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Tyler Nakaue
Professor McClure
Writing 39B
25 October 2015
The Monster Within
In the short story, The Other Place, written by Mary Gaitskill, recipient of the
Guggenheim Fellowship award and nominee for the PEN/Faulkner award, a man recalls
moments of his life and sees how similar he and his son are. The man talks about how he would
travel to another place when he was mischievous, which later becomes his drive for murder. In
The Nature of Horror, by Noel Carroll, a well-respected author in the philosophy of art, a
monster is described as an extraordinary being in an ordinary world. Although this man is an
ordinary human, he is a monster because when he steps into the other place he is able to do
extraordinary things. He is different from the daily norm, yet the reader is not scared of him.
They instead see themselves inside that man, which Gaitskill uses to argue that everyone has the
ability to become extraordinary.
The man, although he was the main character, was the monster of the story. The mans
name was never stated in the story, so for clarity he will be referred to as Man. In Noel Carrolls
The Nature of Horror, Carroll states that in horror stories the monster is an extraordinary
character in our ordinary world (Carroll 52). Man fits that description. He has an outward
appearance that is normal to the average human, but his mind is twisted. He created a world
where he is a monster, a place where he is extraordinary. There he wasnt a little boy. He was a
man who could kill anyone if he were inclined to do so. There were no consequences for him in

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this place. He stalked, watched, and fantasized over the death of women. But how could a man
so twisted as him be anything like us normal humans? The answer is when he is introduced.
Gaitskill purposefully structures this man to be relatable to the reader. When the story
begins he is a caring father. When he talks about his son, Man states that his drawings of crows
are beautiful and precise (Gaitskill 1). Parents tend to encourage their child in all their
endeavors. Man is no different. The reader sees him marveling at his sons drawings, even
though they depict death or crows. Man also has a strong marriage, which many people can
relate to or inspire to have. He has a wife who lives with him and cares for her son as well. The
last detail he shares with most parents is his attention to his son. He noticed his excessive interest
in guns, gore, and death, asking, How did this happen? (1). When the video game industry
began manufacturing violent games about killing the enemy, many parents became concerned
about how this affects their children. Man also feels that way. He noticed that his son has become
found of killing virtual people. He even draws pictures of them dying, which concerns the man,
but for other reasons. Man is designed from the start to relate to readers. He is either the parent
you are, want, or hope to be. Gaitskill sets a strong, basic connection with the reader so that they
can still connect with him later.
The audience is able to solidify their connection with the man when he describes the
other place. Man is a normal human being, physically. If he is cut, Man will bleed. He doesnt
have any super powers that makes him extraordinary. He does, however, have his mind. He
would sit with [friends] and yet be completely apart from them (Gaitskill 5). With his mind he
was able to create a new world. In this place, he was distant. He could do what he wanted, when
he wanted. Gaitskill argues that every person has this other place. This argument may seem
crazy, but it does make sense. Man is only in the other place when he is doing something he

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likes. This is a relatable concept because people can go into a trance or enter another place when
they do things they like. When Man held a woman at gun point [his] voice at the moment came
not from [him] but from the other place (10). Think about when a person watches television,
plays a videogame, or texts a person. They seem enter this trance where they seem distant from
others, just like the man. If spoken to they would give short answers, which they probably wont
remember. In the other place, he was in complete control. He just focused on what he wanted to
do. The rest of the world was not important at the time. This is similar to people when they are
focused. When a person is focused on a certain task then outside interferences are blocked more.
They tend to be less responsive to the people and things around them. The audience at first may
think that Man and they have nothing in common, but in reality they are similar in many ways.
Some may argue that this man is an extreme case and the majority of the population does
not share these aspects. They may say that this man is clearly a psychopath and the other place is
a world for murder. His son also displays these tendencies after he sees a girl die on television.
This, however, is false. The man is definitely a monster, but that doesnt make the other place a
world for murder. When it was first created, the man used it as a place to get away. Its original
purpose was to comfort the man and take him away from situations he did not like. He states that
his friends were disrespectful (Gaitskill 4) to women and at home his mother fought with
[his] dad (5). He was obviously not comfortable with the way the people around him were
acting, so his mind created this place where he could escape to be himself and enjoy life. This
was done by enjoying his darkest fantasies, murder. People enter this other place all the time.
When people become stressed, furious, or depressed they may listen to music, watch television,
or something else to clear their mind. They enter the other place to relax them and help them
enjoy life. The son is no different from us. He just saw the commercial to a movie he might have

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been interested in, and became intensely focused on it. Like most people, when that
advertisement ended his attention went elsewhere (2). He is just a boy who was interested in a
horror movie. This does not make him a monster even though the movies genre is horror. Horror
is a popular genre and people love to watch it, including Douglas, Mans son. Like the man,
Douglas also has the ability to access the other place.
Gaitskill uses this story of a mans twisted desires to show off how every person has the
other place inside them. In the story the man has a son. He praises his son for his uniqueness, but
also is wary of his sons similarities to himself. Douglas enjoyed video games where people die,
and toy guns. Douglas watched an ad where a blond girl was being held captive. She was
terrified and crying. During this commercial Doug didnt speak or move (Gaitskill 1). Like his
father, Douglas entered the other place. Man never told him about it, but Douglas still found the
other place. Douglass lack of motion and speech depicts how focused he was on the
advertisement. He was intrigued and excited by the pain and struggles of this woman. His father
also showed him how to fly fish. As Douglas became progressively better he began to enter the
other place more. At first he was resistant to his fathers touch while practicing, but the second
time he put [his] hand on Dougs shoulder, he didnt move away inside (12). Douglas
displayed one of the behaviors of people in the other place. He became distant. It was as if his
body was next to his father, but his mind was somewhere else. He was so focused on his given
task he didnt respond to outside stimulation. His fathers touch did not register in his mind.
Gaitskill is showing how every person has the capability of opening the door to the other place,
but this place is not exclusive to this story.
Man isnt the only extraordinary person to find the other place. Another fictional
character that has found the other place. The mans name is Robert Neville from New York

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Times Best Seller horror novel I Am Legend. In this story a man slowly becomes the monster in a
post-apocalyptic, vampire infested world. He began to see life from the other place. He did what
he wanted, when he wanted. Neville would take vampire women from their home to experiment
on them, which at first he questioned, but later decided it wasnt important. Neville had no real
outside stimulation to prove he was in the other place, but he did have a split personality. The
other half of his mind started out as a strong moral compass, but slowly Nevilles monstrous side
took over. We can assume that his outside stimulation is his other half, the half that cared about
society and its morals. Neville was easily able to determine that those morals were outdated and
meant nothing. He soon became unresponsive to the morals the other half tried to impress upon
him. Neville did what he wanted, undisturbed by outside stimulations. Although it was never
specifically stated that he traveled to another place, his minds deterioration shows it. He began
as a civilized man, but when society fell and he became the last man in the world, a split side
convinced him to abandon the morals society chained him to. He became free to do what he
wanted.
Gaitskills depiction of the other place isnt just limited to the fictional universe. The
other place isnt just for things we love to do. It can be a place where the person who controls it
determines its use. Man decided to make the other place for murder. I personally use my other
place for crazy, stupid actions. There are things we have thought about doing, but something in
our way. It was society that stopped us. We are a species that deeply cares what people think
about us. Doing things that are considered to be out of the social queue are taboo. People will
look at us differently and judge us. Gaitskill tells a story about a boy growing up. This boy
decided to do what he wanted with little regard to society. Of course, he was still aware of social
judgement. After he gets caught creepily watching a girl sleep he cut school the next day and

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the next (Gaitskill 6), because he was afraid of the rumor spreading and being mocked for it.
Man only cares about what society thinks after he leaves the other place. After he failed to kill
the woman, he began to worry about the consequences. Our lifestyle as a global community puts
up barriers between us and the other place. What if the other place isnt just a person with intense
focus or a place where people can defy social norms, but a real world anomaly.
Gaitskills description of the other place is similar to an anomaly in real life called Out of
Body Experiences. Out of body experiences are perceiving ones physical body as if from a
place outside ones body (Wikipedia). Man clearly leaves his body when he enters the other
place. He says that when he is in the other place he is with people, but distant from them. His
body is physically there, but his mind has already left. He said that when he spoke the words did
not come from his mouth but from the other place. A real document of out of body experience
states that a persons friend was able to leave his body and have his spirit roam around. To prove
it the person left a note in his room for his friend. The next day he got a call from his friend
telling [him] that he had read the note He got it right (Epoch Times). Sound familiar?
When Man was just starting to tap into his other place he would go watch a girl sleep at night.
Generally people feel these out of body experiences at night when the physical body goes to
sleep. The mans physical body went to sleep and now his spirit body was roaming around. This
makes sense because when he thought he was caught by the girl he watched sleeping he realized
that she hadnt seen [him] at all (Gaitskill 6). Without a physical body a person may not be
able to see the spirit roaming. The man may be having out of body experiences without him
knowing. There are some holes in this theory though. Typical out of body experience involves
the spirit floating. The man never said he felt like he was floating. He just felt distant. The most
common way to have an out of body experience is by going to sleep. Man never said he fell

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asleep before entering the other place. This idea is clever and clearly debatable, but one fact is
clear: The other place is a mysterious concept.

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Bibliography
Wikipedia. Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/out-of-body_experience>
6 Stories That Could Make You Believe In Out-of-Body Experiences. The Epoch Times 6
Stories That Could Make You Believe in OutofBody Experiences Comments. N.p., 2014.
Web. 8 Nov. 2015. <http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/509167-6-stories-that-could-makeyou-believe-in-out-of-body-experiences/>
Carroll, Noel. The Nature of Horror. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 1987. Print.
Matheson, Richard. I Am Legend. New York: ORB, 1995. Print.
The Other Place - The New Yorker. The New Yorker. Web. 8 Nov. 2015.
<http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/02/14/the-other-place>