Research Paper
October 11, 2014
“He Becomes Deeply and Famously Drunk”, by Brady Udall
Mr. Brady Udall is an American Novelist from St. John, Arizona, where he worked on his grandfather’s farm. Brady Udall grew up in a very large Mormon and political family. There are four generations of the Udall family, with Brady Udall being the only novelist. Mr. Udall attended Brigham Young University from which he graduated from. After graduating from Brigham Young University, Udall attended the Iowa Writing Workshop at the University of Iowa. Some of his collectable are titled as but not limited to, “He Becomes Deeply and Famously Drunk”, which was published in the year of 1997, “Letting Loose The Hounds” was published in the year of 1998, “The Miracle Life of Edgar Mint:, was published in the year of 2001, and “The Lonely Polygamist”, was published in the year of 2010. Those are just a few of the many novels and short stories written by Brady Udall. Brady Udall type of writing is known or described as to be of fiction and literature. During his writing career Brady Udall was awarded the Spur Award for the best novelist in the west, in the year of 2002. From the years of 2010 through 2013 he was appointed residence of Idaho University. New York Times honored Mr. Udall with the best seller for his novel “The lonely Polygamist” and “Letting Loose the Hounds ”
The generation of the Udall family began with Mr. David King Udall, born in St. Louis, Missouri, which is the great great great grandfather of Brady Udall. Mr. David king Udall parents were both Mormon, converted from England. Both of David King Udall parents arrived in the United States in the year of 1851. Once into the United States they settled and made Nephi, Utah their home. As David King Udall grew into adulthood he married Eliza Stewart and relocated to Kanab, Utah. After settling into Kanab, Utah David King Udall became a Mormon Bishop. In 1880 David and Eliza Udall relocated once again to St. John, Apache County, Arizona in order to become the town’s local bishop. In the year of 1882 David King Udall married Ida Hunt while is being married to his first wife Eliza Stewart Udall. Even in 1882 the act of bigamy was against the law. David King Udall was prosecuted by the state for bigamy in the year of 1884, two years after his marriage to Ida Hunt, but David King Udall was not convicted of the charge. A year later in the year of 1885 David King Udall was then indicted for perjury and sentenced to serve a three year federal prison sentence into the Detroit, Michigan federal penitentiary. Although he was ordered to serve a three year sentence David King Udall only served three months, after President Cleveland issued a pardon for his release from prison.
The Udall family has a long family tradition of being Mormon, and is well known as a family of politics. The Udall family role in politics span over 100 years of history and through four generations of family members. In the year of 1887 David King Udall himself was appointed a stake president. David King Udall had twelve sons in total, all his sons were also into politics. Six kids were mothers by his first wife Eliza Stewart Udall, and six were mothered from his second wife Ida Hunt Udall. Eliza children from David were all democrats, while Ida children from David were all republicans. The United States Senate elected three of the Udall family members in the year of 2008 and two democrat family members were seated and elected in the year of 2009.Although six of David King Udall children were democrats, he himself was a republican. In 1938 David King Udall passed away, leaving his family questioning his act of bigamy.
Brady Udall is one of the children included into the fourth generation of the Udall family tree. Although the Udall family was known for being a political family, Brady Udall broke the tradition by becoming the only writer in the Udall family. In 1981 Esquire Magazine commissioned Brady Udall to write a novel about contemporary polygamy (post). Knowing the history of his great great great grandfather act of bigamy, Brady Udall thought that it was only proper for him to write a novel that was based on his great great great grandfather David king Udall, titled “The Lonely Polygamist “, which was released in the year of 2010.
Unlike the act of committing bigamy in Brady Udall novel, “The Lonely Polygamist,” the short story by Brady Udall I will be elaborating on is titled,” He Becomes Deeply and Famously Drunk”, is based on the act of revenge. Revenge is dined as to pay back; to inflict pain or injury in return or the act to avenge usually done by retaliating. Brady Udall writes in first person in this short story, making the main charter Archie the storyteller from his point of view. In this short story Archie actions describes some of the topics we have wrote about during my English Reading Literature and Writing Argument class, such as the act of integrity, knowledge individual power and self-identity.
Archie is described as a seventeen year old cowboy at heart, with a face full of freckles and quite good looking. He stand six foot four inches tall, loudmouth juvenile delinquent and one that has a past of being known as hard knock (Brady Udall). Although is a city kid with no ranch experience, his mother sent him to work and live on a ranch with an old friend of his father named Ted. Because Archie was such a trouble past Ted was the only one that allowed him to work on his ranch. This arrangement was made by Archie’s mother
At the young age of four Archie’s father passed away from a blunt blow to the head after a bar fight with Calfred Pulsipher. Archie believed and blamed Calfred Pulsipher for all his troubles, because he was the one responsible for the death of his father in his eyes. Archie mother could no longer deal his behavior. Archie states that while living in Oklahoma, “ I spent my energy talking too much, getting into fights, drinking booze, smashing mailboxes, pretty much being obnoxious however and whenever I could. I have something wrong with me, something bad inside that builds up until I have to let it out by talking, shouting, raging, letting it all loose, even if there is no one there to listen. (Brady Udall)” Archie goes on to further say, “I feel empty and clean, I hurt some people and wrecked a lot of perfectly innocent cars, dishware, phone booths, electronic goods, and what have you. I have seen therapists, psychiatrists, clergymen, even hypnotist. (Brady Udall) ” All of Archie’s problems and anger stimulates from the death of his father and the anger inside of his for revenge .
Once Archie has moved to the ranch he became close with a Mexican by the name of Jesus. Jesus was the only one to take time out of his schedule to teach Archie the lifestyle of working on a ranch. Although Jesus was Mexican he consider himself to be a full blooded Yaqui Indian. His description in Archie eyes are a tiny wetback, barely five feet tall with his boots on. His English was piss poor and he had teeth that were star- quality. Jesus wore his hair coifed and oiled with one curl hanging down on his forehead like old actors. Jesus worked for Mr. Platt to save up enough money so that he can send for his family in Mexico. Since Jesus was the only one to help out Archie on the ranch Archie in returned showed a favor to Jesus by picking up his entire family from the border.
Archie’s rage to kill Calfred Pulsipher grew over the years. He often wonder what his reaction would be if he ever came face to face with his fathers killer. From a young age he dreamed of torturing Calfred Pulsipher and his family. In Archie dreams he even vision stopping Calfred Pulsipher from killing his father. Quinn was Archie’s father name. Quinn was described as a big barrel chested man with a missing front tooth. Quinn believed that because he was so big the front missing teeth made him look friendly and less aggressive looking. Although his look was of a man not to be messed with, Quinn was well liked around the ranch.
Often Archie would questioned Jesus about the address of Calfred Pulsipher, Jesus would never tell him the address, but in return question Archie as to why he wants to know. Everyone on the ranch knew how Quinn died and who the blame for his death even Jesus. After Archie questioning Jesus day after day, Jesus finally gave in, only after Archie had did this big favor of picking up his family from the border of Mexico. Awaking Jesus in the middle of the night they both jumped into Jesus work truck and began to drive down a dirt road that Archie never knew exist. As Archie approached the abandon rundown home, described as the size of a rich man’s bathroom. Callfred Pulsipher and Archie was finally faced to face after all these years. The thoughts of killing Calfred Pulsipher disappeared from Archie mind as the old man on oxygen, with thin brown spotted skin reached out and put his arms around the shoulders of Archie. At that moment Archie felt all the bad that was trapped inside of him for so long was being released after seeing how old and bad off Calfred Pulsipher was.
I believed that Brady Udall made the readers understand that no matter how hard you are or how much you would like to take matters into your own hands, time has a way of dealing with people better than humans. After Archie was face to face with the man responsible for killing his father and the reason behind all his built-up anger for so many years he couldn’t bring himself to harm Calfred Pulsipher. I believe that Archie already knew that Calfred Pulsipher was being punished by nature for his killing of Archie’s father Quinn. Seeing Calfred Pulsipher condition Archie knew that there was nothing left for him to do, nature has taking its course on him, and his killing him at this point would not solve his problem. Instead Archie felt a sense of relief that Calfred Pusipher was one foot in the grave already.
In conclusion the short story,” He Becomes Deeply and Famously Drunk”, is based on a young man seeking revenge for his father’s death, while trying to cope with his built up anger. As it has been discussed and wrote about, Archie demonstrated his individual power by controlling his actions and having the knowledge and wisdom to walk away with doing harm to Calfred Pulsipher.