A protagonist who cannot access his own emotions — the interior/exterior split that prefigures Hal's condition

echoes

Early text: quote "It's not that Mark's emotions are disordered or troubled, but that he is troubled in relation to them... When he has emotions, it's like he's denied access to them. He doesn't ever feel in possession of his emotions. When he has them, they feel far from him; he feels disembodied, other. Except when he shoots, he very rarely feels anything at all." [westward-the-course-of-empire-takes-its-way:p422]; when shooting "he stands somewhere outside himself, eyewitness to his own joy" [westward-the-course-of-empire-takes-its-way:p422]; the flat summary: "either he doesn't feel anything, or he doesn't feel anything." [westward-the-course-of-empire-takes-its-way:p423].
IJ echo: Hal's condition — a rich felt interior sealed off from any external expression or from Hal's own possession of it; the anhedonia/affect cluster built around Kate Gompert and refracted through Hal (scene 135, pp. 692–698); Hal, apparently cheery/cool while inwardly disintegrating, unable to externalize what is inside him (professional-conversationalist opener, scene 005, pp. 27–31; Hal watching JOI's films, scene 132, pp. 686–689; scene 172, pp. 906–911).
Weight: prefiguration