payment page
The most important things often go unsaid.
Throughout “The Body,” Gordie observes that he cannot really express deep truths to people he loves. These emotional truths are too painful and entirely at odds with the stoic masculinity he and his friends cultivate. Gordie never shows his parents “Stud City” because he knows the emotions expressed and echoes of Dennis in that story will hurt them. He never discusses with Chris why Chris pulls the gun on Ace Merrill because he knows how hard Chris works not to follow in his family’s violent footsteps. No one in the group dares tell Teddy that his disabilities will keep him from joining the military because they know it will crush him. Gordie suggests that telling these truths would be akin to opening permanent wounds, warning that “[n]o word, no combination of words, can close those lovebites.” By keeping silent around these delicate topics, Gordie avoids making the people he cares about feel vulnerable and exposed.
However, never discussing these important topics comes at a cost. Even though his friends never talk to him about the futility of his military dreams, Teddy nevertheless finds that out for himself in a harsher way. Gordie doesn’t feel he can express his feelings about Chris’s death to his wife, denying himself an opportunity for comfort. Although leaving these truths unspoken may preserve dignity, in the long run, it does not change the importance or reality of the emotional burdens the characters carry.
Small towns can trap people in stereotypes of themselves.
Because of Castle Rock’s small size, everyone knows about everyone else’s lives, families, and reputations. This familiarity creates a claustrophobic atmosphere where it becomes difficult for someone to grow beyond what the town already thinks of them and create a better life. Gordie explores this problem in his story “The Revenge of Lard Ass Hogan.” Because of Hogan’s weight, the pie-eating contest cannot offer him any sense of triumph or accomplishment. People want to see him eat pies because it fulfills their idea of him as a fat kid who eats too much, creating a no-win situation for Hogan. Gordie’s friends face similar judgment from the town, trapping them in stereotypes. For example, much of Teddy’s reckless boldness appears to be his attempt to counteract his physical disabilities and appear stronger. However, because Teddy’s father has been committed to a mental hospital, people judge his recklessness based on his father’s mental illness, giving Teddy a reputation for being crazy. These accusations only incense Teddy more, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Chris in particular is a victim to small-town prejudice. Because the men in Chris’s family are infamously violent and dangerous, the town assumes Chris will become exactly like them. Even when Chris actively tries to do the right thing, such as returning the milk money he stole, Miss Simons denies him the chance to prove his strength of character by stealing the money herself. When Chris tries to take more advanced courses in school, both his family and teachers force him to give up. Instead of encouraging his ambition, they try to force him back into their idea of a future juvenile delinquent. The expectation that Chris will become a troublemaker or drop-out makes him all the more determined not to be. He refuses to drink or smoke. Within his friend group, he is always breaking up fights and calming down hotheaded Teddy. Tragically, Chris’s efforts to avoid the stereotype get him killed when he tries to break up a fight. His instinct to de-escalate, honed from years of trying not to become his father, ends up getting him involved in a fight with the kinds of people he has avoided becoming.
Stories allow people a means to process their lives.
Throughout the novella, we see how Gordie uses writing to process his childhood and the disturbing and dark things he experiences. In “Stud City,” Gordie uses some of the same imagery and phrases he mentions when describing his childhood in the main action of the story. Chico imagines his brother, Johnny, appearing in his room and telling Chico he should have been the one to die, something Gordie has imagined about Dennis many times. “Stud City” also brings in domestic violence and unhappy marriages, both of which Gordie witnesses growing up in Castle Rock. In “The Revenge of Lard Ass Hogan,” Gordie explores how in a small town a child’s reputation can haunt him, just as his friends seem bound by everyone else’s expectations. As Gordie explains after the inclusion of “Stud City,” taking these feelings and images and putting them in stories allows him to feel in control over these otherwise uncontrollable parts of life.
Gordie’s friends also tell stories or use them to mythologize parts of their lives to help make sense of them. For example, they have superstitions—like “goochers” in a coin flip—to assign meaning to random bad luck. All the kids of Castle Rock tell stories about Chopper, Milo Pressman’s dog, being a terrifying hellhound, as if to make their fear of him make sense. Instead of simply hiding his pennies, Vern uses the trappings of a pirate adventure, complete with treasure map, to make the mundane act an adventure. Teddy loves hearing Gordie’s Le Dio stories because they’re set in France during World War II, bolstering his image of his own father as a war hero. Even the way the boys frame their quest for Ray Brower’s body as a chance for them to become town heroes has a self-aggrandizing, story-like quality to it. In all these cases, the boys restructure parts of their lives around fictional tropes to add excitement, logic, and meaning to otherwise bleak or mundane situations.
