Fight Club and Masculinity

529 Words3 Pages
Fight Club is narrated by an unnamed man who, after a combination of stress and dissatisfaction with his consumerist lifestyle begins to experience horrible insomnia. When seeing a doctor, he is told that if he “wanted to see real pain, [he] should swing by First Eucharist on a Tuesday night” to sit in on support groups for terminal illnesses (Palahniuk 9). After visiting a group he sleeps well, and begins attending more, ultimately posing as one of the sick to vent his emotions. This strategy works until he runs into another imposter named Marla Singer. Seeing Marla at every group upsets the Narrator, and he can’t sleep. After a brief confrontation, the two divide the groups amongst themselves so as not to run into each other again. Later, on an airline flight, he meets a man named Tyler Durden. Returning to his condo, the Narrator finds that a gas leak has caused it to explode, destroying all of his possessions. With nowhere else to turn, the Narrator calls Tyler. The two meet at a bar, and the Narrator asks if he can stay with him. Tyler says yes, but in return he wants the Narrator to “hit me as hard as you can” (37). The Narrator abides and the two men move in together. They expand their fight into an entire “fight club” that gathers underground attention and grows in male membership. After intercepting a phone call from Marla, Tyler rescues her from a suicide attempt and the two of them start an affair. As the fight club grows, Tyler and the Narrator gather its loyal members to form a group they title “Project Mayhem”. The project begins committing acts of vandalism and pranks on corporations, but as it enlarges, Tyler uses the cult as a means to promote his ambitions to combat consumerist, capitalist, corporatist modern principles. While the Narrator is initially very supportive of Project Mayhem, the group’s actions become more violent, culminating in the

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