What is reality?

“Reality leaves a lot to the imagination” –John Lennon

This being “Truth, Lies, & Literature,” one would assume the point of this class is to find the truth and the lies in literature. However, it is not as black and white as one would hope. Once looked at more closely, it becomes clear (or rather unclear, really) that no one truly knows what the difference is to begin with. And after yesterday’s class, I was finally able to wrap my stubborn brain around the idea that the point is not to find where the truth lies (pun intended). In fact, it is far more interesting to notice the many shades of gray. Quite literally, that is. In Bierce’s “An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge,” the color gray is used throughout his descriptions to cloud the line between truth and lie.

Firstly, the Confederacy is illustrated in gray uniform. Thus, when the Northern Scout disguised in the enemy’s color approaches Farquhar and his wife, Farquhar falls into the trap, leading to his untimely death. In this case, the color gray becomes a distortion of the truth. Furthermore, Farquhar’s fantasized escape takes place under a gray sky. Gray is also the color of his eyes as well as the eyes of the sentinel who shoots at him from the bridge. The fact that both men have the same eye color further establishes a link between two opposing sides. The division between North and South, aggressor and victim, is collapsed.

Bierce shifted the focus away from the details and onto a blurred line between illusion and reality. So, with this in mind, is Farquhar an illusion or a reality? As a reader, there is an intrinsic trust when experiencing a story. Where there are holes in the plot, the reader inserts information. Where there are clues or ambiguous passages, the reader assumes. The reader wants to believe and hop on the imagination bandwagon. But what happens when the entire story turns out to be an illusion? Is Farquhar just a mechanism through which Bierce tells this fictional story? After all, there is no evidence that Farquhar was at all conscious during his imagined escape. Yes, he does feel a sharp pain in the back of his head, but who is to say that that is an indication of his death? So perhaps this is all orchestrated. Or perhaps this entire imaginary escape flashes before Farquhar’s eyes right before his final breath. Bierce could simply be narrating what went through Farquhar’s mind in his final moments as a third person omniscient narrator. When the ticking of the clock comes to a slow, is that symbolic of Farquhar’s heart slowing when he dies or an indication of time slowing while Farquhar’s imaginary escape flashes before his eyes.

No one ever likes to just accept that there will never be a clean-cut answer. But I’ve come to realize that, despite the headache that can sometimes cause, it only adds to the story’s captivating effect and draws the reader in deeper. As John Lennon once said, “Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.” After all, what is reality? I mean, really, who knows...