The Awakening of Disillusionment in The Postman Always Rings Twice - E.Bailey

Emma Bailey

Professor Sinowitz

HONR101C

13 November 2017

The Awakening of Disillusionment in The Postman Always Rings Twice

In high school my best friend’s mom Sam worked at the post office delivering mail, which meant she visited every house in town every day. Sam was the kind of woman people gravitated toward; she was bubbly, intelligent, and a magnificent storyteller. Somehow, Sam knew everyone in the town and exactly what was going on in each of their lives. Her stories were a stark reminder of how seemingly perfect families and houses are often far from that- in fact, they never are what they seem. I remember sitting in my friend’s living room with my friend and Sam. I told them I had just been asked to a dance by a boy in my grade, Adam. “Well, you know,” Sam started, “his family is lovely, but his parents are separating as soon as he graduates high school.” Prior to Sam’s insight, I had always seen Adam’s family as a happy one. When I had gone to their house for dinner, it was the expected suburban lifestyle; they had two kids, a two-story house, and two dogs, both parents worked, and there was no indication that any trouble existed. Living in a small town, you grow quite familiar with two key aspects of your expected life: the suburban fantasy, and the American Dream. Small town life is not hum-drum nor boring. Sure, we only have one stop light and Taco Bell and Pizza Hut, our only chain restaurants, are closed by nine every night, but there is something very alive in my town and all towns like it: disillusionment.

        In The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain, we come to know the Greek, Nick Papadakis, and his wife Cora. The two own a “roadside sandwich joint, like a million others in California” and much like Jo’s Diner in my hometown (Cain 3). Cora and the Greek call their mom-and-pop restaurant Twin Oaks Tavern, and, as described by protagonist Frank, “it was nothing” (Cain 3). The Greek and Cora fit a beautiful version of the perfect suburban fantasy. Two lovers, working toward a common goal through thick and thin – the story would be perfect if it stopped here, but much like the perfect suburban fantasies in my small town it is not complete. The Greek seats Frank at the table, takes his order, and enjoys polite small talk with our main character. Frank, unlike the Greek is not concerned with the food or the air quality or why the help is leaving; instead, Frank is concerned with the Greek’s wife Cora. Enter the disillusionment of the suburban fantasy. Reading Cora and Frank’s intimate, albeit violent, encounters, I can hear Sam saying to me “Well, you know, Cora and that Greek are good people but someone, Frank, I think, from Tia Juana has come between the two, bless their hearts.” In The Postman Always Rings Twice, Frank represents the disillusionment experienced with the expectations of a perfect lifestyle.

        Frank’s capacity to bring on disillusionment does not stop with the suburban fantasy. After developing a ruse with Cora to kill the Greek for money, it is obvious that Frank is a man of cons and get-rich-quick schemes. The original murder plan is to drown the Greek in the bathtub and wait until the water runs over, so that it looks like an accident. If everything went well, the Greek would have died, and it would have appeared to be an accident. Unlike the hard working Greek, Frank’s plan for life is not a rosy image of the American Dream. Instead, Frank and Cora’s plot to kill and run away with money is a comment on the perfect crime. In contrast to the unyielding labor necessary for the American Dream, the perfect crime requires no hard work but rather demands immediate success with no consequence. The American Dream is riddled within the streets of a small town. This vibe is easily shattered when introduced to someone like Frank, who is representative of actuality. While the American Dream is this concept of working hard to achieve successes, Frank reminds us of the American Reality of wanting to obtain a lot while working just a little. Last year a girl who had just graduated from my high school won $75,000 in the lottery. I saw her at the gas station and asked if she planned to use the money for college. “No,” she replied. She told me she was going to take a trip to Hawaii, buy a new car, and then buy more lottery tickets. The American Dream is a nice idea, but the ever-present desire to get rich quick often overrides it. The juxtaposition of the Greek’s American Dream and Frank’s American Reality is another way in which disillusionment affects us in The Postman Always Rings Twice. Novels we read often discuss the American Dream as hopeful, optimistic, and something every American possesses, but Cain disillusions us to this idea by telling the narrative of Frank and Cora’s murder scheme as their plan to live their best lives. This plan is just a quick plot to make cash - a reminder that the American Dream is often idealized.

        While the disenchantment of both the American Dream and suburban fantasy portray an uglier reality than we care to acknowledge, they both are very familiar to me. When I was younger I moved from Ohio to Arkansas and then relocated to Kansas. During my move to Kansas, my father had to finish out his contract in Arkansas and we were separated for six months. It was during this time that I began to recognize the wobbliness of the suburban fantasy. Up until that point of my life, everything felt perfect, but just as Frank was a rude awakening in the seemingly perfect lives of Cora and the Greek, the move was a rude awakening in my own life. I remember sitting at the base of the steps, listening to my worried mom discuss finances with my dad over the phone. Being away from my father for those months meant more stress on my mom and it meant me stepping up in the house. Our family was still together, but I was keenly aware of the fact that we were far from perfect; the chagrin of life is always stirring just beneath the surface.

        The Postman Always Rings Twice is a noir novel that comments on the disillusionment that occurs in small towns. By providing us with the visual of a roadside diner, Cain gives us insight into the small lives Cora and the Greek are living. Cora and the Greek are like many small-town families; they seem perfectly happy creating a life together. It is not until Frank enters their lives that the disillusionment sets in. Sitting at the base of my stairs listening to my parents’ concerned tones discus our stability in the transition to Kansas made me queasy. I was worried for our futures and disheartened to the idea that all families, including my own, were not perfect. This same queasy feeling returned when engaging with the novel and noting the relationship spark up between Cora and Frank. Growing older, we replace the idea of a fairy tale ending with that of a suburban fantasy. While The Postman Always Rings Twice tells the tale of crime, passion, and twisted lust, it more relevantly comments on the actuality of life in a small town. Additionally, Cain’s novel disregards the hardworking American Dream and replaces it with a disturbing take on the perfect crime. All in all, the novel reminds the reader that no life, fictional or real, is fully as it seems. Desires exist, such as Cora’s desire to leave the Greek, that are not seen at first glance. And there are people who spend life attempting to make it big without lifting a finger, even those who stroll in as an honest mechanic. The Postman Always Rings Twice is a novel that does hide the disillusionment of the suburban and American Dream fantasies from its readers; instead, it digs up the disillusionment and plants it squarely in front of us. In Cain’s novel and small towns alike, disillusionment is wide awake and ready to change a perspective.