The Third
Level by Jack Finney is a story about time intersection. The narrator of the
story is a thirty-one-year old Charley who works in New York. Charley insists
that the Grand Central Station of New York has three levels, but people working
at the station say only two. Charley claims that he has been to third level, on
this his friend Sam, a psychiatrist, says that Charley is looking for escapes
from the reality of life, as today’s world is full of insecurity, fear, wars,
etc. Also, he called that it is a waking-dream wish fulfillment. Charley is
also in the hobby of collecting stamps and his friends often labeled stamp
collection a type of effort to escape from reality. To this Charley puts that
he inherited the stamp collection hobby from his grandfather and during his
time the world was a good and secured kind of place. So, he doesn’t agree that
stamp collection is an excuse to remain aloof from the reality.
One summer
night Charley, instead of taking bus to reach home, thinks of taking subway from
the Grand Central Station as he has to reach home on time to meet his wife
Louisa. To some time, everything is fine, people crossing him and the normal
hustle-bustle of the metro. Well, he while walking gets into one long dark
tunnel like corridor. He walks further and begins noticing things are from some
other era, for example, gas lights, spittoons and fancy beards, sideburns and
moustaches. Then he caught sight of a different-looking locomotive, funnel
shaped, and this time his suspicion becomes clear that he is in some other time
zone. To confirm it, he walks over to a newsboy and glances at the stack of
papers at his feet. The name of the newspaper is ‘The World’ – and it does not
get published in his current time. The date on the paper read: June 11, 1894.
Charley then
thinks of buying tickets for Galesburg, Illinois, to go there with his wife.
According to him, Galesburg is a nice and calmer place with lawns, farms and
pleasant climate. He approaches the wooden ticket window and asks for tickets
for Galesburg. Well, when he takes out currency, the ticket seller warns him of
that he needs to have old bills (currency), not the one he have. He also warns
him of jail, Charley fearful of jail, runs away to the same passage from where
he had come.
Charley
reaches home and narrates the tale to his wife, and she grows worried. Next
Charley goes to the exchange corner and gets his money changed to old bills
i.e. to the time of 1890s. After that he searches a lot about the passage but
never gets through it. Also, his friend Sam disappears. Charley and his wife
searches him every weekend at many places, they are sure that Sam, taking clue
from Charley, has gone into the third level.
One night
while browsing his stamp collection, Charley comes across a letter marked to
his grandfather. He opens it and finds that the letter is written to him by
Sam. Sam writes that he is happy there in that time and doing his favourite
business.
So, the
conclusion is that sometimes we, humans, feel so out of our world that we look
for possible escapes, well this story is about time intersection, which is a
kind of long dream that we do not experience during our sleep. Time
intersection is an illusion.
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