Greasy Lake Analysis Essay

Assignment Week 2: Greasy Lake Discussion Questions
1. How can the reader tell that the narrator grows and changes during his adventures? How can you explain the change in the narrator's outlook?
The reader can tell that the narrator changes throughout his adventures by his shifting disposition come conclusion of the story. At the beginning of the story, the narrator illuminates the glory days of his teenage years, filling the reader's head with images of "torn-up leather jackets" and "lemon-flavored gin" (115). However, after the narrator is faced with turmoil, he realizes that he may be in over his head in his quest of being a teenage bad boy. Throughout the night, the narrator experiences a multitude of misadventures that prove to be too much for him. During the story's
most climatic event, the narrator bumps into a floating dead body while trying to hide from a group of men tracking him. While hiding neck-deep in the murky waters of Greasy Lake, the narrator says, "Then I thought of the dead man. He was probably the only person on the planet worse off than I was." (119). When the narrator experiences firsthand what it means to be a real badass, he realizes that he'd much rather just lick his wounds and make the silent drive home.
2. In Greasy Lake the lake is a perfect setting for Boyle's story. Explain how Greasy Lake is a symbol of the moral view of the narrator.
Greasy Lake was once an untapped wonderland filled with beauty and serenity.
The Indians of the area had once called it Wakan, "a reference to the clarity of its waters." (115). As time passed and the lake was discovered by the masses, it slowly became a wasteland for rebellious teenagers to hang out at. There are many parallels between Greasy Lake and the narrator visiting it. The narrator himself, was once as clear as the waters of Greasy Lake, but over time, outside influences corrupted his mind, and he became a rebel to the society that raised him. At each of their worst, both the narrator and Greasy Lake were nothing to marvel at, but they each kept qualities that held true to their past roots. Past the beer cans and darkness that Greasy Lake rests in, frogs and crickets can still be heard chirping a distant tribute to what Greasy Lake once was. Similarly, the narrator reveals his good conscience numerous times in the story while getting into trouble. While fleeing to the lake, the narrator thinks to himself, "I kept going, pursued by those cries, imagining cops and bloodhounds." (118). Again, after being offered drugs by a girl in the Greasy Lake parking lot, the narrator
refuses(121).
3. The narrator uses the word “bad” to describe Digby and Jeff. What is it about Digby and Jeff that inspires the narrator to use that word?
The narrator describes Digby and Jeff as "bad" because they exemplify the teenage troublemaker through his eyes. They were both potheads and rebels to conformity. "Jeff was thinking of quitting school..." and Digby was a hothead all his own (115). While the narrator may have just looked the part, Digby and Jeff were the true bad boys that he wished to be at some point. While driving around town, the narrator says, "Digby pounded the dashboard and shouted along with Toots & the Maytals while Jeff hung his head out of the window and streaked the side of my mother's Bel Air with vomit." Digby and Jeff were the cliché rebels that you would expect to see in any high school movie. When the group of friends encountered a "bad character" down at Greasy Lake, Digby and Jeff helped beat the man to unconsciousness (116). Even though Digby and Jeff couldn't have been much older than the narrator, they were the two people that the narrator looked up to in his quest to become a true rebel to society.