"It's hard being a hostage in somebody else's mouth - or a character in somebody else's novel"

Living within the confines of another person’s narrative, words, or control can be a deeply alienating experience. When David Antin draws a parallel between being “a hostage in somebody else’s mouth” and “a character in somebody else’s novel,” he illuminates the loss of autonomy that occurs when life is dictated by external constructs, be they literal speech or narrative expectations. A hostage is deprived of agency, their actions and identity bound to the will of another. Similarly, characters in novels are subject to the intentions and imaginations of their authors, their destinies wholly controlled.

On a personal level, being trapped in another’s words implies that one’s identity, value, or intentions are filtered through someone else’s articulation. It evokes how easily an individual can feel powerless when misrepresented, spoken for, or forced to live up to stories others tell about them. In daily life, social roles, reputations, or projections assigned by others can become a kind of prison, limiting possibilities and shaping self-perception. This loss of narrative authority mirrors the literary character’s plight: someone else writes the script, determines motivations, and choreographs every action.

The metaphor also hints at broader social and cultural forces that script identities and relationships. Institutions, histories, and dominant ideologies can cast people in prescribed roles, often reducing complex human beings to stereotypes, bit parts, or supporting characters in an overarching societal novel. The struggle for self-definition, claiming one’s own voice and story, thus becomes an act of liberation. Antin’s text raises fundamental questions about the ownership of experience, the ethics of interpretation, and the perennial human desire to escape objectification. Ultimately, it addresses the existential yearning to be both the speaker and the protagonist: to reclaim the words that describe us and shape the narrative in which we exist, refusing to remain silent or passive under the pen or tongue of another.