The Red Line, By Charles Higson
Analysis
In this short story by Charles Higson we are introduced to three characters (four, including Cathy) that have nothing in common whatsoever. They come from different environments, backgrounds and families. However, as the story proceeds we discover how fragile, weak and alike they become when their fears take over their lives.
I will therefore do a thorough analysis focusing on fear of the unknown as the main theme. In order to do that, I find it important to do a characterization to gain an insight to the four protagonists’ personalities. Berto, Denise and “the nameless guy” are all sitting in the same cabin in The Tube in London. Berto is visiting London trying to find the love of his life, Cathy, an English girl who has visited Berto in
Italy where they have had an affair. To his disappointment he comes to find out that she is in a relationship. She leaves him in the Tube after an argument. He feels very self-conscious about speaking English. He has asked for directions and he hasn’t been able to make himself clear, so the man just laughed at him and it has been very humiliating. Another obstacle for him is his pride. He is on the platform and he is deciding whether he should ask anybody for directions and he keeps making excuses of why he shouldn’t. The old women are deaf, some of the men seem drunk and so on. Nobody is good enough. He is actually ashamed of asking for the cherub’s help. (“Why was he ashamed to ask a man for help? He was a stranger here”). He doesn’t want to appear helpless (“He felt very small and foolish”), and thus lose his masculinity. That is very characteristic for the Italian culture. Men are often afraid of showing their weaknesses because they think that they will become vulnerable if they do. What Berto doesn’t realize is how much he is losing by giving in to his pride.
If he had asked someone for help sooner he would be on his way to Cathy’s in stead of being a victim of his destiny and being killed.
Berto is also very stubborn and he won’t accept the fact that Cathy doesn’t want the kind of relationship that he does. He doesn’t understand that it was a one-night-stand, or as Cathy said “… an open relationship”. He will not give up, so he finally asks someone for help (which is probably the worst fear he has as a person because he feels that his lack of control and power over the situation is being exposed). Even though he is killed by the person he speaks to, it is a relief to him, because it’s not until he sees a trickle of his own blood, creating a red line, that he remembers the way to Cathy. Metaphorically speaking, the black line, which he is travelling on, has been the way to death. His pride and his fear of talking to strangers have been destroying him. When he steps out of his comfort-zone he remembers the directions that Cathy’s boyfriend has given him earlier before his “development”, where he hasn’t understood anything.
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On the exterior, the immediate impression of the nameless man is that of an angel. He is described as a man with “small feet and hands, they were so dainty and delicate”. The fact that he has rid himself of all his hair, except from his golden locks, purifies him. He is even credited as a cherub by
Berto. As far as his appearances go, he is angel-like. But the façade does not save him from his twisted personality. He hates change and thinks that the world should revolve around him. He has been very disturbed by the fact that the bar he used to go to has changed from being a karaoke bar, where they played decent music like Bob Seger, to Elvis and black music. He went to another pub but there were only drug addicts and “girls with dirty hair”. To escape from society he would go home and stand in front of his mirror, naked watching his own perfect reflection. Yet, he could not break away from the imperfect “hairy” world, he could see it from his window.
He fears this change because he’s not in control. There is nothing he can do about people not being
“perfect” like him. He is insecure of himself and therefore he finds comfort in his routines by shaving off his body hair while staring at his own reflection and washing his curls twice a day.
The day he had gone to the pub and they didn’t play Bob Seger anymore, he decided to stop the world from changing. He was determined to take action.
When he sees Berto in the train he is his perfect victim. Berto is everything he fears and despises.
He is everything he is trying to run away from. He is “covered in hair”. Berto is listening to a tape.
The man assumes that it is a tape with black music, which only arouses an even greater hatred because that is the music that the pub played in stead of Bob Seger. The man feels that Berto is the kind of guy that is ruining London, but the real reason for his anger is that deep down he feels that he himself is being ruined by him. When Berto asks for help, the cherub stabs him and walks away.
As far as her looks go, Berto describes Denise as a typical English girl, with a fresh, pretty, open face. Denise’s fear is different from the other characters’. Hers is quite prominent and obvious.
There’s not one thought that goes by her mind that doesn’t involve dread for masculinity. (“But how did you stop people looking at you? There – he’d done it again. He’d eyed her up. Jesus!”). It can be perceived as if she suffers from some sort of paranoia. She also represents the fear that is in all women (“Every man was a potential rapist. Every time you left your flat you were a potential victim”). She may just lack the understanding of the opposite sex which wouldn’t be odd, since her boyfriend, Neil, has laughed at her when she tried to discuss her fears with him.
In conclusion, these characters all refuse to get involved with other people, being afraid that other people may get involved with them. That would also require that the characters got in touch with themselves, with their inner fears. The nameless man shaves all his hair off, to make himself believe that everything is perfect, and he hates everyone who doesn’t. Denise fears every man, but really she is being destroyed by it and is clueless on what to do with herself. Berto is ashamed to ask for help showing his weakness because that would be admitting his fears.
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The way I see it; this story (and life, for that matter) has fooled us to think that we are afraid of strangers, what we think of, as the unknown, when what is really unknown, what we are really trying to escape are ourselves.