Binx wants to get out of the everydayness and malaise of life, and he does through two different searches: the vertical search and the horizontal search. The vertical search relies on objective forms of knowledge and proves to be insufficient for Binx because it does not account for the subjective aspect of human beings. After failing to find escape the everydayness and malaise, Binx turns to the horizontal search, which is the pursuit of mystery and wonder. Binx first discovered this search after he was wounded in the Korean War. When he was wounded, he gained a profound awareness of his own mortality, and this took him out of the everydayness of life. The Moviegoer shows what happens when Binx finally decided to prusue this horizontal search. Percy elevates the horizontal search in The Moviegoer because this search appeals to the human heart, where the problem of everydayness and malaise lies. When Binx is wounded during the war, he remembers seeing a dung beetle six inches from his face, and this marks the origin of how his search began. "As I watched, there awoke in me an immense curiosity. I was onto something. I vowed that if I ever got out of this fix, I would pursue the search"…show more content… Binx reads books like The Expanding Universe and The Chemistry of Life. From these books of science, it appears that all of Binx's main goals are attainable; however, Binx changes his mind after watching the movie It Happened One Night. Binx now realizes that he cannot find answers through merely reading; he must experience the answers for himself. "But now I have undertaken a different kind of search, a horizontal search. As a consequence, what takes place in my room is less important. What is important is what I shall find when I leave my room and wander in the neighborhood" (70). Binx used to wander to distract himself, but he now wanders to find the answers to his
