A Critic to a Fault

A critic to a Fault

“Bullet to the Brain by,” Tobias Wolff is a story based on a man named Anders, a book critic who has lost touch of reality to a certain degree. The reader is left in a whirlwind of confusion, not fully understanding why Anders, the main character, cannot seem to control his laughter while in a life and death predicament. It’s maybe because he was a book critic his entire life, that he could not control his critical mind from spilling into other aspects of this life. Even when it came to the terrifying situation he found himself in. He became a critic of his own death. Laughter took over as if to say this is it? This is how it all ends? Oh please.

Ander’s much like a law officer; cannot help, but look at the world around you under a microscope. The officer cannot help, but judge all people. He studies people’s behavior and is constantly assessing his surrounding. The officer is a husband and father, but also a brother and son, however family are under scrutiny as well. It is hard for the officer to switch off the many hours of threat training, and the grueling hours of physical fitness defensive training. The officer consequently and unknowingly becomes the uniform 24 hours a day and 365 days a year. Anders has gone such transformation as well; he cannot switch off the many years of criticizing all of his surroundings. Being a critic is what made him so cynical about the immediate threat on his life. He was arrogant up until the point he saw his life coming to an end. He could not bring himself to keep quiet to save his own life. He laughed hard leading up to his brains being blown out, because he was finally able to laugh again after being angry and short tempered his entire adult life.

In the first paragraph there is an important description about Ander’s character and attitude towards life, it is established when Wolff writes, “He was never in the best of tempers anyway.” (pg. 845, ph 3) This personal description is a strong one because it gives the reader a sense of just how intense he must have been most of his career. This all comes to be when he is in line at the bank right before it closes and of course he is stuck behind all these people and one of the bank tellers closes her window early to chat it up with a fellow worker. The teller’s action’s anger him quite a bit and just adds to his long list of disappointments. The lady standing in front of him broke off the workers conversion and said ”Oh that’s nice,” Anders replies in the following way to the lady, “Damned unfair tragic really. If they are not chopping off the