Hangman' in Black swan green

An alter ego is a different version of oneself. Maggot, Unborn Twin, Hangman - Jason Taylor, the protagonist of the novel “Black Swan Green”, has a few of alter egos, and each of them is full of certain meaning. I am going to focus on the most difficult and significant one: Hangman. Why did David Mitchell put the character of Hangman as a central side of Jason’s personality? What is special about the relationships between Jason and Hangman? What is the point of this alter personality?

Jason Taylor is an out of ordinary boy. He differs from other school teenagers basically because of the psychological problem. He suffers from stammering and calls his stammer a ‘hangman’ with “pike lips, broken nose, red eyes ‘cause he never sleeps” (Ch. Hangman, p.31). It is interesting that through the language Jason expresses his attitude to the disease. “..it's his hands, not his face, that I really feel him by. His snaky fingers that sink inside my tongue and squeeze my windpipe so nothing'll work" (Ch. Hangman, p.31). Even the name shows readers that the boy is afraid of the Hangman, hates and depicts him as a horrible and ugly individual. A hangman means a public executioner, a person who kills people by hanging them. Metaphorically, Jason’s Hangman is an evil personality who strangles the boy to keep him from speaking. Their relationships are in a violent struggle, Jason and the Hangman are fighting through the whole story.

What is the reason of his stammer? Jason explains that the disease is not congenital, it appeared when he was to perform in front the classmates and the words suddenly got stocked in his mouth. "Miss Throckmorton said, "Yes, Jason?" and that was when my life divided itself into Before Hangman and After Hangman” (Ch. Hangman, p. 30) So it goes without saying that the emergence of the Hangman is rooted in the psychological problems. Stammering is not a physical trauma.

As we can see at the beginning of the story, Jason is still a child who does not have a shaped personality and who is not self-confident. Jason is shown as a boy who cares about what other people around would think about him, that is why he always tries to conform to the society, follows boys’ school rules and hides his poetry and existence of the Hangman from the World. This all makes him self-aware. More than that, people who stammer usually tend to be highly perceptive, as a result it enhances his self-awareness, self-reflecting and inner experience. The fact that the child is afraid of being judged by people and standing out from the crowd reveals his diffidence and self-doubt. It is also interesting and important to note that the Hangman wakes up and puts his ‘snaky fingers’ on Jason’s voice in situations when Jason feels unconfident or rejects his nature, pretending to be someone else. It can be a public performance, or talking with the parents, or a sense of danger being judged among respectful school boys and laughed by girls.

The strong inner War between the Hangman and Jason starts with the Jason’s defeat. Every time when the boy is not sure and afraid of interlocutor’s expectations or a public performance, the public executioner appears and wins. Every time when he is forced to pretend to be someone else, but not himself, the Hangman is right here. The only people with whom Jason is able to control the stammer are the Belgian lady and the speech therapist Mrs de Roo. Madam Crommelynck appears in Jason’s life as a mentor who helps him to find the right path and be himself. I think that about everybody met in life such people who changed their outlook and perception of the world. Jason is lucky to have one. He has no point to pretend and hide his nature with the therapist and the mentor, that is why there is no need for using special tactics and technics in order to avoid the emergence of the stammer. “Hangman knows he mustn't mess with Mrs de Roo so he acts like he is not there ” (Ch.Hangman, p.35).

The stammering child faces many challenges and cruel reality, experiences bullying and watches problems in society. The child tries to escape from this cruel world and hide away. Escaping from the reality, he is escaping from himself. But getting through the problems at school, problems in the family, problems with girls, Jason starts taking challenges face to face. He stops rejecting himself and escaping. He finds himself. Moreover, Jason starts to make important decisions. He makes a choice between humanity and being considered a respectful Spook. It means he takes responsibility for other people. Finally, the child grows up and starts becoming an adult. What prompts Jason to accept himself? I would say the monition of Mrs Crommelynck. The Jason’s life can be divided into ‘before the mentor’, that considers childhood, and ‘after the one’, that considers teenagerhood. The lady lights the boy’s path up and helps to find harmony and self-confidence in his heart. The Hangman does not control Jason anymore and does not influence his life, Jason controls the stammer. The killer starts dying. The grown up boy also realizes the reasons of the stammer, feels he can win it and accepts himself. “S’pose it isn't Hangman who caused it? ... The other person’s expectations... if I can reach this state of not caring, Hangman will remove his fingers from my lips” (Ch. 13, p. 366).

In conclusion, I would like to say that the creation of the Hangman symbolizes Jason’s weaknesses and fears, unconfidence and self-rejecting. The death of the Hangman means Jason comes over the psychological problems and wins his weaknesses. In the end, he wins his stammer. To compare the protagonist in the first and last chapters, we see how he has developed from being a child to the process of becoming an adult. In addition, when a person has an alter ego, he is said to lead a double life, and with disappearance of the Hangman Jason stops pretending to be not himself. We all have our personal weaknesses, especially being a teenager, but this story shows how it is important to face it, accept ourself and get over. The relationships between the protagonist and his alter ego were a life and death struggle, and finally the boy has won his fears, becoming a shaped personality.

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