Identity Quotes in The Day of the Locust

This is a nice way of saying that Tod is funny looking. Still, you'd be wrong to peg him as a simpleton. Although you might end up detesting many aspects of Tod's personality by the end of the novel, there's no debating the fact that he's a complex guy. Whether that's a good thing, however, is entirely up for debate.

Contradictions between individuals and their clothes appear quite frequently in the novel. Although the idea of wearing "sports clothes" while not playing sports might not seem all that weird in today's era of basketball shorts and running shoes, it's a disparity well worth noting.

For some reason, Claude is obsessed with acting like an old Southern plantation owner. Although we find this both weird and gross, we have to admit that West nails the comedic timing here. It's all fantasy here, and the fantasy isn't even accurate.

Ah, the unassailable logic of a man in love. Putting aside Tod's creepiness, Faye reveals herself here to have an even wider variety of identities than he does. She is an actor, after all. Regardless, Faye wears so many different hats that we sometimes have trouble seeing the real Faye underneath them all. If there is a real Faye, that is.

It's helpful that men create their own, custom-designed identities to place on Faye. After all, does Tod really know anything about this seventeen-year-old girl? Or is he just making assumptions based on an image that only exists in his mind?

Like his daughter, Harry has more identities than he knows what to do with. To go even further, this image implies that he's pretended to be other people for so long that he's lost the capacity to be himself. That's a frightening thought.

This is Tod's explanation for Faye's constant use of slang: she finds it comforting to act like the women she sees in movies who manage difficult situation with a haughty laugh and a string of profanity. It makes her feel as strong as they seem to be. But here's the thing, folks—that image isn't real.

For context, this dude has just finished a drag performance that greatly impressed Tod with its effortless femininity. Note the irony here: the performer only becomes an actor when he steps off stage and resumes his life as a male-presenting person. That makes us wonder how many other characters are stuck in similar positions.

During the final party at Homer's place, Faye plays the role of the saucy performer for an audience of lust-struck schmucks. They even gather around her like it's theater in the round. Interestingly, this is also the moment when Faye seems most comfortable in her own skin.

This passage jumps out at us because we're not sure if it's true. After all, would you be confident about the safety of a seventeen-year-old ex-prostitute who is possibly in the care of a demonstrably violent cowboy wannabe? No way. Even after all that's happened, however, Tod still can't see past the identity he's crafted for Faye.