Since I've decided to write my critical essay on Boy Genius, I read the ending a second time for a better understanding of what happened. I'd just like to say, what in the world? There's the strange medley of reality and surreality and by the end of this hurricane of events I'm not sure what is actually happening anymore.
Anyways, my theory is that Boy Genius has some kind of mental disorder that makes him detached from society and see things quite differently from others. How he sees the events unfolding in his life (becoming friends with President Park, making enemies with HIJ, finding himself with a dog pack or inside of a whale, etc.) could be completely different from what is actually happening, which is why many events narrated through the eyes of Boy Genius don't seem to connect or make sense.
I thought one part that designated Boy Genius as a fictional/unrealistic story is the ubiquity of racial transformation. I mean, 30 minute operations that give you movie-star white people looks? To me, this also was one of the major factors to why Boy Genius was an inherently creepy book. The subdued reactions to Boy Genius's overnight transmogrification was also like an eerie silence in the midst of a horror movie. It may have been symbolic, but the changes in physical appearance of Boy Genius, Judy Kim, and HIJ were all rather horrific to me.
Also, the explicitness of violence and sexuality raised a few hairs on my back. It started with a few broken ribs as BG fights with Rex, and that was bearable, if not enjoyable. But, the morbidity of BG's parents' death and BG's sexual rampage after his yellow-to-white transformation left a bad taste in my mouth. Did he really have to name his babymaker Jesus? And to think that if my theory were true, and this was all a figment of BG's imagination, BG actually thought of ALL of this. It just gives me the creeps.
- Judy Wang
Anyways, my theory is that Boy Genius has some kind of mental disorder that makes him detached from society and see things quite differently from others. How he sees the events unfolding in his life (becoming friends with President Park, making enemies with HIJ, finding himself with a dog pack or inside of a whale, etc.) could be completely different from what is actually happening, which is why many events narrated through the eyes of Boy Genius don't seem to connect or make sense.
I thought one part that designated Boy Genius as a fictional/unrealistic story is the ubiquity of racial transformation. I mean, 30 minute operations that give you movie-star white people looks? To me, this also was one of the major factors to why Boy Genius was an inherently creepy book. The subdued reactions to Boy Genius's overnight transmogrification was also like an eerie silence in the midst of a horror movie. It may have been symbolic, but the changes in physical appearance of Boy Genius, Judy Kim, and HIJ were all rather horrific to me.
Also, the explicitness of violence and sexuality raised a few hairs on my back. It started with a few broken ribs as BG fights with Rex, and that was bearable, if not enjoyable. But, the morbidity of BG's parents' death and BG's sexual rampage after his yellow-to-white transformation left a bad taste in my mouth. Did he really have to name his babymaker Jesus? And to think that if my theory were true, and this was all a figment of BG's imagination, BG actually thought of ALL of this. It just gives me the creeps.
- Judy Wang
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