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Walter Mitty is an ordinary man with an extraordinary imagination that he uses to escape his dull, everyday life. Traditional gender roles are reversed in Mitty’s marriage. He submits to his domineering wife, who berates him for driving too fast. She treats him like a child with reminders to buy overshoes and to wear his gloves. She even hits him when she has trouble finding him. His masculinity is further challenged by the men he encounters around the town, as when he sheepishly obeys the authority of a traffic cop. He also relies on the help of younger men when it comes to the “manly” tasks of parking his car and removing its tire chains. Women find him comical, laughing at him for talking to himself.
In his daydreams, however, Mitty is all the things he is not in reality: brave, strong, decisive, dominant. He plays the hero, a real “man’s man” through and through. In one fantasy, Mitty commands a powerful hydroplane and its trusting, faithful crew. In another, Dr. Mitty’s quick thinking and superior skills save the day in a hospital operating room, all to the admiration of a pretty nurse and highly skilled medical specialists. In yet another, Mitty stars as the celebrity defendant in a courtroom drama. He glibly boasts of his knowledge and skills with firearms and bests the District Attorney both mentally and physically. As a rakish WWI pilot, Mitty volunteers to fly a solo bombing run against all the forces of the German air force. He downs shots of brandy better than any man. Lastly, Walter Mitty the Undefeated courageously faces down a firing squad. Each fantasy shows Mitty’s different visions of heroism and masculinity, the person he wishes he could be but is not.
