the sleeping suit

So I wasn't at school thurs/fri so if my comment is completely redundant I apologize. I don't think any of the interaction between the narrator and Leggatt was real. The sleeping suits add to the suggestion that the relationship between the narrator and Leggatt was nothing more than a dream sequence. "Can it be, I asked myself, that he is not isible to other eyes than mine?" (159). And at the end we never actually get a confirmation that Leggatt actually left. We only see the hat floating on top of the water. I don't know what this could mean. But it certainly adds to the narrator's "stranger-ness" aboard the ship. If he is so out of tune with reality then it's no wonder he feels incredibly insecure in his environment. Maybe Leggatt was the narrator's way of trying to find his place. 

Comments

[Katherine S.]

As I said previously, I think that the "sleeping suits" support the idea of the captain and Leggatt as lovers. "Sleeping suits", the word in and of itself, is a very intimate term, especially if one is reading the Secret Sharer looking for ways to support them as lovers. "Sleeping suits" infers something sexual. The crew wears normal clothes as the captain and Leggatt are the ones wearing "sleeping suits".

[Catie H.]

Wow, I definitely agree that the sleeping suits support that Leggatt was nothing more than really a dream in a sense for the captain. Since the sleeping suits also make the men be clothed identically, they could also enforce the idea of them being the same and/or Leggatt simply being a figment of the captain's imagination.