Character Analysis Of Marla Singer In Fight Club By Chuck Palahniuk

Marla Singer: Character Analysis

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk is a great novel, which captures readers from the very first page. The novel has 3 major characters: Tyler Dyrden, Marla singer and the narrator. Marla Singer is a strange persona. Shabby, neither too young nor beautiful, she appears as a part of “triangle” together with Tyler and the narrator. Her presence in the novel is motivated by her important role in plot development. Her presence and actions change narrator’s life completely, fosters Tyler’s development and helps to regulate the relationships of Tyler and the narrator.

When the narrator says “without Marla, Tyler would have nothing” (5), he explains her primary function in the text. Marla’s attendance of support groups spoils the scheme used by the narrator to “cradle his inner child” and cope with insomnia. She appears as his reflection because she is a liar. Marla’s indifferent behavior, as well as her gender, challenge the narrator because he does not want look weak. He cannot relax when Marla is watching because he is afraid that she will accuse him of being a faker. Marla is the primary reason why narrator’s insomnia transforms into his personality disorder. She is the catalyst for all events in the book.

Marla becomes narrator’s obsession. She is his power animal; she hides in every corner of his head. She is his inner child and she is his greatest fear to be thrown away from the place where he feels much better than others. She understands that well and says her conditions. She will not tell on the narrator, but he has to be silent as well. They are very similar in their behavior and this fact makes them closer to each other. Both of them belong to the same cast of liars. The narrator hates her and...

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...She tries to keep those relationships working and she was ready to sacrifice some of her interests in order to stay. There is a difference between Marla in the beginning of the novel and Marla in the middle of it. Marla shows that she can develop attachment to someone and be involved in romantic relationships unlike the narrator, who is attached to Tyler only.

Summing up, Marla is the main woman who joins the company of the narrator and keeps both Tyler and narrator related to the rest of the world. As well as other characters, she is self-centered and strange to the world where she lives. It is the reason why she finds her new friends appropriate for her. She is narrator’s reflection; a faker who observes sufferings of others to feel alive again. She is incomplete and empty as well as the narrator. All three characters help to find any sense in everything around.