Knowledge And Addiction Play

Roles Knowledge and Addiction Play In Palahniuk’s novel “Choke”, a med-school dropout and sex addict, Victor Mancini, takes a the job playing a colonial era servant to pay for the care of his Mother. Due to the excessive medical bills, he has to play the role of a ruthless con artist. Victor’s scam is to pretend to choke on food while dining in restaurants, and then he allows himself to be saved by a stranger. This stranger then becomes a “hero” and feels responsible for saving Victor’s life, which involves sending checks to support him. Victor uses his knowledge for his addictions to sleep with women and to seek out his future patrons for his scam. Victor presents his knowledge in several different ways throughout Palahniuk’s novel.
The first way knowledge is present is through his medical schooling. He sees people as his patients, and is able to diagnose anyone with some sort of disease or condition. “Everybody you see naked, you see as a patient. A could have clear lovely eyes and hard brown nipples, but if her breath is bad she has leukemia”. He wasn’t even able to enjoy the strip club they were at because he was only looking the girls as patients. Ignorance could be considered bliss in that situation. Victor uses his knowledge to his advantage when he’s seeking out who is going to be his next “hero”. When he is scoping out the restaurant while eating, he categorizes people. He knows who will get up to save him, who won’t, and who is rich or poor. He knows who he wants to save him and who he doesn’t. All his knowledge helps him with his addictions. Victor’s addictions are to sex, choking, and wanting to feel powerful. All of Victor’s addictions stem from his mother and her problems of being in and out of his life as a child. The first time he choked, he was with his mother. His mother would teach him that what he was learning in school wasn’t important and he should only learn from her. His mother was always in control of him as a child, and now the situation is reversed. Victor is in charge of whether she lives or dies. He likes to feel powerful, just like he does when people save his life. “You gain power by pretending to be weak. By contrast, you make people feel strong. You save people by letting them save you”. Victor likes when he feels powerful; his mother was always in charge of him and now he has the chance to be in charge of something.
Victor uses his knowledge as an advantage towards his addictions. His main addiction is choking on food to get money. With this addiction he uses his medical knowledge. “With a steak knife, make a half-inch horizontal incision, then pinch the incision and insert your finger to open it. Insert a “trache” tube; a drinking straw or half a ballpoint pen works best”. Victor is able to look through the room and see who he wants and who he doesn’t want to save him.
Victor uses his knowledge and addiction together as tools for each other, they play hand in hand. He uses his knowledge of sex addicts from the meetings to hook up with recovering sex addicts like Nico. But the medical knowledge he obtains isn’t always the best to have. He lives life thinking every small thing is a disease or cancer. Ignorance should be bliss for him. He uses his scam to get money from people to feel powerful. He feels powerful knowing that he is completely in charge of his mother’s life, she could live or die.