"The American Male at Age Ten"
"The American Male at Age Ten" by Susan Orleans is an essay about the edge of childhood that bleeds into adolescence. It is narrated by an anonymous little girl seemingly the same age as the ten year old American male. It is unique how the main character is not the narrator, but Colin Duffy. We know the narrator is a girl because Colin asks her at one point if she would ever have an abortion and only women can have abortions. The essay is a whole description of who the character is and her relations with the boy. We never find out who exactly she is.
The essay opens with the narrator describing how life would be like if she married Colin. It is sweet. It is detailed. It sounds unrealistic. She states that Colin and her would constantly wear baggy big shirts, cure AIDS, and how Morgan Freeman would visit them. She sounds like a kid in love. She then describes Colin as a charming boy that always wear baseball caps. We the reader find out his family situation, where he lives, and where he goes to school. The narrator tells the reader how she met Colin and little by little, through each paragraph read, we see what type of person Colin is and what the narrator means to him.
We the readers know how the narrator feels about Colin but it is never clear how Colin feels about the narrator. We know Colin doesn't hate her because she goes with Colin and his best friend Japeth to play video games in places where girls aren't allowed. We know that Japeth gave advice to Colin that said to show a girl you like them, you have to steal something of theirs and then run away. The essay ended with Colin trapping the narrator in a web made of fishing line and then running back into Japeth's house. It is an ending that leaves the reader questioning why Colin did that exactly. Even though the reader just read five thousand sixty four words about Colin, we don't know why he did that. We are left with the impression and hope that maybe Colin likes the narrator back but at the same time feeling satisfied with meeting Colin because the author did a magnificent job at explaining who Colin was.
Personally, I didn't see the narrator as being the same age as Colin. From the beginning I read it as if she was an adult, and I judged Colin likewise. Therefore, it was interesting reading your response, because it gave the story a whole different viewpoint for me.
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