Kosinskis Being There and the Existential Anti-Hero Essay -- Being Th

Kosinskis be There and the Existential Anti-Hero Critics have referred to Kosinskis creation There as his worst novel. Perhaps, Kosinskis prosaic style is deceptive in its apparent simplicity (especially when contrasted with The multi-coloured Bird). What Kosinski seeks to do, as Welch D. Everman relates, is to stimulate the readers recreative and imaginative chore by offering only the essentials...Kosinskis style draws the reader into the incident by refusing to allow him to remain passive (25). This essay will propose that beingness There is a major existential work following in the tradition of Sartre and Camus in which Chance, the main protagonist, mirrors Camuss Mersault in A Happy destruction and in which Koskinski demonstrates the logical progression of the existential anti-hero. An initial response to Being There often might be to focus upon the text as a type of Creation anecdote, or as a complaisant satire, or perhaps as a political critique against mound media and the television generation. While all of these readings are legitimate, it seems that the starting point should spunk on Kosinskis protagonist, Chance, in order to understand the universal significance of the act of Chance, and implicitly the reader, as victim. Chance is a contemporary innocent. Whether, as is often argued, he is mentally challenged or not is irrelevant. Rather, Chance simply exists. He watches television, is unable or unwilling to function within prescribed ethnic paradigms, and finally, is simply a mirror, reflecting back to others sublimated images of desires projected onto him. Chance is the the Statesn Everyman. The events which befall him could befall anyone. He, like all of us, ha... ...en, David. Camus. Philadelphia Temple UP, 1988. Works Consulted Bruss, Paul. Victims. Lewisburg Bucknell UP, 1981. Camus, Albert. The Stranger. untested York Vintage, 1946. Granofsky, Ronald. Circle and Line Modern and Postmodern Constructs of the Self in Jerzy Kos inskis The Painted Bird. Essays in Literature 18.2 (1991) 254-68. Griffiths, Gareth. Being there, being There Postmodernism and Post-Colonialism Kosinski and Malouf. Ariel 20.4 (1989) 132-48. Grigbsy, John L. Mirroring of America and Russia Reflections of Tolstoy in Jerzy Kosinskis Being There. Notes on Contemporary Literature 17.4 (1987) 6-8. Kosinski, Jerzy. The Painted Bird. impertinent York Bantam, 1978. Lavers, Norman. Jerzy Kosinski. Boston Twayne, 1982. Piwinski, David J. Kosinskis The Painted Bird. The Explicator 40.1 (1981) 62-3.