I suspect her sex was another tool to isolate Lila Mae, and setting the story somewhere vaguely back in time was a way of simplifying (or even not dealing with) the since-emergent subtleties of both sex and race.

So do you think the setting was lazy, or was there a reason beyond wanting to make the racism and sexism apparent? (I do think the showgirls were pretty sexist- in fact, I'm having a milder form of that issue at work right now).

I don't even think it gets as far as saying sexism is bad. It says discrimination against Lila Mae is bad, but it doesn't, e.g., show us other female wannabe elevator inspectors who are excluded because of gender.

This is true, but I think the point was made by having all of the other elevator inspectors in the story as men. That said, it really doesn't address the specific issues women deal with in a male world as the character is pretty flat in any case and, also, too busy banging you on the head with the racism issue.

Why do you think he purposefully went out of his way to make Lila Mae so isolated, and give her so little life aside from Intuitionism? It wasn't just a lack of interest in her - when you specify that one pear is her choice for decoration, and the details of her safe were so mundane (yet important for her to keep hidden) it seems like a very conscious choice on his part.

I think the point was made by having all of the other elevator inspectors in the story as men.

Right, but I don't feel the book made it clear women wanted to be accepted as equals and weren't, in the way it made it clear "coloreds" were being oppressed. If someone who didn't have the context of knowing about the women's rights movement read the book, they might assume women except Lila Mae only *wanted* to be cigarette girls or wives/mothers at home.

Why do you think he purposefully went out of his way to make Lila Mae so isolated, and give her so little life aside from Intuitionism?

For one, for the book to work as he structured it, Lila Mae *has* to have few sources of information and be generally mistrustful. Otherwise, she wouldn't be such an easy scapegoat after the accident, and Natchez wouldn't have been able to get close to her.

Also, if intuitionism is her only source of belief/comfort, it makes her reaction when she finds out Fulton was joking much stronger. (Or should, anyhow -- her reaction in the book as written seems to pretty much be a shrug.)

I'll admit, I completely didn't understand the point of those several flashbacks to Lila Mae's interpersonal/sexual history. They didn't seem out of character, for the character that had been established, but for the life of me I didn't know why we saw those scenes.

Actually they made me a little annoyed with Whitehead, like he was punishing Lila Mae for something, and I felt protective of her, against him. I dont' know if that means he was pushing pity, and that annoyed me, or if something else was going on.

I thought the parts that showed us glimpses of Lila Mae's life--the bare apartment, her family, the sexual encounters--were all designed to show that all she had in her life was Intuitionism and being an elevator inspector. If was as if she was preparing to be the monk or saint that brought the truth of the second elevation to the world. I also understood her isolation from her colleagues--I was the first female news reporter at the first newspaper I worked at.

It didn't bother me that the book was mostly an allegory about race and not sexism or a hundred other ills. To me, race was standing in for all of those. I do agree that the minstrel show was a bit anvilicious.

I did think parts of the book were quite funny, particularly the student discussions. I didn't think the fact that Intuitionism started as a joke was supposed to be particularly funny. It does carry through the racial theme, because it relates to stories like the Uncle Remus stories, in which Brer Rabbit defeats the powerful with jokes and tricks.

It wasn't just a lack of interest in her - when you specify that one pear is her choice for decoration, and the details of her safe were so mundane (yet important for her to keep hidden) it seems like a very conscious choice on his part.

I agree. I believe he probably is making a point with these details, but I can't tell what it is.

I think if I had to compare Lila Mae to anyone, I would compare her to Anya. She really seems to have no identity outisde her job and her race. Unlike Anya, Lila Mae seems comfortable (not happy) with that situation and sees no reason to change.

I think, maybe, that his point is that Lila Mae herself is extra-ordinary, and the fact that all of this activity seems to be focusing on her is indeed extraordinary. Lila Mae is the focus of of this attention not because she is black or female or the first black female elevator inspector. The focus on Lila Mae by the guild and by the elevator companies is because Fulton made an entirely random note in his journal: "Lila Mae Watson is the one." Who stays up late studying. Like the Fannie Briggs Building, Fulton's notice of Lila Mae and the subsequent focus on her by others is an accident. Accidents happen to extra-ordinary people all the time.

Yes. And? Maybe is point is that extra-ordinary people are transformed by the random events that happen to them. Again, I knew that.

It seems to me that one can interpret several meanings from Whitehead's writing. For other writers that might be a sign of success. I think Whitehead is writing with such a strong sense of purpose, though, that his meaning(s) should be more clearly defined and not be grabbed at or supposed.

I thought the parts that showed us glimpses of Lila Mae's life--the bare apartment, her family, the sexual encounters--were all designed to show that all she had in her life was Intuitionism and being an elevator inspector.

I think too that he was concerned to make the most capable Intuitionist a figure without frivolousness or touchy-feely aspects to avoid Intuitionism coming across as, in the words of the great Cartman, "a bunch of tree-hugging hippie crap". (That she experienced elevator diagnoses as geometric shapes appears to me to be of a piece with this.)

Well, but if Billytea's right, then Whitehead went too far in the other direction. I don't think a throw pillow or two would have impeded my seeing her as a hard-headed person. Lila Mae had less adornment, decoration, and detail-richness than a boy's college dorm room.

Yes. And?

I think I felt that way a lot about the book, in a lot of different ways, and that is what I mean when I say "mystified".

Well, but if Billytea's right, then Whitehead went too far in the other direction.

Yes, I agree. And still found Intuitionism irritating. I spent a while untangling the whole 'magical negro' thing from what I was reading. (Granted, the magical negro trope isn't one I'm very familiar with, so maybe it was more obviously irrelevant to others.)