Most critics of the novel The Big Money, including Becker, tend to read the character Tony Garrido as an extension of Margo Dowling or a subplot to her overall narrative. I would argue that Dos Passos is using the character of Tony, as a “closeted” main character to explore the dissent of the homosexual from social conventions, and its repression which is demonstrated internally and externally[RSB1] . Garrido’s embodiment of the theme of “repression of dissent” may in actuality define him as a significant character (perhaps more so than Margo). Both in the context of the story and in the technical method by which this character has been presented by Dos Passos, Tony’s sexuality relegates him to a marginalized status which effectively silences his voice. Tony is never able to directly broach the struggle his sexual identity causes him and the pain and difficulties he faces must be related only through the voice of others. The exploration of Tony Garrido’s experience is therefore hidden or “closeted” within the context of Margo’s narrative and the Valentino biography.
In Margo’s second narrative section in the novel, when Margo and Tony happen upon each other, they are both struggling to form their identity in terms of their sexuality. The young couple, she is sixteen years old and he is twenty-one, find solidarity and a level of newly experienced comfort in someone with whom they can share their frustrations and their dreams. Margo complains to Tony, describing the unease she feels because of her burgeoning sexuality. She recounts to him the harassing attention of the men who are interested in her - though she withholds news from him about being raped by her stepfather Frank. Tony also fails to disclose the secret of his homosexuality. Though unvoiced to Margo, Tony displays signs of distress regarding the sexual component of their relationship, as well as her conclusion that a marriage between them would provide the perfect escape (for her away from Frank and Agnes and the stifling boredom of the apartment and for him to the nostalgia of his childhood home of Cuba) which they both desire.
Tony clearly struggles internally during this period with the true nature of his homosexual desires and the societal pressures to seek out a conventional relationship. Tony responds timidly to Margo’s aggressive sexual advances, allowing her to take on the role of instigator. Despite her provocative actions which grow increasingly intimate by her design, Margo refuses to allow consummation by completing the sexual act, insisting on first being married and escaped from their present condition. Tony’s emotional outburst of tears and feigned indignation to Margo’s sexual advances would indicate extreme sexual frustration or a frightened lack of experience, they are in fact the first real intimations of Tony’s homosexuality, and the dueling urges which conflict him. Later references will indicate to the reader (and eventually to Margo,) Tony’s true sexual identity, but during their courtship he seems willing to participate by marrying Margo and attempting a more traditional relationship. Margo is the architect of the marriage plan, and though “he didn’t seem to like the idea very much” (146) he did nothing to dissuade his future wife.
Theorist Judith Butler argued that “Gender …is a construction that regularly conceals its genesis. The tacit agreement to perform, produce and sustain discrete and polar genders as cultural fictions is obscured by the credibility of its own production “ (903). During their engagement, Tony “performed” the role that was expected of him, in both appearance and deed. Tony and Margo were striking together, causing strangers on the street to remark, “my, what a handsome young couple” (146). Tony provided the anticipated protest when Margo refused to allow him to have intercourse with her, referencing male dominated cultural tradition, or machismo, identified with Cuban men. He also played stereotypical male roles by earning the money needed to carry out their plans and by being the decisive voice in the timing and execution of their wedding arrangements. Tony’s unease becomes evident as he plunged into a “compulsory heterosexual” relationship, which although he participated in and enacted, is not credibly based. The narrative catalogues Tony’s increasing discomfort and fear as they obtain a marriage license, register at the hotel as a married couple and secured the room , and their honeymoon suite – they use it for practical purposes of freshening up, and not for relieving the unrealized sexual tension.
Immediately upon marrying, Tony is affected by the external consequences of the denial of his nature. The unnatural carriage and composure of the couple belie the true nature of their relationship- causing the hotel clerk to doubt their marriage claim and demanding proof. When the newlyweds begin to drink champagne shortly after their wedding, effectively loosening his inhibitions, Tony begins to gradually insinuate his homosexuality, revealing that “many rich men like me very much” (148). His marriage and return to Havana are so unsettling to Tony that he becomes physically ill on the journey and Margo must assume the role of caretaker and protector which will continue through the course of their relationship. Though Tony experiences a sexual relationship with Margo, as is evidenced by her subsequent pregnancy, it becomes increasingly clear that he is dedicated to pursuing (or being pursued) by male companions. The nature of Garrido’s relationships with men like “el Senor Manfredo” are cloaked, falsifying their true intent. Tony presents these men as friends who are interested in helping him further his career. Tony demonstrates his confusion and dual allegiance to both his constructed heterosexual image and his homosexual yearnings by visiting the bedside of his pregnant wife while accompanied by his male “benefactor.” Margo’s reaction to the events unfolding around her are filled with denial, her arrival in Havana marks her realization that she will be unable to fulfill her dreams of happiness with Tony..” The nature of their incompatibility is unclear to Margo, even as Tony gradually reveals more of his authentic self to her. It is only when she hears the truth from her husband about his “secret disease” that she fully comprehends the situation.
Tony’s external characteristics and actions which distinguish him as homosexual develop throughout the course of the novel. Initially Tony is described in terms of his feminine features and mannerism – Margo initially marvels at his “long eyelashes brushing his pink cheek” (148) and his “polite bashful manners.” Despite his delicate description, there is no clear indication that he is other than a typical heterosexual male. This is further reinforced by the reaction of Frank when he learns that Margo and Tony are dating and he disparages Tony by identifying him as a “greaser” rather than using a sexual epithet. When Margo encounters Tony in Florida as she is preparing to cruise with her new boyfriend Tad, a dramatic change has come over Tony by extension Margo’s perception of him. Upon recognizing his “mincing” walk approaching, “the first thing that Margo thought was how on earth could she have ever liked that fagot” (216). Tony also develops a drug problem – which a modern reader may interpret as further evidence of the self destructiveness and inner turmoil caused by Tony’s conflicted sexuality. However in exploring “The Gendering of Addiction in the Twentieth Century,” author Mara Keire explains, “Cocaine was another signifier that some fairies adopted to distinguish themselves from conventional society. These fairies chose cocaine because, like their contemporaries, they associated drug use with femininity…. It was the association of drugs with fairies that informed John Dos Passos’s characterized Tony Garrido it was his addiction as much as his "mincing walk" that confirmed his homosexuality to his wife Margo Dowling. (Keire 3) Tony’s secret which he was initially reluctant to confide, becomes a very public presentation of self.
Dos Passos creates the character of Tony as the ultimate symbol of the outsider. Tony is a drug addict, out of work, effeminate foreigner. His delicate appearance, body language and mannerisms offer rebellious challenge to the image of the generally strong and powerful male ideal common in American in the post World War I era. Becker’s criticism of The Big Money relates several behavior patterns among the main characters, most significantly for this thesis, is that which the critic identifies as being “so prominent as to constitute a major theme, …an eradicable inhumanity, an intolerance toward all people and ideas in anyway offbeat” (Becker 9). The many distinctions which make Tony an outsider, also make him the object of scorn and contempt from other characters featured in the novel. He is railed against as being a “greaser,” “spick,” “fagot” and a “rat.” Becker writes of Dos Passos’s characters, that “this automatic consigning of aliens and oddballs to coventry leads to exploitation and violence” (Becker 9). Becker points to Margo’s harsh treatment of Tony throughout the novel, and while I would agree that she is lashing out at him for his homosexuality, I would suggest that she is demonstrating the confusion and internal struggle caused by the confusion which their complex relationship causes her – she loves him – even the characteristics which signify his homosexuality, and yet it simultaneously repulses her. Margo does regularly exploit Tony, treating him as a commodity that can be used when it benefits her, and dismissed when it does not. Tony is also the victim of violence or threatened violence, several times in the novel, In one incident he arrives on Margo’s doorstep bloody and disheveled explaining “A gang beat me up” (269). In another incident he has been beaten by his male companion, Max, who has threatened to “break every bone in his body” unless he is able to extort money from Margo. Finally, perhaps predictably, Tony is killed, his skull is fractured by a blunt object during a wild party rife with alcohol and narcotics, attended (according to newspaper accounts) only by men.
Dos Passos’s use of the Newsreel and (newspaper articles like the one recounting Tony’s death), and the biography sections may be read as a subjective voice guiding the reader’s attention to significant issues. The choice of biography subjects within The Big Money is often debated, but many critics have chosen to explore the importance of his choice of framing Margo Dowling’s narrative with celebrities Isadora Duncan and Rudolph Valentino. Rudolph Valentino’s biography in The Big Money is often described as Dos Passos’s critique of Hollywood manipulation and artifice, idol worshipping fans and the naiveté of the celebrity (Eduards 6-9). The Duncan biography is regularly distinguished by critics as the only use of a female in any of the 27 biographies presented in the U.S.A. Trilogy (Casey 7-9).I believe that the incorporation of the Valentino biography is as equally distinctive as the Duncan text, because the Valentino text features the only presumed homosexual in the biographical series, but also because it underscores the importance of the only defined homosexual figure in the novel. The similarities between created celebrity which Dowling and Valentino experience is certainly an issue which Dos Passos wished to explore, but I believe that framing Margo and Tony’s story with a character so remarkably similar to Tony Garrido points clearly to Dos Passos choice to highlight the challenges of gender identity and it’s implications.
Tony Garrido self identifies with Valentino, insisting upon his chance for success in Hollywood, that “if Valentino can do it, it will be easy for me” (314). The similarities between the Garrido and Valentino are notable. Both are foreigners who hope to find fame, and start out dancing in cabarets. Tony and Valentino were both “stranded on the coast [and] headed for Hollywood, worked for a long time as an extra.” (150).But the similarities between these men go beyond superficial details. Holding up these figures for examination, Dos Passos allows for contemplation of binaries prompting the reader to consider how as a society and a culture we tend to privilege one and scorn the other. Some of the binaries explored by an examination of the Valentino/Garrido characters are straight/gay, public/private, artifice/authentic, foreigner/citizen all of which are based on perception. This idea may be illustrated by reading Valentino’s biography which emphasizes dreams – both in the the dreams he had for himself and for his future, but also of the creation of this man of questionable sexuality becoming the “gigolo of every woman’s dreams ” (Dos Passos 150). This passage can be seen to represent both Valentino’s idealism versus the realism of his early struggles, but it also suggests the binary of artifice versus authenticism.
The most provocative elements of the Valentino biography for this examination are the veiled references to homosexuality and descriptions of the relationship to his wife, which can be compared to Tony’s relationship with Margo. Details of his divorce according to the biography entitled “Adagio Dancer” indicate that he and his first wife never slept together, implying a marriage of convenience which would allow him to assume the constructed image of a married man. This deceit allowed Valentino to fulfill the lustful fantasies of his fans, while providing a cover of privacy allowing him to follow other pursuits. Though Margo and Tony are never revealed to have been intimate after their time together in Cuba, they continue their legal marriage and remain a constant in each other’s lives. Another significant detail which emerged from this section is that Rudolph Valentino wore a slave bracelet given to him by his wife. It is an object that implies a delineation of power and control in the relationship. Valentino’s wearing of the bracelet suggests subservience to her despite his expected masculine domination. Though Margo does not offer Tony a slave bracelet, she similarly marks his subservience with a concrete object, “she made him wear an old chauffeur’s uniform when he drove her to the lot. She knew that if he wore that he wouldn’t go anywhere after he’d left her except right home and change” (Dos Passos 316). The uniform served not only as a physical marker of Tony’s inferior role, but it allowed Margo to exert her dominance by controlling his behavior.
Valentino’s biography also describes his collapse, emergency surgery and death from infection which is ambiguous in nature. Readers of Dos Passos’s era would have been familiar with the rumors which surrounded his death and which ranged from the innocuous suggestion that he had died from a burst appendix to the more scandalous accusations that he had been shot by a gay lover or that he had contracted syphilis and succumbed to an infection because of it. Tony’s venereal disease, which he spreads to Margo and their baby is featured as a prominent plot element. Similarly to the Valentino account, allusions are made to Tony’s “secret disease,” – it is only through knowledge of his activity and deduction by the symptoms whch confirms to the reader that Tony has contracted a venereal disease (and infected his wife). This rising action of discovery of Tony’s syphilitic condition and its resulting death of her infant daughter, prompts Margo to flee from Tony. Though she is aware of the disease and it’s potentially permanent complications, she refuses to seek treatment for some time – further demonstrating her denial of Tony’s behavior and how his behavior and its consequences becomes her “secret” as well.
Tony’s constant presence drives or alters the action in each of the Dowling sections, which further support the claim that Tony is truly a main character. The only section of the novel in which Tony is not represented is in the section describing Margo’s youth - although even in this introduction, an incident is described which indicates an attraction for and desire to protect effeminate men. She is awarded with a prize at a boardwalk game booth by a foreign man described in effeminate terms: “Margie thought he was lovely, his face was so smooth and he had such a funny little voice and his lips and eyelids were so clearly marked just like the dolls’ and he had long black eyelashes too.” Margo’s attraction to the game attendant is more profound and indicates her desires, “Margie used to think she’d like to have him to take to bed with her like a doll. She said that Agnes and Frank laughed and laughed at her so that she felt awful ashamed.” (133-134). Her youthful wishes to take this man as a plaything to her bed – though innocently voiced - certainly indicate a physical attraction to men whose signifiers would indicate a definite preference for effeminate men. Her desire to treat him like a doll and protect him also indicates a nurturing side – which is internally conflicted because of the shame related to this desire, and will form the basis of her relationship with her future husband. Though not present physically in this section, the issues which Tony represents and Margo’s response to them are markedly clear.
Dos Passos intentionally crafted this lonely girl whose upbringing is void of traditional or conventional gender roles – she grows up with an absentee father and a surrogate motherer figure with whom she cannot relate – to become an extension or anchor for Tony’s character. Margo’s upbringing is designed to make her sympathetic to Tony’s flawed judgment and inability to conform and which make it impossible for him provide her with stability and provide her with the idealized husband figure she desires. One cannot overlook the similarities between Tony and Margo’s father – both are men who desired to live a traditional life, but whose addictions and lifestyles made that impossible. Both men ultimately disappoint Margo repeatedly, but she continues to hold out hope for them. Tony’s unexpected arrivals and departures, as well as brief flashes of happiness and normalcy are reminiscent of the limited happy experiences she would have as a child when Fred would return home, brightening her world. In Margo Dowling II (192-201), though Tony has abandoned her in a foreign country while he is being pursued by his male “friends,” Margo lashes out and literally beats him into submission – after which they are being described as “happy and cozy for the first time since arriving in Cuba” (195). Later in the novel, Margo is confronted by her estranged husband who is ill and she makes the decision to nurse him back to health in her hotel room. His presence forced her to alter the room registration, “it made her awful to have to write it down in the book Mr. and Mrs. Antonio de Garrido. Once it was written it didn’t look so bad though” (218). Margo’s use of Tony’s last name when she registers at a modeling agency upon arriving in Hollywood and her incorporation of his family history and culture into her created image indicates an ultimate acceptance of Tony. Though she is still hurt and perplexed by his dalliances with other men, and horrified by his behavior which is marked by lying and stealing, Margo continues to stand by Tony.
The final section on Margo Dowling (303-339) ends with the revelation of Tony’s death described in a newspaper article which a relieved Agnes shows to shocked Margo. Upon learning of his death, Margo demonstrates the most emotional response she has had throughout the novel. “Margo felt the room swinging in great circles around her head. “Oh, my God “she said. Going upstairs she had to hold tight to the balustrade to keep from falling. She tore off her clothes and ran herself a hot bath and lay back in it with her eyes closed” (338). Immediately upon learning of Tony’s death, Margo embarks on a staged marriage trip with Sam Margolies and her transition to completely artificial construct is complete. Tony therefore may seem, troubled and a source of pain for Margo (who at times lashed out because of her internal desire to force him to conform), but was what defined her humanity.
Though Margo is presented as a main character, The Big Money presents her life story and rise to celebrity only in the context of Tony’s experience. It is significant that Dos Passos symbolically represented Tony in Margo’s earliest experiences, interwove him through her narratives and then related biographies framing her and that the sections narrating Margo’s experience come abruptly to an end upon the death of her husband.
Philosopher Michel Foucault recognized those who fell outside of the accepted norms of sexual and gender identity as “other.” Those who were deemed to engage in “unnatural” sex practices were identified by some as a separate “species.” (Foucault 896). Dos Passos recognized the social oppression faced by homosexuals in the early part of the twentieth century in America which made it impossible for them to proclaim their sexual identity without fear of vicious attack. The inability for the character of Tony to claim a voice and speak openly of the pain of the queer experience and the persecution inflicted upon him by an unsympathetic world is personalized for the audience, in a nuanced manner which would begin to prompt society to view those relegated to the status of “other” as humanized. Tony Garrido’s embodiment of the overarching theme of “repression of dissent,” which is so significant to Dos Passos marks him as a significant voice within this novel – though he seems to have no voice at all.
Works Cited
Becker, George J. “Visions…” John Dos Passos. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1974. Galenet. Literature Resource Center. Oviatt Library, Northridge CA. 29 April 2009.
Butler, Judith. “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. Eds. Julie Rivkin and Michael Rivkin. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. 900-911.
Casey, Janet Galligani. "Historicizing the female in U.S.A.: Re-visions of Dos Passo's trilogy." Twentieth Century Literature 41.16 (Fall95 1995): 249. MAS Ultra - School Edition. EBSCO. Oviatt Library, Northridge, CA. 29 Apr 2009.
Dos Pasosos, John. The Big Money. Boston: Mariner Books. 1933.
Eduards, Justin J. “The Man with a Camera Eye: Cinematic Form and Hollywood Malediction in John Dos Passos's "The Big Money." Literature Film Quarterly. Vol 27. Iss 4. 1999. 245-255. Communication and Mass Media Database. EBSCO. Oviatt Library, Northridge, CA. 29 April 2009.
Foucault, Michel. “The History of Sexuality.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. Eds. Julie Rivkin and Michael Rivkin. Malden: Blackwell, 2004. 549-565
Keire, Mara. “Dope fiends and degenerates: the gendering of addiction in the early twentieth century.” Journal of Social History. Volume: 31. Issue: 4. 1998. Page Number: 809+. Questia. 27 Apr 2009. http://www.questia.com.
[RSB2]
[RSB1]Reword/change order.
[RSB2]
No comments:
Post a Comment