The Pugilist at Rest" begins as the first-person narrator recalls, many years after the event, an incident that took place in August 1966 at a twelve-week boot camp he attended at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, California. One recruit got caught writing a letter to his girlfriend when he should have been taking notes on the specs of ...
Lance Corporal Hanes
Lance Corporal Hanes is an experienced Marine with two Purple Hearts who has only twelve days left on his tour of duty in Vietnam. He is killed when the platoon comes under fire from the North Vietnamese. The narrator is angry that Hanes, since he had such a short time left, was not sent to the rear, out of harm's way.
Hey Baby
Hey Baby is the nickname of one of the Marine recruits at boot camp. He is large and fairly tough, but he is a bully and is not liked by the other recruits. He takes to picking on Jorgeson, the narrator's buddy. But when he shoves Jorgeson hard with his rifle, the narrator responds by striking him in the temple with the butt of his rifle. Hey Baby suffers a fractured skull.
Jorgeson
Jorgeson is a friend of the narrator since they were both training to be Marines at boot camp in San Diego. At boot camp, Jorgeson is an unconventional character. Drawn to being an artist rather than a Marine, he wants to live a Bohemian lifestyle, drinking, playing jazz, hanging out with Jack Kerouac and other beatniks, studying Zen Buddhismand astrology. The narrator thinks Jorgeson has a skeptical attitude regarding his Marine training, but he changes his mind when he runs into Jorgeson ag...
The Masculine Code
The story presents an ideal of manhood in terms of toughness and aggression. In the narrator's world, real men put their masculinity to the test in extreme conditions, whether on the battlefield or in the boxing ring. Courage, fearlessness, and endurance are the qualities to be cultivated. Men must show other men what they are made of. In the boxing match, for example, the narrator makes a decision to stay in the fight because his buddies are watching, and he cannot let them down. The fact th...
Research the types of brain injury caused by boxing. How many boxers have died over the last decade directly as a result of injuries sustained in the ring? Should there be more regulations to make...The narrator in the story was probably in Vietnam during the Tet offensive in 1968. What was the Tet offensive? In what sense did it mark a turning point in the war?What are the symptoms of depression? How is depression treated? How does depression alter the way a person feels and the way the person perceives the world? Write two separate paragraphs describing...Select a piece of visual art—a painting, photograph or sculpture. Describe it and also describe its significance for you. What does it tell you about life that is so appealing? What questions does...Imagery and Symbolism
The narrator frequently brings attention to one image: the blue eyes of his friend Jorgeson. There is nothing remarkable about Jorgeson's appearance other than his "very clear cobalt-blue eyes": "They were so remarkable that they caused you to notice Jorgeson in a crowd. There was unusual beauty in these eyes, and there was an extraordinary power in them." While Jorgeson is firing at the enemy, he turns and looks at the narrator "with those blue eyes," and just as Jorgeson is about to die, th...
Vietnam War
In the summer of 1966, when the narrator in "The Pugilist at Rest" was attending boot camp in San Diego, the war in Vietnam was steadily escalating as the United States sought to prevent communist North Vietnam from taking over South Vietnam, which had a non-communist government. American planes began bombing Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam, in late June, 1966, and by the end of the year the number of U.S. troops stationed in South Vietnam had risen to 385,300. This figure rose to 475,000...
U.S. War Crimes in Vietnam
The narrator in "The Pugilist at Rest" commits "unspeakable crimes" in Vietnam, yet he is not court-martialed but given medals. This point touches on the issue of American war crimes in Vietnam and their cover-up, which was a controversial and divisive issue in the United States during the late-1960s and early 1970s. One notorious incident took place on March 16, 1968, at the village of My Lai, in which between 347 and 504 civilians were killed by American soldiers. The victims were mainly ol...
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can result from a traumatic experience such as combat in war or from any highly stressful experience, such as natural disasters (fire, flood, earthquake); torture or rape; an automobile or airplane accident; or childhood physical abuse. The traumatic event may retain its power, years later, to evoke the same emotions, such as panic or terror, which the person felt at the time. Any stimulus that the person perceives as being related to the trauma can trigg...
1960s: In 1963, the drug sodium valproate (VPA) is found to be effective in controlling epileptic seizures. In 1968, the Epilepsy Foundation of America is formed, dedicated to promoting the welfare...1960s: In spite of its huge manpower and technological superiority, the United States cannot defeat the enemy in Vietnam. The war is a divisive issue among Americans and saps American self-confiden...1960s: After two well-publicized deaths from injuries received in the boxing ring, there are calls for boxing to be banned. In 1962, Cuban boxer Benny Paret dies ten days after being badly beaten i...Jones's collection of stories The Pugilist at Rest was received enthusiastically by reviewers, who hailed the author as a strong new voice in American short fiction. According to Publishers Weekly, "Jones's voice … is irresistible—sharp, angry, poetic. His characters … are scarred, spirited survivors of drug abuse, war and life's cruel tricks." Mos...
The depressed, epileptic Vietnam veteran who narrates "The Pugilist at Rest" and whose life is a toxic cocktail of pain, cruelty, aggression, and suffering is not an isolated figure in...
Nov 24, 1991 · Fiction. The Pugilist at Rest. By Thom Jones. November 24, 1991. The New Yorker, December 2, 1991 P. 38. The narrator recalls his experience as a Marine during the Vietnam War. In boot camp...
