Carson McCullers

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Is Sucker a real person or a symbolic creation derived from psychological needs?

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Sucker is a symbol of Pete’s younger self, not a living person. The evidence for this conclusion is that he says Sucker is younger, that he treats him as such in the story’s present, and that the symbolism fits his psychological need for release from that stage of life.

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Sucker is not a living, breathing person. He is a symbol of a real person, who is in many ways Pete’s younger self. Pete’s adolescent changes cause him to reflect on his own shortcomings, which he would like to leave behind. This is a psychological need for his emotional growth. Ultimately, however, this creation does not fulfill that need because Pete regresses. The evidence is of three types: Pete’s presentation of Sucker as younger; his comparison to aspects of his own personality and experiences; and a confrontation and transformation when his need for his younger self ends.

Pete tells the reader that Sucker, his cousin who is like his brother, is younger when he says, “He’s twelve, four years younger than I am.” In the story’s present, Pete says refers to his own behavior in the past that he treated Sucker bad “when he was a little kid and up...

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until the time he was twelve.” Pete describes Sucker as sharing his room for years, being very quiet, not having many friends. His personality was a watcher not a sport-player. By saying he wore clothes that Pete outgrew, Pete places his association with Sucker in the past. This supports the idea that he is projecting his own memories of himself.

Pete’s desire for Maybelle stems not only from her popularity but from her lack of awareness—“she didn’t even notice me.” Later he says of Sucker, “I had never really thought about Sucker." Then, after they have some conversations, “It was like I was really knowing him for the first time.” The theme of ignoring and recognizing connects past and present. As Pete first gains some ground in his relationship with Maybelle, and then is ignored again, he finds Sucker waiting for him, again being ignored. In this central section of the story, Pete is moving in and out of this particular adolescent stage.

Finally rejected by Maybelle, Pete retreats into self-pity, harsh self-criticism, and uncontrolled verbal and physical outbursts—childish behavior. He calls Sucker “the dumbest slob I ever saw” and “a dumb-bunny,” and “a dumb Sucker.” He repeatedly tells him he doesn’t care about him. This self-image of being “dumb,” a loser, is that of his younger self that he has been trying to leave behind when falling for Maybelle.

In the next section, they experience transformations. Sucker looks like he is getting older, and gets “a look in his eyes that you don’t usually see in a kid.” The next day, he is gone. Pete has outdistanced that phase of his youth.

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He could be a figment of the imagination of a teenager who needs to vent his frustrations, but Sucker is way too black and white not to be a real person.

First, Sucker did not come out of the midst of nowhere: He was a baby when his parents died in a car crash. Hence, he has an origin- a very real and human one at that.

Second, Sucker presents characteristics that are very human and real: He sweats, reacts, fears, attaches himself. Surely an imaginary person could do that but the chances of a real person being like that are higher, especially someone who has experienced trauma and co-dependence.

Third, Sucker changed and became bigger and badder than Peter. He was clearly a developed person. I think that if Sucker had been imaginary, a la "Fight Club" he would have met a specific demise once the character who feeds it does not need it anymore. Seems like Sucker fared quite well without Peter, instead of the other way around. That is significant that he is indeed a person who changed.

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