A Study in Fremdscham
Or, 3 Book Characters we can’t help but feel embarrassed for.
Written
for Expresso and Pencakes, Monsters Under the Bed, 2015
We all know that feeling. You’re just
sitting there, minding your own business, happily reading your book when a
character does A Thing. Not just any Thing either. The Thing.
These are the moments that make you put
your book down groaning with embarrassment and have you cringing with sympathy
as the situation snowballs out of control. The Germans call it ‘fremdscham’; us
English-speakers know it better as second-hand embarrassment.
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| It's not happening if we can't see it. |
3. Ron Weasley, Harry Potter series
Poor Ron. His friends and family members
seem to have all the luck. Rowling knew what she was doing when she made a
failed supposed spellcasting our first introduction to the character. From his
mishaps with his broken wand in Chamber
of Secrets to his short-lived (thank goodness) romance with Lavender Brown
in Half-Blood Prince, embarrassing
moments seem to follow this boy everywhere he goes.
Probably the moment which earned the
greatest amount of sympathy from readers would be the dreaded Yule Ball in Goblet of Fire, wherein Ron is forced to
wear a particularly hideous set of second-hand dress robes to the Yule Ball. I
think we can agree that Ron has earned his spot on this list.
2. Marius Pontmercy, Les Miserables
When the online Les Mis fandom has turned
‘pontmercy’ into a verb, noun and adjective
describing his special brand of Pontmercian awkwardness, you know there’s something wrong with this
guy. In fact, at one point in the Hapgood translation of the Brick, Valjean
calls him a great booby. It pains me to say that the moniker is an accurate
one.
For crying out loud, who sleeps with their
love interest’s handkerchief on their face after picking it up at the park? The
hanky wasn’t even Cosette’s, anyway. No wonder Papa Valjean thinks you’re
strange. For shame, Pontmercy. For
shame.
1. Newland Archer, The Age of Innocence
Honestly, the first thought that ran
through my head when I picked up Wharton’s The Age of Innocence for H2 Lit was
to question if Archer had Pontmercy blood running through his veins. In
general, this guy is about as embarrassing as they come. He is frustratingly
passive where other characters are not, describes himself as being “at heart a
dilettante”, and really, his thought processes? Are hilarious. He reads too much into the tiniest things, then goes off
into dreamland where his imaginary scenarios play out perfectly in his head –
why, you’d half expect him to be a literature student.
(Just kidding.)
Really, who can forget the Pink Umbrella fiasco?
Despite having never known his love interest Ellen to have had a penchant for
pink, upon sighting a pink parasol, he becomes single-mindedly convinced that
the umbrella is hers. He waxes lyrical about it. He even goes so far as to kiss
it. Of course, as he learns on the very next page, the umbrella does not, in fact, belong to Ellen Olenska.
The only thing that differentiates Archer
from his French fellow awkward turtle is the fact that he tries to be savvy. He
does. He really does. Somehow, that makes everything about his life even more
tragic.
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Thought of other cringe-worthy moments in
stories that you could have done without? Feel free to share them with us!