The Listeners

The fictional Avallon hotel is located in Appalachia, a mountainous, heavily wooded rural region in the eastern part of the United States. The isolation of this environment has encouraged the growth of an insular culture with its own dialect, mannerisms, traditions, and beliefs. This culture is reflected in many aspects of The Listeners. For instance, the novel uses “sweetwater,” an Appalachian word for a pure and natural source of water, to refer to the water running underneath the grounds of the Avallon hotel. The role of sweetwater in the story reflects a traditional Appalachian belief that water collects spiritual energy from the things it contacts and flows through and that it can acquire both healing and destructive powers this way.

The isolation of Appalachia has also contributed to economic hardship. Mines and logging operations—generally run by wealthy outsiders—have historically been two of the few sources of income in the region. In the 1940s, many Appalachians had little choice but to accept work in these dangerous occupations. At this time, Appalachians also had limited access to good schools, health care, and modern conveniences. Along with its isolation and its history of poverty, Appalachia’s lower access to education contributed to stereotypes about its people and the marginalization of its culture. In The Listeners, characters like general manager June Hudson demonstrate how tricky the world represented by the Avallon could be for those born into the mountains surrounding this outpost of luxury and wealth.

The Avallon is an enclave for powerful outsiders, where they can be pampered and catered to by a staff of people who have themselves had very little in the way of luxury or opportunity. Its existence highlights the divide between Appalachia and the rest of the United States. Early in the novel, June sees the intrusion of the war into the Avallon as a temporary inconvenience, and her main concern is how to maintain the status quo—but what June cannot know is how World War II will change Appalachia and its status forever.

The Listeners is built around a little-known chapter of American history: the wartime internment of Axis diplomats. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, the U.S. State Department’s Special War Problems Division launched a program to detain hundreds of German, Japanese, Italian, and other Axis-affiliated diplomats, journalists, and their families. As historian Harvey Solomon details in Such Splendid Prisons, these individuals were not sent to typical internment camps but were instead housed in opulent resorts like The Greenbrier in West Virginia and The Homestead in Virginia. The government hoped that treating enemy diplomats to luxury would ensure that American diplomats held abroad would receive humane treatment in return.

While foreign diplomats were entering Appalachia, Appalachians were flooding out: The draft pulled huge numbers of young Appalachian men into the outside world, where their stories of life in Appalachia brought the region’s poverty to national attention. Outsiders—many exposed to real Appalachians for the first time—began to realize the injustice of stereotypes about the region. Journalists and other writers began investigating conditions in Appalachia, and when the coal industry began to decline and poverty in the region grew even worse, the larger nation was ready to be sympathetic. By the early 1960s, serious federal investment in Appalachia had begun.