The comfort of Storytelling Versus the Horror of War

Short Analysis One: Bausch’s Peace and Storytelling

Debra Moreno Blouch

            Early in Richard Bausch’s Peace, during the climbing of the hill, the narrator gives a background story about Joyner and his life leading up to the war. Information is given about Joyner’s storytelling abilities which relate to the novel’s theme contrasting the comfort of storytelling versus the routine horror of war. For example, the narrator describes Joyner’s expressive speech in contrast to his vulgar speech.  “He could talk about the moon shining on water, and yet obscenity flowed from him like the little beads of spit he kept throwing off. He would spray it out from between his teeth. This punctuated his talk, like a nerve-tic” (29). This contrast between the beauty of his descriptive storytelling speech and the vulgarity that he uses in his speech during routine war is a contrast that is seen throughout the novel. Another contrast would be towards the end of the book when the Jews are being murdered. The men kept recoiling to the sounds of gunfire when the Jews were being killed, which was a sharp contrast to the beauty of the snowfield and star filled sky. Joyner’s spit that he kept spraying from between his teeth that punctuated his talk shows the stress from the horror of the war that he is a party to. The punctuated talk in his obscenity is a nerve-tic just like the insatiable itching on his arm is a nerve-tic. The beauty of Joyner’s expressive speech in storytelling contrasts the obscenities in his speech for war is a theme in Bausch’s novel that reoccurs with the comfort of storytelling versus the routine horror of war.