What does jack do for Willie?
In All The Kings Men, Jack the narrator acts as a
smart and helpful hand to Willie more than anything as a friend and colleague. Before
he is hired by Willie, The Chronicle favors MacMurfee during the campaign and asks
Jack to support Willie's opponent. Jack doesn't want to help elect MacMurfee,
so he quits his job and Talos comes in and offers Jack a job. "When what
you got to work with is Sam MacMurfee” (138). I see that Willie impulsively
hired Jack because he needed his support and Willie knew that was slipping from
his friends. He is eventually sent to dig up dirt and dirty political
information of his father figure the Judge. Jack is his personal support system
even though he knows that Jack sees him as a joke in the political world. He
also doesn’t seem to agree or care about his political views that are supposed
to change the state. In the scene where they are sitting in the hotel room the
night before the barbeque, Willie is trying to read his speech and share his
ideas to jack who just sits there with no interests. “I heard that kind of talk.
It gets around, I said. It not any secret. Then he demanded “Do you think it’s
true?”(103). The author pushes Jack into the corner of friendship and work in
his relationship with Willie. They both seem to know their stands in their
relationship but then is altered when Jack works with Willie on a personal
level. They seem to loose even more connections because Jack’s seen him at his
lowest and helped him out of it. That is why I think Willie hired him because
he was loyal even though he knew that Jack doesn’t have the same intentions. The
author brilliantly points the distress in Willie about his complain and uses
Jack as a support shoulder during this time. Yeah I said “I heard his speech. But
they don’t give a damn about that”(102). The most important thing that Jack
ever did was being honest about his feelings towards Willies ideals. He told
the truth on what his ideas made him think about and what he shouldn’t say. “But
for sweet Jesus’ sake don’t try to improve their minds”(102). Everybody who
heard Willie Talos speak, they knew what he was saying and already knew his
plan to improve the state. Jack gave Willie this information straight and gave
him a clearer state of mind to observe his own actions.
I completely agree with the idea that Willie uses Jack as a shoulder to lean on. Throughout the book we see how Willie is always asking Jack to do this and that as well as keeping him by his side at all times. It is also clear that Willie often manipulates and takes advantage of Jack. He knew that asking Jack to dig up dirt on the Judge would be uncomfortable for Jack, but he forced him to do it anyway. Jack even tells Willie that the Judge may not have anything to hide, but Willie, being the sly, snoopy man he is, says this, "Man is conceived in sin and born in corruption and he passeth from the stink of the didie to the stench of the shroud. There is always something" (223). Jack follows through with the task because he doesn't have much experience saying no to Willie and knows that Willie needs his help and to use him as a crutch.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with your thesis that Willie hired Jack to be a helpful hand during the election, I also agree that to Willie Jack was so much more than an employee. The main reason why Willie hired Jack was because Jack would tell Willie the truth no matter what which really helped out Willie. For example when WIllie shared his speech with Jack, he didn't lie or give Willie confidence. He gave him the truth. "I heard the speech. But they don't give a damn about that... " (102). This helped Willie so much by being able to use the critisism to help him win the election. That is mainly why he hired Jack.
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