Fight Club Lesson 2

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• havo
• Leerjaar 4

Fight Club

Lesson 2

Narration

In Class Today

• First reactions, expectations, and ideas
• Analysis chapters 1-3
• Narration
• Narration and the Narrator in Fight Club
• Read on. 

First reactions

What do we think so far?

What do we know about the protagonist?

What do we know about Tyler Durden?

Analysis Chapter 1

The story begins “en medias res,” which means “in the middle of the action.” The first things we learn about the Narrator are that he knows a lot about weapons, and seems to have a connection with Tyler (in spite of the fact that they seem to be enemies)—the line, “I know this because Tyler knows this” repeats throughout the book. 

Tyler’s first line, “This isn’t really death,” suggests that he loves flirting with death and danger. 

Analysis Chapter 1

The text doesn’t tell us what Project Mayhem is yet, but it establishes suspense immediately: the clock is, quite literally, ticking.

 Although the Narrator seems frightened, Tyler is eerily calm, again suggesting that he celebrates death and danger. 

Tyler’s mentions of “our world” might imply that he has ambitions of changing the world with the help of his followers (in Project Mayhem).

Analysis Chapter 1

The novel is told almost entirely in flashbacks (reminiscent of the way, according to some, “your whole life flashes before your eyes before you die”). 

The Narrator’s thoughts of Marla Singer establish a romantic triangle between the Narrator, Marla, and Tyler. In essence, the novel’s “project” is to explain how, exactly, the Narrator comes from point A to point B.

In one sentence:

How would you summarise chapter 2?

Analysis Chapter 2

The chapter opens with an image of emasculation: Bob is a man, but he’s depicted as being burdened with humiliatingly large mammary glands, or, in The Narrator’s rather cruel phrase, “bitch tits.” 

With this, Palahniuk immediately contrasts the danger, pain, and “realness” of the first chapter to what is here presented as a weak, emasculated modern culture.

Analysis Chapter 2

The Narrator attends support groups meant for people with serious medical problems, even though he’s perfectly healthy. 

The men in such groups, such as Bob, seem almost literally, biologically feminized by this: Bob loses his testicles and gains breasts.

Analysis Chapter 2

The awareness of another person who does the same thing—another faker—makes the Narrator feel more self-conscious and guilty; he can no longer “lose himself in the moment” and cry.

Analysis Chapter 2

The Narrator’s insomnia, the doctor suggests, is symptomatic of a larger problem (although this is also a common misdiagnosis of insomnia). The larger problem presented here is the Narrator’s emasculation and boredom: he lives an unsatisfying life and has a dull corporate job. 

Analysis Chapter 2

The Narrator’s problem, as the doctor’s comment about “real pain” might suggest, is that his life is boring: everything he does is familiar and comfortable. Pain, then, is an escape from the ordinary for the Narrator, a way to experience something truly “real.”

In one sentence:

How would you summarise chapter 3?

Analysis Chapter 3

The chapter reinforces the connection between Tyler and the Narrator (“I know this because Tyler knows this”). And yet Tyler and the Narrator lead opposite lifestyles: 

The Narrator has a corporate job that requires him to follow orders, 

Tyler marches to the beat of his own drum, and works during the night 

Analysis Chapter 3

Tyler uses his jobs to undermine what big movie companies are trying to do: he’s literally stealing audiences’ entertainment. 

The Narrator spends his job following orders at all times. The monotony of his uniform symbolizes the monotony of his lifestyle as a whole.

Analysis Chapter 3

Tyler doesn’t just steal from film companies; he sabotages their products and subverts their goals of providing “family entertainment,” disobeying the rules of his profession. 

The Narrator obeys his company’s dictates to the letter, even suspending his own morals for the company’s sake. 

As he explains it, he helps his company save as much money as possible, even if doing so involves innocent people dying in their cars.

Analysis Chapter 3

When the Narrator meets Tyler for the first time, he’s just woken up from sleep, immediately introducing the dreamlike nature of his friendship with Tyler. 

Tyler’s sculpture suggests the way that he uses ugly or chaotic-looking elements to make a coherent, organized plan, albeit a plan that breaks down over time. 

Also notice the homoerotic nature of Tyler and the Narrator’s meeting: they meet on a nude beach, and Tyler gives the Narrator his number.

Narration

Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration encompasses a set of techniques through which the creator of the story presents their story, including:

Point of view

Narrative perspective is the position and character of the storyteller, in relation to the narrative.

• First-person
• Second-person
• Third person

First-Person Narration

A first-person point of view reveals the story through a participant narrator. First person creates a close relationship between the narrator and reader, by referring to the viewpoint character with first person pronouns like I.

The narrator openly acknowledges their own existence. . 

First-Person Narration

 A first person narrator is not able to witness or understand all facets of a situation. 

Thus, a narrator with this perspective will not be able to report the circumstances fully and will leave the reader with a subjective record of the plot details. 

Additionally, this narrator's character could be pursuing a hidden agenda or may be struggling with mental or physical challenges that further hamper their ability to tell the reader the whole, accurate truth of events.

Narrative in Fight Club

Fight Club is written in the first person and the story is told entirely from the Unnamed Narrator's point of view. 

"For a long time Tyler and I were best friends." 

Narrative in Fight Club

The action and characters are presented entirely as the Narrator perceives them, 

"I know all of this: the gun, the anarchy, the explosion is really about Marla Singer."

Narrative in Fight Club

The reader therefore only finds out about events if and how the narrator remembers them.

The Narrator only informs the reader about the events he wants them to know about, so certain key occurrences may be kept hidden, therefore distorting the reader’s knowledge and understanding.

The Unreliable Narrator

The unreliable narrative voice involves the use of an untrustworthy narrator. 

This mode may be employed to give the audience a deliberate sense of disbelief in the story or a level of suspicion or mystery as to what information is meant to be true and what is meant to be false. 

The Narrator

The unnamed narrator in Fight Club is immediately questionable as he suffers from impaired thought processes due to chronic insomnia.

"Three weeks and I  hadn't slept. Three weeks without sleep, and everything becomes an out-of-body experience." 

Narrative in Fight Club

This requires the reader to do a certain amount of perceptive thinking of their own. 

For example, you need to consider if the Narrator can be trusted. You need to ask if he narrates events as they really happened or if he retells events in such a way that forces you to see them how he wants them to be seen. 

Read on!

Before class next week:

Read up to and including chapter 6 of the novel

Prepare a one-line-summary of each chapter read.