37 pages • 1-hour read
Dinner At The Homesick Restaurant
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Symbols & Motifs
The Homesick Restaurant
The titular Homesick Restaurant becomes one of the novel’s defining motifs. It evolves and changes over the course of the years, acting as both a setting for many combative family encounters and a representation of Ezra’s personality. However, when the restaurant is first introduced, it is known under a different name. Scarlatti’s is something of a throwback; the traditional Italian style seems outdated, even by the standards of the time and the socioeconomic level of the neighborhood. Ezra takes on a partnership in the restaurant after befriending the owner. As she lies dying, he begins to absentmindedly make changes until the restaurant bears little resemblance to its old self. Mrs. Scarlatti is shocked and appalled by what he has done. For a character who is typically so emotionally intelligent and pleasant, this is perhaps Ezra’s greatest sin. By the time he realizes what he has done, it is too late to undo the damage. Mrs. Scarlatti dies without ever forgiving Ezra, and this lack of forgiveness eats away at him.
Before Mrs. Scarlatti dies, she hosts one of the first family meals in the restaurant. It becomes a repeated motif throughout the novel that the Tull family will sit down to dinner. Each time, Ezra hopes that they will be able to enjoy one another’s company and have a nice, traditional family meal. However, each time, something goes wrong. An argument always erupts, forcing Pearl, Cody, or someone else to abandon the meal. This repeated scenario demonstrates that, no matter how much the family changes, they remain the same. That Ezra keeps attempting these meals also serves to demonstrate the importance to him of a convivial, friendly family atmosphere, even though that has never really been evident.
This use of the restaurant as a reflection of Ezra’s wants and desires extends to the food they serve. The approach to writing menus is nonconformist. Ezra does not really enjoy eating, but he enjoys tuning a meal to a person’s emotional tenor and then watching them eat. He derives satisfaction from pleasing others, the kind of unselfish behavior that would be alien to Cody. The menu encompasses all sorts of unique and global cuisines, including eggplant and banana soup. The restaurant’s idiosyncratic approach operates as a reflection of Ezra’s own idiosyncrasies. He is willing to entertain any idea if it will entertain others. Thus, the Homesick Restaurant becomes an extended motif for Ezra’s personality.
Homes
If the Homesick Restaurant becomes a public expression of many of the problems that the Tull family experiences, then their house operates as a more domestic, private expression of the same issues. On a wider scale, houses and homes function as symbolic representations of the people who live inside them. This begins early in the text: Beck drags his family from home to home, not allowing them to integrate into a community or put down roots. This frequent changing of the home is a reflection of Beck’s impulsive, flighty, and noncommittal personality. It is only when Beck departs that the family can make a house truly their own.
After Beck leaves, Pearl becomes the sole parent. She takes on the responsibility for the whole family, and this includes the maintenance of the house. She teaches herself to take on the traditionally masculine roles around the home, handling repairs and improvements. This allows her not only to save money, but to provide protection against the outside world. She ensures that the house is safe and secure, insulating herself and her family from the outside world. The house is not a happy home, but Pearl soldiers through and sacrifices her time and energy to make sure that it is livable. She exhausts herself daily to make sure that her children have a roof over their heads. Her commitment to ensuring that the house is always in good repair is a symbolic reflection of the effort and sacrifice she makes to ensure that her children are raised properly. Though she might not always succeed, the effort that she applies is unquestionable.
After he grows up and leaves the home, Cody finds himself in a similar position to his father. Like Beck, he finds himself dragged across the country by his jobs. Like Beck, he drags his family around behind him, living in a series of rented houses. Though he is much more successful than Beck, he similarly prevents his family from putting down roots, and his son, Luke, finds himself alone and friendless during the summer months. At one time, Cody had hoped to buy a farm in Baltimore and live there with his wife. This had seemed like an active attempt to disassociate himself from Beck, but the dream of the farm collapses when Cody marries Ruth. The abandoned farm becomes a symbol for the vast distance between Cody’s ambitions and his realities. He had hoped for years to never become like his father and then—seemingly by accident—he is unable to stop himself from replicating Beck’s behavior. The demise of the farm acts as a symbolic representation of how this was inevitable and lamentable.
Archery Set
The novel uses different perspectives to provide insight into various events in the lives of the characters. The way that Cody interprets an event, for instance, differs from the way that Pearl interprets an event. As such, certain events become repeated motifs in the lives of the characters. The best example of this is the incident with the archery set, in which Pearl is shot in the chest by a renegade shot from a bow and arrow. Each time a character remembers the event, they project their own personal biases and subjective interpretations.
The first time the incident is described, the audience views the accident from Pearl’s perspective. In this telling, Beck takes the blame for the incident. Though it is Cody who fires the arrow, Beck is blamed for wasting money on a ridiculous archery set. By this stage, Pearl already blames and resents Beck for their downturn in fortunes. The marriage is on the rocks already and—as she is reviewing the event from later in life—she sees this moment as something of a turning point. That she is willing to blame Beck for Cody’s bad behavior demonstrates the extent to which she would rather defend her children and blame Beck than admit that her husband was not at fault.
When it comes to Cody’s time to reflect on the incident, the audience is already aware of his jealousy toward Ezra. Cody describes the event in much more detail; he mentions how Ezra achieved a perfect shot without seemingly trying. This describes how Cody had pointed a notched arrow at Ezra out of spite, and it describes how Ezra had bumbled toward his brother, desperate to stop him. Though Cody is the one who fires the arrow and who was acting recklessly, he has no trouble blaming Ezra. The resentment and jealousy Cody feels toward Ezra allow him to blame his brother for whatever happened, using it as another tool with which to bully Ezra.
The next interpretation is Ezra’s own. This version is quicker and almost dismissive, as though Ezra is embarrassed about his actions. He takes full blame for the incident and is even annoyed that Pearl refused to blame him; he wanted to apologize to her and needed her to accept his apology. This demonstrates Ezra’s own introverted personality: He is willing to accept Cody’s version of events but craves forgiveness rather than blame or guilt. In each instance, the story changes slightly, and the different perspectives highlight the differences between the characters.
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