Adam and Eve and Willa
several days ago
Dear Moira,
I’m reading Willa Cather’s
O Pioneers! You’ve read it, I’m sure, probably in high school.
What did you, or do you, think about it? Talk it over with your peeps, Lisa, Gretchen,
Trudy if you are still friends, Bucket, your cat, and tell me. I'm about
halfway through and feel disaster impending. The Eden that Alexandra has built
cannot endure, not with two “strangers come to town”: Marie and Carl (who has come back actually) … No, there are three, the third the
strangest of all, Marie’s Frank Shabata. I’ve read the novel before, maybe in college, but I
don’t remember the plot, at least not consciously.
Strangers mean confusion. Non sequitur I begin wondering as I write that, “confusion,” if that isn’t Eve’s problem. Adam doesn’t mind it, not understanding the order of things, but it truly bothers her. Walking around half-blind bumping into things, hearing as from a distance what is almost in her ear, smelling with only half a nose, tasting with only half a tongue, touching with illiterate fingers – unlearned and to be taught only a sliver of what could be known. Then, here’s the solution: there is a tree and on the tree ...
Alexandra is both God and Adam. She builds the garden, and she fits into it: she lives content in it. She knows what she needs to know; she’s not tempted to know more. What more is there to know? It is her garden. The others are imported into it, Marie from Omaha, Frank from the Old Country. And Carl and Emil leave it; then can they come back? Can they belong?
I don’t know and I don’t know. Talk about it with your well-read coffee house friends. Tell me what to think.
Your ignorant brother, Ted
several days after that
Dear Ted,
I should
have written sooner. Likely you have finished O Pioneers and you were going on
to My Antonia – you’ve probably finished that as well; you are no longer
looking for opinions or guidance. But if by chance you haven’t finished, you might want to before you go on. [link to plot summary]
We all like O Pioneers! if for different
reasons and some more than others. Les says he could read it again and (maybe) again for the
descriptions of the seasons and of the land, and of the land in its seasons, slumbering
and awakening. He thinks Cather is much better with things than with
people. “The land has character, and they’re all caricatures, aren’t
they? – serious, upright Alexandra, her swinish brothers, weak Carl – and weak Emil,
for that matter – easy, generous Marie and angry, unbalanced, mad Frank. That
she gives reasons for Alexandra’s uprightness and Frank’s loss of balance, for example, doesn't
make Alexandra or Frank any less one-dimensional.” Then, it’s that – the one-dimensionality
of the characters – that runs the plot. Marie can't not be easy; Emil can't be
strong enough to stay away; Frank must go off half-cocked. Alexandra will
marry, and subsume, Carl whatever her selfish siblings think. So says Les, and
so agree we all, more or less.
I am more forgiving of Emil and Marie than Les seems to be.
I am willing to give them more of my sympathy and understanding; and when I do
that, I make them more real, more human, less one-dimensional. Alexandra and Carl,
too. Even poor Frank, though I find it difficult to be as forgiving as either Alexandra or Cather. None can escape being playthings of their circumstances,
the land and the weather, the seasons, the time and the place. That place, which Alexandra tries to
overcome and succeeds in some measure but which
Carl tries to escape, which Emil tries to escape, which Frank can only escape in drink! But all are stuck now, even if they think they can get away. I think: If only Frank had stayed in the old
country. If Marie had stayed in Omaha.
If Emil had stayed in Mexico. But then Cather wouldn't have had a story, trite as it is. And it comes to me (almost as it came to you: Adam and Eve). Marie is the apple Emil will pick because she looks and will taste so delicious; and she is so easy-of-heart she cannot cling to the tree but must fall into his hand. Then,
the seed of tragedy is sown. Only in this case the couple cannot be driven from the garden, they must remain in it.
Who said there are only two stories in all the world, “boy meets girl” and “stranger comes to town”? I think there is a third, “what we want we cannot have.” But why can’t we have it?
Is this another way to read the Bible story? Eve
is tempted by beauty her generous, joyful, wonder-filled heart can’t resist?
It’s not something just pretty (like shoes) because she can and will share it with Adam, who can’t
resist because she, more lovely to look on and more delicious than the apple,
gives it to him? I know you love this story. Tell me what you think. Isn’t it finally about desire? If it is, or only if it is a little bit about that, I’ll add that Who is God that gives us eyes and noses and
hearts to desire – Who is He to put the apple in our way and expect, much less demand, anything but that we will take it?
Well, that’s it for
right now. I was going to write you more about your friends and acquaintances
here, but I’ve run out of both concentration and wrist, for the moment anyway.
Love, Moira.
02.25.22
_______________
Don’t expect book criticism here. (Why?) Likely this means nothing to you if you haven’t read O Pioneers! or Genesis 2-3. A fair summary of the first is here. If you haven’t, you really should read the second. You can find it here. Line of Willa Cathers by m ball .
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