Ok, I'm the first to enter my blog this round, so I might be setting myself up for embarrassment and ridicule if no one else came away with my same query: Am I missing a couple pages at the end? I truly thought we would find out who this mysterious narrator is. Perhaps it is alluded to and I'm too dense to recognize it. I also found it quite odd that the book should end with the story of Dean Makepeace, as he was such an obscure (please don't hate me for choosing that word) character throughout the novel. He rarely makes an appearance and I can't help but equate the ending with that of a cheap thriller where the villain is revealed in the end to be someone of no consequence. That said, I think I may be projecting a harshness toward this book that I don't necessarily feel. I really did enjoy the book and can identify traces of Hemingway's style in the writing. Last semester, Dr. Scruggs reminded me of the "iceberg theory" surrounding Hemingway's writing. Not having read Hemingway since high school and having failed at that time to invest much in his writing, I had forgotten Hemingway's own confession of his style: "If it is any use to know it, I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it underwater for every part that shows. Anything you know you can eliminate and it only strengthens your iceberg. It is the part that doesn't show. If a writer omits something because he does not know it then there is a hole in the story." I see this same theory at work in Wolff's story as well. On the surface, we are to believe that the narrator plagiarizes another's story because he believes it to be his own. Yet, when reading the plagiarism segment, I couldn't help but think that the narrator was indeed, subconsciously, retelling Bill White's story. Susan's story is unmistakably about repression stemming from religion, not just class. The fact that the narrator draws comparisons from her account of taking the bus to the Y and their shared "cigarette-craving," illustrates how much he missed the point. Yes, he knows she's Jewish and must hide it, as he believes to be true of himself. But, as we discussed in class (and I am in complete agreement with Keren), he is not Jewish and truly has nothing to hide. His friends know that he was raised a Catholic. So although he can elicit certain superficial parallels, he cannot appreciate the origin of Susan's struggle--as can Bill. Somehow, I gather that the narrator knows this--hence the "iceberg theory"--and he writes the story on behalf of Bill. When the two boys are together in their room discussing their stories, Bill's own truth of not having written a story is reflected in the narrator's thoughts. He himself has not written a word, yet claims that it is "going...Like gangbusters" (118). Bill returns with his own over-enthusiastic claim that his is "like a house afire. Like crazy. Like nobody's business" (118). The story ends there with no reflection upon the statement from the narrator. Here, I deduce that he knew the truth of Bill, just as he knew the truth of himself--he hadn't written a thing. When he copies the story and substitutes his own name for "Ruth," essentially, he is testing the limits for a response to such a "taboo" story. Upon its acceptance and praise, the narrator seems to have broken some new ground for Bill who hides his identity. Yet, by not using Bill's name, he has not risked anything on his friend's behalf. Here is just one instance where I see Hemingway's "iceberg theory" at work. There are others, but I fear I have written too much already that is based solely on speculation and I may be way off base. For those who think this is crazy, I hope it at least provided a good laugh.