Unique Snowflakes.

‘If I could wake up in a different place, at a different time, could I wake up as a different person?’(Palahniuk 33) this is the question the Narrator asks us barely into the story of his Tylor Durden’s life together.

In Chuck Palahniuks book Fight Club, he asks us similar questions that we, as the reader, must answer for our selves. Without ruining the story with major motifs and explanations of scenes, Fight Club is about a man, whom we only know throughout the book as the Narrator, who is unsatisfied with his life as a recall sales specialist for an unknown car company who suffers from sleep apnea. He tries going to a doctor for this problem however his physician insists that there is nothing wrong with him instead he should try 'valarian root tea', an herb commonly used for anxiety treatment. 

'This is when I'd cry because right now, your life comes down to nothing, and not even nothing, oblivion.' (Palahniuk 17)

        In order to over come his sleeping problem he starts going to support groups, which works, for two years, until he meets Marla Singer another support faker, like himself, only after he finds out she’s faking as well it unables to cry. Not too long after he meets Marla, while on a plane back home he meets an odd nihilist guy named Tyler whom he calls after his condo blows up from 'mysterious causes' that same night. The Narrator explains the dynamics of Tyler’s odd jobs and us of 'gorilla warfare' in the catering business as well as his job as projectionist, where he cuts images of porn and places them indiscreetly with the latest kid flick. After they have a fight at Tyler’s request as a clause for letting him stay, the idea of the fight escalates into what quickly becomes known as Fight Club. Fight Club is the place where men of all factions of life can get together and take their feelings out on each other. Therapy for men without the patience or money for shrinks and not everyone can handle their problems by sitting on a couch crying.

One of Tyler’s other main goals in the story is to help the narrator reach ultimate enlightenment by reaching 'bottom', reaching bottom will enable him to take control in his life with a 'you have to destroy yourself to save your self'.

Fight Club slowly turns into Project Mayhem, where certain men of the club join Tyler in his mission to, in a way, destroy the things that, we the people, are dependent on. There are several ‘committees’ within Project Mayhem, which are all focused on, more or less, the same tasks; picking a fight with a stranger, blow up a computer store, destroy a monument, or display a large demon face using the exterior of a major office building.

The Narrator soon starts thinking, after someone in Project Mayhem is accidentally killed, that maybe they are in over their heads and sets out to find Tyler to end it.


The Four Noble Truths: From : The Journal of Religion and Film

Fight Club: An Exploration of Buddhism

By Charley Reed

 'The relationship between the narrator and Tyler is a representation of the four noble truths of Buddhism: Dukkha, Samudaya, Nirodha, and Magga. Dukkha states that there is suffering, and this is simply a part of life. Samudaya says that Dukkha is caused by an attachment and desire to worldly objects. Nirodha is the truth which simply states that Samudaya can be eliminated by Magga, otherwise known as The Eightfold Path. In the film, the simple translation is that the narrator’s suffering is a part of life caused by the cultural consumerism in America. It is through Tyler and the eightfold path of Fight Club that the narrator can eliminate his suffering. Tyler sums up the connection when he says: “It’s only after you’ve lost everything that you’re free to do anything.”'

         He and Tyler fight over the morality, right and wrongs, of Fight Club and Project Mayhem. In the end the narrator ends up with a gun in his mouth as he realizes the truth about his relationship with Tyler.

'I just don't want die without a few scars,' (Palahniuk 48)

'No matter who you are you are going to have to either reach a high or stoop low to enjoy the full spectrum of the collection.' Mercer Schuchartd, of The Existentialist Paramedic.  

            The story itself is written as a satirical novel stocked full of philosophies and random facts that really play no real part in plot development, yet the information is interesting and plays its own part well. Overall the book is one that anyone can, I believe, read no matter who you are or where you come from and take something useful from it and grow. 

'Didn't I realize that each of us is a sacred, unique snowflake of special unique specialness?...

We are not special.

We are not crap or trash, either.

We just are.

We just are, and what happens happens.' (Palahniuk 207)

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The photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/landeng/3836276194/

Palahniuk, Chuck. "Chapter 3 Page 33." Print.
Palahniuk, Chuck. "Chapter 2 Page 17." Print.

Reed, Charley.'Journal or Religion and Film.' Vol. 11, No. 2 October 2007.
         http://www.unomaha.edu/jrf/vol11no2/ReedFightClub.htm

Palahniuk, Chuck. "Chapter 6 Page 48." Print.

Schuchardt, Mercer. 'Chuck Palahniuk, Existentialist Paramedic.'
           http://chuckpalahniuk.net/files/features/fight-club-anthology-intro.pdf

Palahniuk, Chuck. "Chapter 30 Page 207." Print.