Robert Coover Stick Man Essay

Sticking it to the Man The great mind of American literary author Robert Coover creates a twisted, peculiar, perplexing world though the short story “Stick Man”. The world presented to readers is one in which many seem to be unfamiliar and uncomfortable with, but in reality the world presented to them is the well known idea of The Civil Rights Movement as well as the concepts of one superior race and unjustly powers. When African Americans first began their so-called normal lives, it was widely unaccepted by whites in the rest of the country. Their intent was to live among everyone in peace and equality. But because they were different and thought to be inferior, people were unsure and uncomfortable with their presence. Similarly, this
In the sense of Civil Rights, evil is not known to them until revealed by the horrific acts of the evil and the silence of the good. “History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people” (Marting Luther King Jr.). One can see here that the silence and horrid acts are exposing African Americans to the evils of the world, thus taking away their innocence as Cartoon Man does to Stick Man. “The Stick Man thinks about evil. Perhaps for the first time” (221) when he is with Cartoon Man. Just as Civil Rights revealed evil to African Americans, Cartoon Man revealed evil to Stick Man. However Cartoon Man also is perceived as the leaders of The Civil Rights Movement throughout the story. “Just when all seemed lost, a Cartoon Man flies in from overhead and the humans fall back” (219). Cartoon Man typically appears just in time to direct Stick Man and save him, he continuously guides Stick Man whether it be away from the humans, or when “the Cartoon Man swoops down, snatches up the Stick Man and Stick Woman, and flies them back to their stick world”