Portnoy's Complaint

Alex complains to his therapist about The Monkey’s bad handwriting and low intellect. Her inability to write or spell filled him with contempt, but this was matched by his erotic desire for her. Alex reflects on his investigations into psychoanalysis and Freud, remembering a weekend in Vermont with The Monkey when Alex felt deeply and tenderly connected to The Monkey, rather than his normal, anxiety-ridden compulsions. He recalls his parents’ reaction to his relationship with this gentile girl; they claimed that The Monkey would “EAT YOU UP ALIVE” (92). In Vermont, Alex booked their room under the names Mr. and Mrs. Mandel. They drove through the countryside in a convertible in defiance of his father’s pleas, and Alex recited a poem for her by William Butler Yeats. They spent the weekend in Vermont, then drove back to New York City. While driving, they bickered. The Monkey did not know whether she loved Alex or whether he would never understand her, but they formalized their relationship.

Alex tells his therapist that The Monkey was once paid for sex. Following her divorce from the French industrialist, she slept with a man who mistook her for a sex worker. When he asked her about a fee, she unthinkingly accepted $300.