How we cite our quotes: (Page)
Quote #1
"In the jail there were some Party men. They talked to me. Everything's been a mess, all my life. Their lives weren't messes. They were working toward something. I want to work toward something. I feel dead. I thought I might get alive again." (8)
Jim explains to Harry Nilson why he wants to join the Party. For Jim, it's less about politics than it is about finding a purpose for his life. He tells us later that he'd grown up in hopelessness—always knowing that he and his family were going to lose. Belonging to the group gives Jim the opportunity to throw his shoulder to the wheel with a bunch of other guys working toward the same goal. In a sense, it also relieves Jim of the painful task of creating a personal identity for himself. As a group-man (as Doc Burton calls them), he can take on the stance of the Party and stop at that.
Quote #2
"It seemed a good thing to be doing. It seemed to have some meaning. Nothing I ever did before had any meaning. It was all just a mess." (20)
Jim responds to his first assignment for the Party: typing letters for Mac. It's a small task, but it gets Jim outside of himself and of his own memories of a miserable past. The work gives him purpose and finally makes living worthwhile. While typing seems like a menial task—and a short one at that—it's incredibly therapeutic for a young man who has suffered trauma after trauma. The act of typing also helps Jim feel like part of something bigger than himself, and that moves him out of his lonely, individual identity.
Quote #3
"Mac, I don't know why I didn't come into the country oftener. It's funny how you want to do a thing and never do it." (30)
Jim has spoken earlier of feeling "dead" or "asleep" until he joined the Party and went to work. As he and Mac ride into the countryside, Jim begins to remember parts of his life when he felt pleasure but never pursued it. In this instance, he remembers making a trip into the countryside with a boys' group and making a failed resolution to get out of the city as often as he could. Jim's awakening reminds him how often people gets the chance to define themselves and their own lives but often lose the opportunity when the complications of life take over.