34 The Nature and Reality of Work – Jason Harrell
Jason Harrell is a senior from Dallas, Texas and he is majoring in English. This paper is an analysis of naturalism and realism in nineteenth century literature. Jason’s professor, Dr Brian Brodeur, said, “I would like to celebrate Jason’s innovative literary analyses of complex texts, the high level of motivation and initiative he takes with this research and writing, and his dedication to pushing his work in new directions.”
The Nature and Reality of Work
During the nineteenth century, the challenges Americans faced, such as racial oppression and class-based struggles, consumed a significant part of the American discourse. Writers, in an effort to both confront and portray the nuances and subjective realities of certain experiences in America, utilized the literary movements of realism and naturalism to examine the everyday American, including both maligned and misunderstood characters. For Mark Twain in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the author utilizes realism to examine the impacts of societal oppression upon the individual and how this awareness can also shift the perspectives of oneself and others. For Stephen Crane in “The Open Boat,” naturalism operates as a vehicle for interpreting the characters’ plights and challenges. In a subversive analysis of nineteenth-century American culture, Mark Twain and Stephen Crane exemplify realism and naturalism through the broad theme of societal oppression in fictions by focusing on “common-man” characters engaging in forms of work.
This analysis of naturalism and realism in nineteenth-century fiction will use additional critical sources. In “Realism, Romanticism, and Politics in Mark Twain,” William F. Byrne details the areas of apparent pessimism in Twain’s fiction by offering both a psychological and philosophical approach toward Twain’s writing. Byrne also explores Twain’s realism as his rejection of romanticism. In “Nature as Protagonist in ‘The Open Boat,’” Anthony Channell Hilfer analyzes the literary devices Crane uses in “The Open Boat,” in addition to offering a perspective that Crane’s short story is thematically and substantively about nature, man’s direct and indirect relationship to the will and control of nature, and Crane’s theological views. In “Emotive Realism,” Jane Thrailkill examines the history of literary realism in the nineteenth century and examines aspects of realism in the realization and awareness the characters experience in Twain’s fiction.
Naturalism, which focuses on how characters on the outskirts of society are held captive by the environment and societal forces beyond their control, is exemplified in Crane’s “The Open Boat.” In this short story, four men are stranded in a tub-sized lifeboat in the sea, and they are struggling survive and to get to shore. At the mercy and misery of the sea, Crane makes nature the ultimate protagonist of the story, as nature controls the men’s fate. The boat provides minimal security or safety for the men, as “the lifeboat itself becomes a danger to the men in their final attempt to reach the shore” (Hifler 252). With nature as the lead and controlling character, Crane’s characters are largely unnamed and exist in anonymity as he instead qualifies, credentials, and reduces these characters to their respective stations in life: the captain, the cook, the correspondent, and the oiler. Their work as common men, especially their work on the sea, is far more important and informative to the reader than who the men are as individuals. In this small boat, nature robs them of both identity and individuality. The men become synonymous with and attached to the work they perform in life, and the work they engage with on the sea as they struggle to survive. The correspondent, an unnamed journalist, takes turn rowing and “watche[s] the waves and wonder[s] why he was there” (Crane 1048). This wondering of the correspondent is indicative of Crane’s naturalism, whereby a journalist, someone with assumedly a modest career, is still forced by the will and influence of nature to ponder how he is on the boat as he receives instructions on rowing from the oiler. Nature, then, has both unified and humbled all men under its force. In this vast and naturalistic setting—the wide, deep sea—people must work in a seemingly futile but life-essential attempt to prevail against the strength and will of nature. In “The Open Boat, “the sea is depicted in an orgy of hyperbolic personifications” (Hifler248). These personifications, whereby the sea is personified to the greatest extent, are Crane’s method of conveying the strength of nature and the weakness of men in comparison to it. Nature has more will and “agency more primary, than that of the men in the boat, who are merely in a reactive relation to the waves” (Hifler 249). In this story, and in their work, the men function and exist in collective reaction to nature rather than as individuals with any control over it. The correspondent is not the only man who wonders, though, as one of the men thinks to himself, “I am going to be drowned, why, in the name of the seven mad gods who rule the sea, was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees? Was I brought here merely to have my nose dragged away as I way about to nibble the sacred cheese of life?” (Crane 1057). This profound, desperate wondering is indicative of Crane’s naturalism, as is the scene itself. In this scene, “the oiler rowed, and then the correspondent rowed, and then the oiler rowed” (Crane 1057). Crane details the work and roles of each character, but for this specific plea, Crane does not state from whom it comes. The characters’ work, then, becomes more central to the narrative than the identity of the life-questioning words they utter. This refusal to attribute the quote to a character is Crane’s method of showing how unified, reliant upon the other, and tortured the men have become by nature. The plea is as real and urgent from one man as it is from another, and the seven mad gods, consolidated as nature itself, become more significant than the name of the person responding to nature.
In Twain’s novel, the characters are also engaged in intense work over a similar setting, an unforgiving sea: the Mississippi River. Twain’s portrayal of the sea and the events, however, is distinctly literary realism in its focus. As “Jim manned the oars,” Huck begins to wonder to himself “how dreadful it was, even for murderers, to be in such a fix … there ain’t no telling but I might come to be a murderer myself” (Twain 61). The wondering of Huck is strikingly different from the wondering of Crane’s correspondent and other characters. Instead of wondering about the impacts of nature on the self and one’s station in life. Huck wonders about his fellow common man. The murderers to whom Huck refers are Jake Packard, Bill, and Jim Turner. The men are trapped, and Huck’s internal conflict regarding the robbers’ collective fate expresses the empathy he has for them. Instead of the unnamed, nearly distinguishable men on the boat in Crane’s story, Twain decidedly names these three men, which gives them distinct identities even as minor characters. Their work, in this instance and in life, obviously criminal in practice and corrupt in nature, still does not have the power to rob them of identity and individuality. The realism of Twain’s novel depicts these men as real men with intense, understandable fears of life and death. The fears in Crane’s story are viewed as nearly inconsequential against the force of nature. In Twain’s realistic depiction, however, Huck plans to “go for that gang and get them out of their scrape, so they can be hung when their time comes” (Twain 61). Huck is intentionally attempting to allow society and people to judge the men instead of immediately forgetting about them and their plight. Their work, then, is only an aspect of their identity rather than its defining feature. The people play an essential role in men’s fate in Twain’s fiction—not nature. Instead of focusing on the supposed and personified will of nature, Twain’s realism enables Huck in this scene not “to view men as indiscriminately bad, or human nature as exclusively ugly” (Byrne 38). In this portrayal of men as real but flawed characters, Huck and the robbers have agency instead of nature, which differs from Crane’s story.
While the men in “The Open Boat” are struggling to survive on a nearly inconceivably small boat, Twain’s characters in Huck Finn travel the Mississippi River on a raft. Although neither vessel is ideal for working to travel across the dangerous and deep water, the open nature of the raft becomes symbolic for the freedom that Huck, Jim, and the other characters in the novel seek. Two such characters are the duke and the dauphin (king), two con artists. The older man is running from authorities after knowingly “selling an article to take the tarter off the teeth,” and the younger man is running after having run “a little temperance revival” (Twain 99). Both of their lines of work are ironic, especially in a novel full of realism. These two men work in a way that is deceptive and false instead of authentic and real. The realism aspect, however, lies in Twain’s persistent awareness that truth inherently involves the recognition and acceptance of falsehood. The men’s work, then, functions as an extended metaphor for this truth. The men agree to “double-team it together” to further their deception and enter into another form of work (Twain 99). After Huck invites the two men on the raft, “Huck lets them take over; he becomes their servant and addresses them with the various exalted titles they prefer. Of course, Huck really has little choice in this matter; he and Jim are but a boy and a runaway slave” (Byrne 27). This shift in circumstances is especially realistic. Huck and Jim’s work on the raft has been changed by the two men. Twain is expressing how common-man individuals have ethical choice and can control the lives of others. In Twain’s fiction, men are subject to the will and control of other men. Huck’s age, then, and Jim’s identity as a slave, rob them both of full agency over their future on the raft. The two men, deceptive in their work but real in their assumed and exerted power, have the ultimate control. The raft and nature merely become part of the narrative instead of the lead.
In Crane’s “The Open Boat,” work functions as a way to justify man’s survival or demise, and nature becomes the ultimate decider of a man’s fate. One of the men wonders to himself, “If I am going to be drowned … why was I allowed to come thus far and contemplate sand and trees?” (Crane 1059). This pensive thought is naturalistic itself. Instead of thinking about one’s life, family, relationships, or anything seemingly metaphysical or religious, the man is thinking of elements of nature itself: sand and trees. These two elements, which are indicative of safety and dry land, also provide nature with a redemptive and nearly salvific power over men. Crane alludes to this power by narrating how “it was certainly an abominable injustice to drown a man who had worked so hard, so hard. The man felt it would be a crime most unnatural” (Crane 1059). Crane is again indirectly personifying nature as someone or something with the will and ability to drown the man, but he strategically notes that doing so would be an abominable injustice. If there is injustice, however, Crane is implying how work, then, can justify men. It is particularly striking that Crane, as narrator, defines it as an injustice instead of the character himself. It is the man who considers it “unnatural,” but it is Crane who deems it an injustice. The “unnatural” qualifier again aligns with the naturalistic elements of the short story, whereby hard, arduous work alone should somehow redeem the man from drowning. One could also argue that crime most unnatural is nearly a joke from Crane, “as if large waves and heavy surf were un-natural impositions” (Hifler 251). Tumultuous waves are part of nature, and yet the characters, desperate for survival and justifying themselves by their work, feel as if nature is behaving and acting in a dysfunctional way.
The characters see and personify nature as an “old ninny-woman” and “old hen who knows not her intention” (Crane 1054). This personification of nature is ironic, since the men speak of nature in a dismissive, condescending way, and yet they feel subject to the control and whim of nature as they attempt to understand, reason, threaten, and bargain with nature based on their work. One of the men ponders to himself, “ if nature has decided to drown to me, then why did she not do it in the beginning and save me all this trouble. … She dare not drown me. She cannot drown me. Not after all this work” (Crane 1054). The man has again used “trouble” and “work” as qualification and justification for one’s survival. Crane is stating that in the harshness of the world, men are reduced to their work and have neither individuality nor significance, and nature is the ultimate decider of fate. Bereft of any effective solution or power to change one’s future in such a life-threatening situation, “the man might have had an impulse to shake his fist at the clouds” or threaten nature with names (Crane 1054). This is a futile attempt to condemn or denounce the rule and force of nature: “The preposterousness of this denunciation is quite marvelous. Intention is posited where it does not exist, and that the men have worked so hard is presented as a moral claim to a dubious divinity, Fate” (Hifler 250). This moral claim is specific to and necessary in Crane’s naturalism, wherein morality has a definitive and almost divine connection to work, regardless of the specific context of one’s work, and work itself involves a continual moral claim and appeal to nature for one’s worthiness to exist.
The relative morality and irony of one’s work is decidedly literary realism in Twain’s novel, as Twain shows the deceptive nature that can exist in many lines of work. There are instances when work itself confuses Huck, and Twain employs these moments in a layered, realistic, and profound way. When visiting the circus, Huck notices that an apparently drunk man in the audience has made his way into the circus ring. The audience encourages the man to ride a horse, and when the audience sees the man can barely hold on, “the whole crowd of people [stood] up shouting and laughing till the tears rolled down” (Twain 120). Huck is unable to laugh at the spectacle, though, because he believes the man is in physical danger. He is unaware that the drunk man is part of the circus act. The realism is not in the act itself, then, which is entertainment for the crowd. The realism exists in “the internal theater of Huck’s imaginative engagement with the perceived danger of someone else” (Thrailkill 376). There are both real and fictional elements at work at the same time. The performers in the circus are working, but the performative nature of their work is to entertain. While the scenario they are portraying is an illusion for the audience, Huck’s response to it is real. The line between reality and artificiality is blurred in Huck’s young mind. In this scene, “what looks real is, then, revealed to be an act, a simulation of reality” (Thrailkill 376). A major aspect of realism involves an individual’s ethical choice, which makes this scene with ordinary, common-man circus performers more layered. Huck’s internal conflict has him genuinely concerned for the drunk man, and although he has no reason to be concerned based on actual reality, Huck’s concern is authentic. These are not highly skilled actors in the circus; instead, they are common-man characters involved in a traveling form of work. By using the theater, Twain is informing readers that even unreal scenarios can involve and influence real, ethical choices. In Twain’s realism, this work of the circus performances is not their way of justifying their existence or seeking to stay alive; work is a simply a matter of fulfillment and individual goals. This is decidedly different from the society-driven and collective focus of work in Crane’s story.
Huck is confronted with the societal aspect of work with his father, Pap. Pap is an absent, abusive father, and as part of Twain’s realism, he lives on the fringes of society as a drunken criminal. In Pap’s mind, work, which involves a social hierarchy and education, is despised and viewed as impediment to one’s individuality and freedom. The irony, of course, is Pap is bound to his alcoholism. Pap desires money, the results of work, but he lacks any interest in substantive work, which he sees as being too integrated into society. In admonishing Huck against education and school, he tells him, “And looky here—you drop that school, you hear? I’ll learn people to bring up a boy to put on airs over his own father and let on to be better’n what he is” (Twain 22). Pap is so bound to his social status, low as it is, that he finds no redemptive quality in work; instead, he finds more security and validation in his race. His rejection of work and embrace of ignorance, however, is a component of realism. Not only is this a common-man feature, but it was characteristic of some men during the novel’s period, which is the reason Twain’s writing addresses it. Instead of exercising his right to vote, Pap is infuriated when he learns of black people voting. Although he has the legal right to vote, “Pap is unwilling to participate in the democratic process on an equal basis with others; he must maintain his superiority, a ridiculous requirement given his extreme poverty and complete lack of virtue” (Byrne 29). In Twain’s realism, work makes one part of society existing structures and its conventions. Pap and Huck “are at the bottom, view themselves as outsiders, or simply have no interest in social status” (Byrne 30). Work, and the decision not to, are part of individuality and one’s own choices, both of which are part of realism. There is no redemptive power or virtue alone in work, especially if one might be different from or lower socially than someone of another race in different work, such as the black professor Pap despises. In Twain’s satire, which relies upon common-man characters, work and education would make Pap, despite his contemptibility, a potentially less-common-man character.
The indiscriminateness of nature and inability of work to save one’s life are aspects of Crane’s short story. The oiler, Billie, is the only named character. This is a common nickname, however, which aligns with the uniformity and collective aspects of naturalism. Billie has worked more than any of the other men on the boat. The night before the Commodore sank, Billie worked a double shift. During the scenes of the short story, the oiler rows and relieves the correspondent. As the men are racing to shore, “The oiler was ahead in the race. He was swimming strongly and rapidly” (Crane 1063). As the other men are saved, though, “in the shallows, face downward, lay the oiler” (1064). The oiler has engaged in more work than any of the other men, but it has not redeemed or saved him from death. Nature, the despised woman, does not even drown the oiler in the depth of the sea when he is working; instead, exhaustion has drowned him in the shallow part of the water. In a novel of literary naturalism, it is also arguable that the oiler’s last-minute ambition, the pursuit of individuality and his own life while leaving the collective group and common man, gave nature reason to drown the man.
Work can function as an important component of one’s life. In naturalism and Crane’s story, work can unite the common man in life, resulting in unity but also anonymity, as one’s life is more determined by nature’s will instead of one’s individual choices and ethics. The ordinary individual, a feature of realism and Twain’s novel, exemplifies how work both connects and separates one from societal forces and bounds. Nineteenth-century American culture, consumed by issues such as class, race, the individual and deceptive practices, is examined and explored in the respective realism and naturalism of Twain and Crane.
Works Cited
Byrne, William F. “Realism, Romanticism, and Politics in Mark Twain.” Humanitas 12.1 (1999): 16. ProQuest. Web. 1 Dec. 2021.
Crane, Stephen. “The Open Boat.” Norton Anthology of American Literature, WW. Norton & Company, Inc., 1977, 1048-1064.
Hilfer, Anthony Channell. “3. Nature as Protagonist in “the Open Boat”.” Texas Studies in Literature and Language 54.2 (2012): 248-57. ProQuest. Web. 1 Dec. 2021.
Thrailkill, Jane F. “Emotive Realism.” Journal of Narrative Theory : JNT 36.3 (2006): 365,388,447. ProQuest. Web. 3 Dec. 2021.
Twain, Mark. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. New York, WW. Norton & Company, Inc., 1977.