Under The Volcano By Geoffrey Firmin Mistrust Of Friends

Henry Colageo
Ms. Carlisle
English III, Backroads-2
3/31/16
Junior Term Paper
Geoffrey Firmin's Mistrust of Friends
In the novel Under the Volcano by Malcolm Lowry, Geoffrey Firmin lives a low and depressing life as a rather empty soul with an extreme drinking problem. This problem is enhanced through his complication in his relationships with his friends and family, who allows him to perish in the end of the novel; Therefore, his friends and family are partly to blame for his downfall. His wife Yvonne leaves him for a better life in America, but for more than just the a better life. The idea that Geoffrey's brother Hugh was having an affair with Yvonne is blatantly clear. It can be seen through their subtle interactions and connections

throughout their conversations involving and not involving Geoffrey. Yvonne’s leaving him in hopes for a better life in America was destructive to Geoffrey's mental health. However, Yvonne has good intentions when she leaves for America. She plans to come back at a later time and bring the Consul, Geoffrey, with her to America to give them both a better life. This did not work; when she returned she found a shell of her husband, who channels his problems through alcohol.
This failure to rehabilitate the relationship with Yvonne allows for alcoholism to coincide with his already relevant depression caused by living in a town overrun by fascism. Surprisingly, this fascist government is corrupt and destructive to the people of Quauhnahuac Mexico. An addition to this already destructive government is the fact that Geoffrey Firmin is not a supporter of fascism. His political beliefs against fascism combined with his tendency to always be intoxicated leads to increasingly destructive behavior in public. This includes the type of behavior that eventually leads to his body at the bottom of a crevasse. This "political epiphany" as described by Mark L. Hama, allows for Geoffrey to be self-destructive and causes his own death because of his political views. This personal belief and political stance, however, is noticed by his friends and former fiancée. Hama talks about how this "leftist" political belief is presented in the writer, Malcolm Lowry. Lowry is left wing political supporter; he does not support the idea of a fascist government. Hama expresses the connection of fascism saying, "Lowry came to identify so closely with the protagonist, Geoffrey Firmin, the British Ex-Consul to Mexico...he had become unable to separate himself from the character he had created" (Hama 60). This connection explains why Geoffrey expresses these anti-fascist ideals because Lowry expressed his own political opinions through his writing. Lowry wants to express his political views but is afraid of what will happen if he speaks out against the government that is in power. In turn, he began to write to express his political opinion, and it worked because Geoffrey expressed these characteristics perfectly through his characters such as Geoffrey Firmin.
However, through the writing and documents presented by other theorists, there is no explanation as to why Geoffrey's friends and family do not act to save him.

It is blatantly clear throughout the novel that Yvonne, Hugh, and the others see Geoffrey's drinking problem, yet they do nothing. Geoffrey’s friends and family are to blame for his demise because it is clear that Geoffrey possesses self-destructive behaviors throughout the novel. They consistently disregarded Geoffrey's drinking problem and the problems caused by it and attempted to continue life as normal when that is merely impossible to achieve. To follow up with this utter inattention for life, Yvonne, the person who jumpstarted Geoffrey's alcoholic tendencies, never tries to repair the gap that she left unfilled when she abandoned him for the United

States.
Yvonne’s selfish acts leads to Geoffrey’s death and her own, for that matter, because of her failure to help her fiancée. She is found allowing Geoffrey to drink his life away in the text. Yvonne finds Geoffrey alone at the bar at the Bella Vista hotel. When she arrives in the morning after travelling from Acapulco, Geoffrey is not doing so well after heavily drinking the night before with his acquaintance, Dr. Vigil. However, he is still coherent. Geoffrey and Dr. Vigil were celebrating All-Saints day at the Red Cross Ball. Later, when they decide to celebrate, Yvonne and Geoffrey walk to the Geoffrey’s house and Yvonne learns that Geoffrey’s brother Hugh is staying with him. While at Geoffrey’s house, Yvonne relives some of her memories as Geoffreys wife. Geoffrey manages a few therapeutic drinks, and proceeds to pass out. When Geoffrey wakes up, he finds various hidden bottles of tequila and whiskey, which he drinks to cure his shakes and hangover. Hugh, Geoffrey and Yvonne set out for the nearby town of Tomalín, where they watch bull-riding. During this period of time, Yvonne allows Geoffrey to continue to drink and does not attempt to shorten his everlasting supply of alcohol that is well known by all to be in the household. Geoffrey asserts to Hugh and Yvonne saying, “Try persuading the world not to cut its throat for half a decade or more...and it'll begin to dawn on you that even your behavior's part of its plan” (Lowry 291). Geoffrey says this while in the house with his brother and ex-fiancé yet, Yvonne says nothing nor responds to this treacherous idea. How does this not concern Yvonne or Hugh who are clearly listening during their conversation with the Geoffrey before leaving for the town.
The conversation that previously occurred exposes a continuous tension between Hugh and Yvonne exposing a rather scandalous part of their lives. There is likewise a key scene where the Consul is sleeping, allowing Hugh and Yvonne to rent horses and ride through the countryside.“So the château was a brewery, but of a very odd type—one that hadn’t quite made up its mind not to be an open-air restaurant and beer garden. Outside in the courtyard two or three round tables (more likely to provide against the occasional visits of semi-official ‘tasters’), blackened and leaf covered, … They had not dismounted and he handed the beer up to them.
‘God, that’s cold,’ Hugh said, ‘good though.’ The beer had a piercing taste, half metallic, half earthy, like distilled loam.

It was so cold that it hurt.” (Lowry 318) they stop at a brewery and then at the country estate of Archduke Maximilian. The novel does not fully disclose whether or not Hugh and Yvonne had an affair while Yvonne was married to Geoffrey, but the conversations and the way they communicate with each other in the text would propose the idea that they did have an affair while Yvonne was still living in Mexico. When you coincide the fact that late at night they rented horses to go on a journey through the countryside alone, it helps to better the possibility of an affair. However, this would’ve been before Yvonne began to flee to the United States for a better life. Another piece against Yvonne that is exposed is the idea that she flees to the United States to create a better a life for herself and

Geoffrey.
However, the plan does not work out this way. When she left, she never told Geoffrey that she was leaving for the United States. She blatantly left with no notice, this event began his alcoholism. This dependency on alcohol stopped his shaking and gives him the ability to face the world, “A deep flush had suffused his face, and his hand trembled slightly over the bottle, from whose label a florid demon brandished a pitchfork at him”(Lowry 14). Although, the habit is bad it was not caused by his own failures. She does not return from the United States for more than two years. She then proceeds to come back in an attempt to save an already lost marriage after disappearing from the town the following years. She caused emotional distraught and failed to care for her most important relationship to Geoffrey, her own marriage.