Why We Are Here: A #Townhall Special Presentation
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wildchild

Marilynne Robinson published her first book in 1981, "Housekeeping." It was an excellent read and her next novel was anticipated eagerly. Finally, a book in the tradition of her first has appeared. I don't find it has as much of an impact as the initial novel but it is still very well done.
Reverend John Ames, 76 years old, is close to the end of his life. It is 1956 and the dying man lives in a small town named Gilead, in the middle of the Iowa prairie lands. As his heart fails, he writes a letter to his 7-year old son, documenting a careful account of himself and his ancestors. While the concept of a religious man recounting the lives of his father and his grandfather, (both also ministers), doesn't sound all that appealing, Robinson does it brilliantly. She has the gift for giving life to her characters. She does this as well as Norman MacClean did in "A River Runs Through It," which made fly fishing seem very romantic and beckoning.

John Ames' grandfather left his home when he was fourteen to fight for abolition; he later became a Union Army Chaplain and lost an eye in battle. His eccentricities provide some extremely enjoyable scenes: his habit of giving away anything and everything, including the blankets off his own bed; the tensions that were strong between himself and his son, a devoted Pacifist, both so respectful that they would not contradict one another; an ongoing feud between the grandfather and the storyteller's own mother -- she hiding hard-earned dimes and nickels in the sugar bin and lard and the grandfather systematically shaking and rearranging everything in the pantry in deliberate search.

The son of Ames oldest friend, Jack Ames Boughton (Ames' namesake), comes home to Gilead to see his dying father. Jack is the town black sheep, shouldering a problem, a burning secret that he cannot disturb his own father with. Before he can turn to Ames for guidance, he hammers him with questions of faith, causing Ames to face his own fragility. This particular sub-plot alone makes the book worthwhile and hard to put down.

An excerpt from "GILEAD" by Marilynne Robinson reprinted with media permission:
"It's a plain old church and it could use a coat of paint. But in the dark times I used to walk over before sunrise just to sit there and watch the light come into that room. I don't know how beautiful it might seem to anyone else. I felt much at peace those mornings, praying over very dreadful things sometimes -- the Depression, the wars. There was a lot of misery for people around here, decades of it. But prayer brings peace, as I trust you know.

"In those days, as I have said, I might spend most of a night reading. Then, if I woke up still in my armchair, and if the clock said four or five, I'd think how pleasant it was to walk through the streets in the dark and let myself into the church and watch dawn come in the sanctuary. I loved the sound of the latch lifting. The building has settled into itself so that when you walk down the aisle, you can hear it yielding to the burden of your weight. It's a pleasanter sound than an echo would be, an obliging, accommodating sound. You have to be there alone to hear it. Maybe it can't feel the weight of a child. But if it is still standing when you read this, and if you are not half a world away, sometime you might go there alone, just to see what I mean. After a while I did begin to wonder if I liked the church better with no people in it. . . .

"In the old days I could walk down every single street, past every house, in about an hour. I'd try to remember the people who lived in each one, and whatever I knew about them, which was often quite a lot. . . . And I'd pray for them. And I'd imagine peace they didn't expect and couldn't account for descending on their illness or their quarreling or their dreams. Then I'd go into the church and pray some more and wait for daylight. I've often been sorry to see a night end, even while I have loved seeing the dawn come.

Trees sound different at night, and they smell different too."

Courage, faith, fear, forgiveness, friendship, grace, jealousy, love, resentment and solidarity are all tightly woven themes in this multi-generational story. Rural Iowa and Kansas, from the Civil War through the fifties, bring back a culture much removed from what most of us are living today. "Gilead" is a fulfilling book spiritually, not because John Ames, his father and his grandfather are preachers; this only provides a better-focused lens through which to see the issues of belief and doubt, and how these issues affect our own daily lives. One reviewer of this book who claims to be an atheist, interestingly enough, stated that the book "becomes a meditation on how even the simplest life can be touched by grace and wonder." A scene of a young neglected mother and her naked, unnamed child playing in a stream suggests that the simplest life is indeed touched by grace and wonder.

The book may take some time to get into; some of the early narrative takes on the form of religious rambling. Stick with it. The rambling is, in fact, a good solid basis providing the context for confrontations that take place in the last part of the book. It is quite a book of substance. I did have one small nagging question though. How can a 76-year-old man have a 7-year old son? Aside from that, while I probably wouldn't read the book again, I am glad I read it. It is a good look into human nature. Check it out from your library.

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