Brokeback mountain –correction 1. This text is an extract from ‘Brokeback mountain’, a short story written by the American writer Annie Proulx. The text was taken from a collection of short stories entitled “From Close Range: Wyoming stories” 2. The action takes place in 1983 in the American West –more precisely in Wyoming – at Jack’s parents for the first scene and in Ennis’s little town and trailer/mobile home for the second scene. 3. Ennis has decided to visit Jack’s parents after he learnt about his lover’s (Jack) tragic death. Jack wanted his ashes to be scattered on Brokeback mountain, so Ennis is going to ask Jack’s parents if they agree to give him the ashes so that he can fulfill Jack’s last will. He may also want to see where Jack grew up/ discover the place where Jack had often wanted to take him so as they could live there together. 4. -Three characters are present in the scene: Jack’s father and mother and Ennis. -Ennis seems to be deeply moved (l4 “I can’t eat no cake just now”/ l8 “I feel awful bad” / “How bad I feel”) but also ill-at-ease / embarrassed (l7 “took a breath” / l11 “cleared his throat” ). He can’t find the words to express his feelings (l11 “silence” / “said nothing more”) -Jack’s father is first characterized by his silence (l5 “silent”) but also by his anger (l5,6 “with an angry knowing expression” / l18 “spoke angrily” ). -We understand he knew his son had homosexual relationships (l12,13 “he was too goddam special”/ l19,20 “he had some half-baked ideas”). He seems to disapprove of his son’s sexual orientation and is despiteful / disdainful towards him. -On the contrary Jack’s mother looks very nice/kind/understanding. We can imagine she knows who Ennis was for Jack as she offers him to go up in his son’s room. In the film adaptation of this passage she even gives Ennis a bag to put the shirts and she invites Ennis to visit them later. 5. When Jack’s father mentions his son’s plan to bring on his farm “some ranch neighbor” Ennis understands Jack had an affair with another man in Texas. He is then convinced that Jack was killed by a homophobic gang (l24 “he knew it had been the tire iron”) just because he had dared to cross the conservative, homophobic line. 6. -the closet and the intertwined shirts (l36) epitomize Jack and Ennis’s forbidden love. The closet refers to the well-known expression “coming out of the closet” –which is what Ennis had never dared to do. The fact that he takes the shirts out of the closet at this point of the story is thus quite symbolic. The intertwined shirts stand for the two men’s hidden relationship. They suggest how taboo their love was as it was against acceptable social dictums, but also how strong and neverending. -It clearly suggests that Ennis and Jack live is a conservative, homophobic society where the notion of two men in love is reprehensible and considered as a sin or even an illness / a society in which greater tolerance exists. -The intertwined shirts suggest that Jack’s feelings for Ennis were very strong. Despite the fact that he got married and had other lovers, Ennis had a special place in his heart. He was probably the love of his life. 7. -Ennis lives in a 'trailer' (l62) that is to say a mobile home. It is highly symbolic(al) and it seems to suggest that he doesn't belong to anywhere – at least he doesn't belong to and fit into the society he is doomed /fated to live in. He seems to be trapped as he hasn't got the financial wherewithal to escape. He is confined to a sad life as an outcast on the broad, flat plains of Wyoming. -Ennis pins up a postcard of Brokeback mountain and the two entertwined shirts in his trailer. Again, these two elements are highly symbolic(al). It looks like a sort of memorial Ennis constructs to his

dead lover, the picture of the mountain serving as a tombstone under which the two men's relationship is finally buried. - These words can be interpreted in different ways / are open to a lot of meanings. It could mean that he swears he'll get Jack's ashes and fulfill his last will / that he'll never forget Jack , the way neither of them ever forgot their time on Brokeback mountain/ that if he ever had the chance at love again he'll take it. It can also be seen as a promise to Jack that he would do his best from then on to please those he loves and who love him, as well as not denying himself something that he might want. 8. The open-space may be a reference to both the expansive, endless plains of Wyoming and the open-ended pain that will stay with Ennis forever but also to Brokeback mountain-the place where the natural force of the two men’s desire could exist openly. - In the last sentence, Ennis's stoicism is made explicit. Ennis has begun to question his decisions but as he feels there is nothing he can do, he can only now live with the outcome of the choices he made. He thus appears as the story's tragic soul.