The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

According to the narrator, Benjamin’s parents “held an enviable position, both social and financial, in antebellum Baltimore” (169). Though readers hardly encounter Benjamin’s mother, his father’s awareness of his social position shapes his son’s early years. Roger Button’s initial revulsion toward his son derives from his fear of judgment and loss of standing. He fixates on clothing as a means of saving face and accepting the old man as his son. The scene in the clothing store sees Roger lying and dissembling about his child to a clerk, desperate to find apparel that will clothe his own class pretensions as much as his newborn baby.

Roger struggles to establish his desired father-son hierarchy, ludicrously threatening to spank the elderly-looking Benjamin, who forces himself to respond with “a grotesque simulation of filial respect” (175). He insists on creating the trappings of a traditional childhood, resorting to self-delusion when necessary, and focusing on the opinions of Baltimore society above all. These concerns are later recalled and reversed by Benjamin’s son, Roscoe, who is similarly preoccupied with the adverse social impact of Benjamin’s embarrassing de-aging.

As in the case of Benjamin’s other relationships, the father-son connection normalizes when Benjamin’s apparent age aligns with his father’s actual age. Then it is appropriate for the men to appear in public looking like brothers and for Benjamin to be entrusted with a role in the family business. This is where Roger is most comfortable, in the world of industry. On the evening when Benjamin first meets Hildegarde, his father is too distracted by hardware minutiae to notice, mistaking Benjamin’s whispers about “love” for a contribution to a discussion of “lugs” (184).

Hildegarde Moncrief’s appearance in Benjamin’s life affects “an almost chemical change” within Benjamin that seems to “dissolve and re-compose the very elements of his body” (182). Their meeting bears an unmistakable resemblance to Fitzgerald’s fateful meeting of Zelda Sayre, an event that shaped both of their lives and much of Fitzgerald’s fiction. During their first dance, Hildegarde disavows men of her own age, professing her preference for older men and elaborating on her assessment of each age decade by decade before concluding that “fifty is the mellow age. I love fifty” (183). However, the story reveals that 50 for a man has a much different meaning than 50 for a woman.

Hildegarde is unconcerned with gossip surrounding her marriage to a man whose age is so far from his appearance, not to mention their apparent age discrepancy itself. The narrator says, “So many of the stories about her fiancé were false that Hildegarde refused stubbornly to believe even the true one” (185). This refusal to accept the truth will continue to haunt her later in life, leading her to accuse Benjamin of growing younger on purpose, an accusation later echoed by their son Roscoe.

As Benjamin and Hildegarde reverse roles—she now appearing to be married to a much younger man—Benjamin finds himself less attracted to her. He spends his time “dancing with the prettiest of the young married women” while “his wife, a dowager of evil omen,” sits to the side with the chaperones watching her husband jealously (188).