Individuality In Ralph Waldo Emerson's The Monster

"Monkey see, Monkey do." The clever pidgin-style phrase means to follow blindly or the act of mimicry similar to how the characters act in Stephen Crane's short story, "The Monster." Crane uses the bandwagon-discrimination Henry Johnson receives from the community to bring light to the prejudice and pettiness people experience that appear physically different. The small town's shared perspective and disownment of Henry Johnson shows why it's important for people to form their own individual opinion. It’s similar to the importance of individuality in Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Self-Reliance." Crane illustrates Emerson’s belief that people conform to social norms discussed in Emerson's "Self-Reliance" by illustrating how characters in Crane’s “The

Monster" mirror one another's ideas and discrimination against Henry Johnson. By doing this, Crane suggests what he imagines a new start for America with independently thinking citizens.
The story takes place in Whilomville, New York in the early 1900’s, which was the time of post-reconstruction. Although America’s cities were rebuilt, its citizens still had to readjust to the Black’s transition to American society. Crane’s use of a black and a white male Henry Johnson, Dr. Trescott, characters introduces readers to the two different racial classes, and allows them to see the different privileges and struggles of each race through an omniscient perspective.
The title of the story, "The Monster," requires a second look at who the real monster is.

According to Old Judge Hagenthorpe and everyone else in town that copies his opinion, Henry Johnson “could not live. His body was frightfully seared, but more than that, he now had no face. His face had simply been burned away... [He’s] a monster, a perfect monster, and probably with an affected brain." Johnson is referred to as a monster due to his physical scars after his heroic gesture. Ironically, there are many characters throughout the story who are monstrous because they lack empathy, morals and humanity for Johnson. To further illustrate, Old Judge Hagenthorpe suggests death by euthanasia for Johnson to Dr. Trescott when he says, "No one wants to advance such ideas, but somehow I think that poor fellow ought to die… you are performing a questionable charity in preserving this negro's life" (Crane). Not only is it disgusting of Old Judge Hagenthorpe to suggest that Dr. Trescott should kill the man who saved Dr. Trescott's son, - just to spare him and the town the sight of Johnson rather than applaud him for acting as a hero - but it's even more awful that he insults Dr. Trescott by saying that Trescott's kindness to Johnson is "questionable." When Hagenthorpe begins with "no one wants to advance such ideas" he reveals that no one in town wants to confront Trescott about Johnson, but they have decided that Johnson should die. Their monstrous request for Johnson's death reveals

their lack of humanity and ability to form their opinions individually.
According to Emerson the townspeople are not individuals, but “cowards fleeing before a revolution “because, to be considered an individual man one must be a nonconformist… [Who] Speak[s] what [one] think[s] now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again” (Emerson). The townspeople work as and think as a society, which is “a conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members… a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater” (Emerson). They find their opinion through strength in numbers as an entity, not independently; which relates to some of Crane's overall message, that people should have self-reliance in order think for themselves, because “Self-reliance is [society’s] aversion” (Emerson).
Another part of Crane’s message is to display the danger in mimicking an identity that does not belong to one. When Jimmie Trescott role-plays as "engine number 36" and "makes the run between Syracuse and Rochester" he tramples a flower in Dr. Trescotts garden (Crane). When he attempts to hold the flower upright "on its spine, resuscitated, the spine of it [is] hurt, and it... only hang[s] limply from his hand," Jimmie "could do no preparation." Dr. Trescott chastises Jimmie when he says, "you had better not play train anymore." Trescott's warning also extends to Henry Johnson's mimicry of white clothing choice and mannerisms because they are fatal to his racial identity. He’s an African-American man whose face is "simply... burned away." Jimmie’s failed attempt to give the flower back its stiff structure foreshadows Dr. Trescott's failed attempt at repairing Johnson's face and burns. The disappearance of Johnson’s face ties to the identity Crane believes the people within the American society lack. It portrays the nonacceptance freed blacks, who imitated whiteness, experienced during the time the story was written. Crane does this to show the imitation he wanted the American society to stray from. This relates to Emerson’s idea that people should “never imitate… the adopted talent of another [because they’ll] have only an extemporaneous half possession… imitation is suicide; [people] must take [themselves] for better, for worse, as [their] portion.” Comparably, Crane insinuates that people should learn to accept who they are and be themselves.
His focus on imitation in his text “The Monster” reveals his own attempt to inform readers of the discrimination that forms the basis for American individuality.

Crane also discloses his view of the American society in a realistic light because he exhibits realism by unveiling America’s true monstrous face, and its white privilege- he same white privilege that causes blacks to conform to the standards of a white American society. In doing so, Crane compliments Emerson’s main idea of “Self-Reliance” that people should “believe [their] own thought, to believe that what is true for [themselves] in [their] private heart is true for all men.’’ Emerson’s belief that people should take heed to their own thoughts because society persuades people to conform, summarizes the idea of individuality Crane express in his story “The

Monster.”