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My Pafology: Tin
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Erasure, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Race and Identity
Familial Obligation vs. Personal Needs
Artistic Integrity vs. Commercial Success
Authenticity
Summary
Analysis
It’s the middle of July. Monk is sitting in the study when Yul calls him and asks if he’s serious about the manuscript he’s submitted. Monk, unflustered, says he is. He also points out that he hasn’t put his name on it. He tells a hesitant Yul not to include any disclaimer—if the editors can’t understand that it’s a parody, that’s on them.
The manuscript in question is My Pafology. Although Monk’s writing My Pafology perhaps signals a new willingness to express some of the outrage and raw emotion he otherwise keeps out of his art, his choice to submit the scathing satire to publishers under a pseudonym reflects his lingering hesitance to fully own and accept those sentiments as his own. He still wants to treat his anger as art and performance rather than genuine emotion.
Themes
Later, fretting about money, Monk calls Bill to ask for help with some of Mother’s expenses. Bill insists he doesn’t have any money with the ongoing divorce. He suggests that Monk put Mother in a home, sell the house, and let Lorraine go. He also tells Monk he’s “taken a lover,” a phrase that irks Monk. Monk is also irritated to detect a slight “stereotypical lisp.”
Superficially, one might interpret Monk’s irritation at the slight “stereotypical lisp” he detects in Bill’s voice as homophobic. But on a deeper level, Monk’s irritation at Bill seems to stem from the jealousy he feels toward Bill’s ability (and perhaps also courage) to reinvent himself. In coming out as gay, Bill embraces a facet of his identity he has previously kept hidden from the outside world, and in so doing, he perhaps opens the door to gaining deeper self-knowledge, as well—something Monk, with regard to his confused racial identity, can’t (or isn’t willing) to do.
Themes
The next morning, Yul calls back and says that Random House has offered Monk an advance of $600,000—they love the book and want to meet with “Mr. Leigh.” Monk is in disbelief and describes the situation as “really fucked up,” but he reluctantly admits that he’ll accept the offer. He asks Yul to make up something about Stagg R. Leigh being really shy to delay Random House editor Paula Baderman’s request for a meeting.
Monk sent My Pafology to publishers to criticize the offensive, overly simplistic representations of “real” Black life in America they tend to publish. He thought it would be obvious his novella is a parody—so he’s shocked and disturbed at the “really fucked up” outcome of them taking the book seriously. At the same time, he’s not in a financial situation to turn down the hefty advance they offer him, so he accepts it, thereby becoming complicit in the system he so hates. Monk may not “believe in race,” but he nevertheless finds himself subject to the powerful social and economic forces that mold and perpetuate systemic racism and injustice. Meanwhile, the plot thickens as Monk makes the ludicrous choice to act out the role of Stagg R. Leigh.
Themes
Sometime later, Bill calls Monk in the middle of the night and asks him how long Monk has known Bill is gay. Monk says he’s known for a while, maybe since high school. Bill wonders if he should tell Mother. Monk asks why Bill would want to bring that drama into his life—it’s not like Mother will remember it anyway. In a brief interlude that follows, Monk reflects on how people sometimes place human-made structures in a stream to try to “improve the habitat of trout.” However, “fish prefer the smooth curves of nature to the hard edges of humans,” and so such methods often do more harm than good.
Monk comes off as dismissive of Bill in this scene. Although he frames his advice that Bill not tell Mother about his homosexuality as a practical decision, it perhaps betrays Monk’s own jealousy at Bill for his willingness to be open about parts of himself that might invite rejection and disappointment. Monk does not have this resolve—that’s why he has chosen to perform the role of Stagg R. Leigh rather than admit to his authorship of My Pafology. Monk’s meditation on fishing adds to fishing’s symbolism, underscoring the clarity and natural ease of nature as compared to the uncertainty and unnatural ways that humans engage with other people and with their surroundings.
Themes
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The next morning, Monk takes the Metro to the mall and walks around the National Gallery. He considers the money he’s just come into and how he technically doesn’t have to teach anymore. As he looks at the art, he considers all the times he had thought of killing himself in his early adulthood. He’d always stopped at the stage of writing the note, unable to see his “silly romantic notions shattered by a lack of imagination.” He wonders if his latest novel will make him a sell-out.
Monk’s troubling thoughts of suicide are a response to what he considers the unpardonable crime of compromising his artistic integrity for a paycheck. Monk has constructed his entire identity around his commitment to his art. Now that he has betrayed that commitment, can he say with certainty who he is anymore?
Themes
Later, after struggling to catch a cab (three empty cars drive right past him) Monk returns home to find Lorraine sitting on the porch steps. Lorraine explains that Mother doesn’t recognize Lorraine and has locked and bolted the doors. Monk climbs through an open window in the study. He finds mother in the house holding a pistol—which he later discovers is loaded. Following this incident, Monk takes Mother to a doctor who runs some tests and tells Monk that Mother seems to be experiencing the early stages of Alzheimer’s. She suggests moving Mother into a care facility for everyone’s sake.
The narration frames Monk’s struggle to catch a cab is the result of racism—it’s implied that these cab drivers failed to stop for Monk because he is Black. Once more, racism continues to affect Monk’s life despite his personal rejection of the concept of race. This adds to the novel’s broader examination of identity as a combination of how the world views a person and how a person views themselves, particularly with regard to racial identity.
Themes
Later, Monk works on a bedside stand while Lorraine puts Mother to bed. The legs of the stand wobble a bit, but Monk doesn’t mind—the nightstand is at least “something to feel in [his] hollow stupor.” Monk’s thoughts drift to a memory of being at the city dock in Annapolis with his family. In the memory, Monk is 12. Lisa is reading a book, and Monk comments that he wants to be a writer when he grows up. But he wants to write serious stuff like Dostoevsky, not like the “crap” that Lisa is reading. Lisa scoffs, but Father says that if Monk says he’ll do something, then he’ll do it. He “will be an artist,” Father explains. “He’s not like us.” Lisa and Bill, on the other hand, will be doctors. Lisa will be “[a] good one,” Father says. He’s not sure what kind Bill will be.
The obvious favoritism Father exhibited toward Monk may have caused bitterness between Monk and his older siblings, but it’s clear that favoritism has only disadvantaged Monk in the long run. Whereas Lisa and Bill learned to look inward for purpose and fulfillment and thus grew into functioning, self-assured adults, Monk learned to turn to his father for approval. As a result, he struggles to make peace with—or even know—who he is and what he values. Monk’s entire identity is tied up in his father and his father’s standard of excellence, and he’s just now realizing how negatively this has affected him throughout his life.
Themes
