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Jude lived a life of extremes. Before college, he was an absolute object — manipulated both physically and psychologically by men. Jude grew up without agency and independence, stunting the development of his masculinity and forcing him into a limited existence as a sexual being.
During and after college, Jude becomes an absolute subject. He gets everything he wants: freedom, a meteoric career, parents, and friends. When Jude suffers, everyone drops to his side. His friends act like planets orbiting the Sun, obsessively (and ineffectually) trying to help him and asking him about his past.
Yanagihara does a lot to dispel any notions that Jude’s new life in New York is a utopia. There is zero explanation for why Jude’s college friends are so close. Jude’s doctor Andy is inexplicably complicit in his self-harm and suicide attempt. Harold and his wife “save” Jude by adopting him but only worsen his trauma through implicit expectations about love. What is left of the novel aren’t traditional relationships between actual people, but broad Modernist ideals of friendship, family, and art.
“A Little Life” is unusual because it flips and then exaggerates the dichotomous process of growing up. In the West, we cling to the almost religious notion of childhood as a safe haven for children to explore and learn as much as…
