Biff Musclewhite: the real threat in Mumbo Jumbo
Reading Mumbo Jumbo by Ishmael Reed, It's hard not to think that the villains of the story are a bit incompetent. Hinkle Von Vampton and Herbert "safecracker" Gold spend are introduced as intimidating, immortal knights in charge of what is essentially eradicating a unique cultural phenomenon and eventually orchestrating world war II. And they initially live up to this reputation early on in the story by killing Abdul, an important figure related to the Works and Jes Grew. This event conjoins the actions of the knights templar and the mumbo jumbo kathedral as Papa LaBas investigates the murder of Abdul. But after this, Von Vampton and safecracker spend the rest of the story running around like idiots trying to understand black slang and finding a talking android. Von Vampton embarrasses himself when trying to find any educated African American person to act as the talking android. And when he finally realizes that the talking android has been in front of him the entire time in Woodrow Wilson Jefferson, he and safecracker are viciously beaten by Woodrow Wilson Jefferson's reverend father. This leads Von Vampton to the brilliant idea to have Safecracker wear blackface and attempt to pass as the talking android and perform a poem to a white audience where they are confronted and defeated by Papa LaBas. But what if I told you the real threat of Mumbo Jumbo wasn't Hinkle Von Vampton and Herbert "safecracker" Gold. In fact, the real threat in Mumbo Jumbo, on a literal and ideological level, is Biff Musclewhite.
On a literal level, Biff does much more to hurt the protagonists than Hinkle Von Vampton and Herbert "safecracker" Gold ever did. Despite getting captured by the Mu'tafikah, he is able to convince one of their members to give up his cause and let him go free. Afterwards he ha Berbelang killed by one of his officers and eventually discovers that Charlotte has been duping him and he goes to her house to confront and kill her. I believe it is important to look at Musclewhite's interaction with Thor Wintergreen to analyze his potential as a threat. He is able to remember Thor from his interactions with Thor's father, showing his sharp intuition and memory under pressure. He is also able to defeat Thor in philosophical combat, convincing Thor to give up his role as an art thief by showing Thor's lack of true conviction as a white person. On an ideological level, Biff acts as a bigger hurdle for the goals of the mumbo jumbo kathedral. His job, an ex-cop now turned curator for the center of art detention, portrays him as a white captor of African culture. He overlooks Voodoo and Hoodoo works taken from their place of origin and keeps them under Atonist watch for mainly white people to observe and view. He is the warden to a prison whose inmates are important African culture and kills the spirit of Jes Grew in these works by preventing so may people from seeing them. Musclewhite also represents a threat directly against Jes Grew through his interactions with Thor Wintergreen. Jes Grew undoubtedly has its white supporters like Charlotte and Thor, But Biffs actions show that he s capable of undermining Jes Grew and it's beliefs in white sympathizers. One could wonder if Biff is capable of undermining the support for Jes Grew in people whose conviction isn't as strong as people like Papa Labas. Maybe the Atonist should have put Biff Musclewhite in charge of Phase 2 instead.
Biff is definitely a huge threat, although because I think he isn't directly a part of the Wallflower Order, I would say that his threat level could never reach the level of #1 threat in Mumbo Jumbo. I also agree with you that his psychological manipulation of Thor Wintergreen is kind of scary and does make your point of him taking away part of Jes Grew's potential audience, and it was quite sad/frustrating to see Thor slowly break down and betray his friends and then "commit suicide" with a list of Mu'tafikah in his pocket.
ReplyDeleteHi Eli. I agree that Biff Musclewhite is an important villain to this novel, more so than Hinckle and Hubert. He's also scarier. Reed may have wrote these characters in this manner because the idea of having Knights' Templars in the "modern day" is so absurd that he could mess with them as much as he wanted to. A personality like Biff Musclewhite, though, definitely existed in the 20s. I like your speculative conclusion and makes me wonder how things would've played out if Biff was in control of Phase 2. Maybe he could have festered more public opposition of Jes Grew or would have found a more impactful Talking Android. Great post!
ReplyDeleteI think it's comical just how little Hinckle von Hampton does throughout the story. I mean, he doesn't even manage to help in eradicating Jes Grew. That just happened when Abdul decided to burn the Text, which Hinckle didn't have any part in afaik. On the other hand, Biff Musclewhite, in the few scenes we had with him, ended up doing far more to divert the plans of our protagonists. I think his character is definitely one of the more interesting ones in the story, and I wish he could have become more of a main antagonist in the later parts of the story (just my personal opinion).
ReplyDeleteThis is an excellent point: in some ways (as his allegorical name suggests), Musclewhite represents actual white-supremacist *power* in the real world: this is seen most chillingly when he casually murders Berbelang and reports him as "resisting arrest," and the same with Charlotte after he strangles her. We see him easily cover up his acts of violence with institutional authority, and we see a police officer able to murder with impunity. I agree that this is a more frightening model of white power than HVV and his bumbling sidekick.
ReplyDeleteYou make a really interesting argument here. I confess, by the end of the book, I didn't think too much about Biff Musclewhite, and mainly about HVV and Safecracker. Biff Musclewhite kind of disappears near the finale, and he faded from my memory. However, I think that might have been a purposeful move on Reed's part. While he puts the ridiculously evil and mockable villains to the forefront who are clearly fools to distract the readers, he puts Musclewhite in as the underlying threat, the hidden villain who can pretend to be a friend, convince people to join his side, and then use their trust against them to achieve his malicious goals. I think this applies to the real world as well, where media and public attention will often be drawn to the most extreme, dramatic and outlandish figures, whereas the real threats to Jes Grew, (or in the context of the real world, equality? Social liberty perhaps?) blend in, and are the ones with the real control.
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ReplyDeleteI think this is a really good insight! We talked a lot in class about how Hinkle Von Vampton often feels more like a scheming, mustache-twirling cartoon villain than a real person. In contrast, Musclewhite is a character who absolutely doesn't belong in a kids' show, and his casual violence, calculated manipulation, and utter confidence that he'll get away with everything he carries out (which, of course, is proven true) makes him a lot more disturbing. He also feels a lot more grounded in real life, though—it's easy to imagine a real-life white supremacist looking like his archetype, and I think this lends a lot of legitimacy to Reed's portrayal of Atonism as analogous to a real-life threat.
ReplyDeleteWait yes I totally agree. To be honest after a certain point Biff Musclewhite kind of just slipped from my mind, but now that you've really laid out everything he did and I'm reminded of the ways he hurt the Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral group, it makes total sense. Hinkle is present consistently throughout the novel, whereas after a while Biff kind of fades. We are left to focus on Hinkle, simply because he's there, but Biff has clearly done a lot more to hurt them.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I definitely agree that the villains in the story often seem incompetent. I also didn't notice how Biff Musclewhite comes in and out of the plot line, but Hinkle von Vampton is more often in the story. Your post is also well written and easy to follow.
ReplyDeleteI think our characterization of the two sides of Mumbo Jumbo's main conflict puts an interesting spin on the concept of villains in the narrative. Throughout our discussion, we always look at Papa LaBas and the Mumbo Jumbo Kathedral versus Hinckle von Vampton, "Safecracker" Gould, and the Wallflower Order/Knights Templar. We always characterizes von Vampton as more of a cartoon-esque villain that has this "masterful plan" to undermine Jes Grew. However, on the other hand, Biff Musclewhite seems like a real, violent, potent villain that contrasts very differently, and Biff was not necessarily in the main conflict for most of the story.
ReplyDeleteHuh that's a good point. It does feel like Biff Musclewhite (despite his name) is less comically portrayed than the other antagonists and more capable, working behind the scenes a bit. I don't know if he'd have the motivation to plan and work on the same broad level as Hinckle Von Vampton, but as I read your post and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that Musclewhite may be more of a force to be reckoned with than previously thought, and more than some others.
ReplyDeleteHi, I didn't really give much thought to Biff Musclewhite - I think most white characters are kinda insignificant in the book and portrayed in a comical way and so I only paid attention to Hinckle Von Vampton. I guess he is more significant than other characters which is weird because he does show up a lot less.
ReplyDeleteThis is something I haven't really thought of before, but I completely agree with you. Biff Musclewhite is by far the smartest "villain" of the Atonists we're presented with, and does the most to further the Atonist cause on the ground level. He literally kills two supporters of Jes' Grew and is the partial cause of another one's death. He's not a part of the Wallflower Order, and doesn't seem to know that these secret organizations controlling the world exist, but he's basically doing their job for them, and better than them in some ways. All of his "plots" worked out in the end, with him getting away scott-free, which is more than any of the rest can say.
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