Before beginning Black Swan Green, I’d kind of always assumed that the social ramifications of speech impediments were mild and rather inconsequential to a person’s psychological development. Now, after reading Jason’s vivid portrayal of his constant internal struggle and general feeling of powerlessness against his demon, I feel extremely sheepish for my ignorance.
Jason calls his tormentor “Hangman”, ironically the same name given to a word game that slowly executes a helpless victim via the selection of incorrect letters. The real life consequences of choosing the wrong words are fully acknowledged and feared by Jason, who avoids ones that start with “N” and “S” and will even sacrifice expressing his true thoughts and feelings in order to escape public embarrassment. According to my research, this is a very common course of action for stammerers and stutterers alike. So is the feeling of guilt; the stammerer may believe that their handicap is merely a flaw of their willpower and that if only they had stronger self-discipline, they would be able to correct their bad habit. Such individuals would be very prone to self-blame, which is consistent with Jason’s narration. These feelings only augment when perhaps well intentioned but misinformed spectators try to dole out suggestions like "slow down, take a deep breath, think about what you want to say”. Ms. De Roos seems to understand these dynamics and for that reason Jason does not feel pressured around her. She can grasp that for Jason to speak publicly in front of a large crowd is his worst nightmare because as we've seen, he can’t predict when Hangman will reveal himself. This social anxiety causes individuals like Jason to constantly anticipate and assess the difficulty of imminent situations, which includes a negative reaction from their audience and a desire to avoid the humiliation of such a scenario altogether. Because disfluency so heavily impacts a person’s self esteem especially if that person is a child, it is particularly important how that person’s family deals with their condition. By finishing their sentences or telling them to slow down, a parent could be subconsciously damaging their child’s confidence. In Black Swan Green, it’s very telling when on page 33 Jason admits that one of the reasons why he can’t argue with his father is because he knows a single inarticulacy would topple his argument.
In other ways, Jason’s stammer gives him supplementary advantages. For example, we mentioned that by reading dictionaries for replacement words, he also builds his vocabulary. Additionally, the self consciousness that is otherwise a burden helps him have a particularly meticulous social radar that helps him survive the brutal arena of adolescent boys, at least for the time being. To conclude, I know that I can by no means speak for stammerers or people with other speech impediments and I can’t even begin to understand what it must feel like, this novel is doing a good job of at least encouraging me to make a perfunctory reflection.
Of course, in an ideal world, a stammer would be met with patience and understanding by others, and Jason wouldn't suffer this degree of total dread at the prospect of it being discovered and mocked relentlessly by other kids. He fears being *defined* by this one impediment, and ironically (as you point out), this fear intensifies the effects of the impediment. But Jason lives in a social context that is *especially* unforgiving of any perceived flaw or weakness--these kids are on the lookout for something to make fun of in others, at all times--so it's so much worse for him. You're right that, among the many things this novel accomplishes, it helps a reader understand the feelings of a stammerer from his perspective (and, not surprisingly, David Mitchell has acknowledged in interviews that he is drawing on his own personal experience in this depiction).
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, the "Hangman" metaphor/personification reflects Jason's creative and metaphorical mind at work--as a budding poet, his imagination has found a compelling and multifaceted way to represent his experience in artistic form. The stammer does contribute to his verbal dexterity in writing, as he has to read dictionaries and develop a flexible vocabulary.