The Journal of a Disappointed Man · Chapter
Part III: Marriage explained
The narrator reflects on his marriage, his declining health, and his ongoing confrontation with mortality.
What happens
The narrator reflects on his marriage, his declining health, and his ongoing confrontation with mortality. He recounts the story of his courtship and marriage in a 'potted novel,' revealing his initial egotism and the revelation that his wife knew of his illness and married him anyway. The chapter includes his meditations on death, his desire for a controlled exit, his fluctuating temperament, and his hope for a beatified afterlife revisiting past joys. He also describes his walks in the countryside, finding solace and defiance in nature despite his physical decline.
Themes in this chapter
Mortality and the Brevity of Life
The narrator confronts his imminent death, contemplates suicide, and reflects on the fear of fear and the desire for a controlled, artistic death.
Egotism and Self-Expression
The narrator admits his 'superlative egoism and superlative conceit' in his marriage, and describes his temperament graph as a record of self-love and self-disgust.
The Natural World as Escape
The narrator finds solace in walks through the countryside, describing trees, wind, and landscapes with vivid detail, using nature as a counterpoint to his suffering.
The Search for Meaning and Legacy
The narrator hopes for an afterlife where he can relive past ecstasies, and reflects on his unfulfilled desires to travel and experience more of life.
Characters to notice
- Barbellion
Reflects on his marriage, egotism, and illness; expresses fear of fear and desire for a controlled death; describes his temperament as a graph of fluctuations.
- E⸺
The narrator's wife; she knew of his illness and married him for love against advice; shown the crescent moon by the narrator.
- H⸺ B⸺
Sent an affectionate letter that warmed the narrator's heart.
- Dr. H⸺
The doctor who wrote a sealed letter about the narrator's health, which the narrator opened; advised against the marriage.
- Austin Harrison
Mentioned as having written only once since August.
Key passages
“This great bully of a universe overwhelms me. The stars make me cower. I am intimidated by the immensity surrounding my own littleness.”
The narrator feels crushed by the vastness of the universe and his own insignificance.
Expresses his agnosticism and sense of being overwhelmed by existence.
“I hope for something much freer and more satisfying after death, for emancipation of the spirit and above all for the obliteration of this puny self, this little, skulking, sharp-witted ferret.”
He desires an afterlife that liberates his spirit and erases his petty, cunning ego.
Reflects his longing for transcendence beyond his flawed self.
“It is futile and presumptuous for me to opine anything about the next world.”
He believes it is pointless and arrogant to speculate about the afterlife.
Highlights his agnostic stance despite his curiosity.
“He was an imaginative youth, and she a tragedy queen. So he fell in love with her because she was melancholy and her past tragic.”
The narrator fell in love with a woman because of her tragic demeanor and past.
Part of the 'potted novel' summarizing his courtship.
“Marriage, said he sententiously, is an economic trap.”
He cynically viewed marriage as a financial snare.
Shows his initial reluctance and pragmatic view of marriage.
“Ill-health after all made marriage impossible.”
His poor health initially prevented him from marrying.
Foreshadows the central conflict of the chapter.
