The Winter Room

“In the spring everything is soft. Wayne is my older brother by two years and so he thinks he knows more than I can ever know. He said Miss Halverson, who teaches eighth grade, told him spring was a time of awakening, but I think she’s wrong. And Wayne is wrong too.”

The motif of changing seasons and the theme of Living Attuned to the Natural World immediately emerges in the novel, highlighting Eldon’s perspective and emotional experience in the story that revolves around the family farm and its natural surroundings. In the above quotation, Eldon challenges the common notion of spring as an idealized symbol of renewal, emphasizing its less-seductive aspects. Simultaneously, the quotation establishes the different mindsets between Eldon and Wayne, as their conflicting views are a key part of their development.

“In northern Minnesota where we live, the deep cold of winter keeps things from smelling. When we clean the barn and throw the manure out back, it just freezes in a pile. When chickens die or sheep die or even if a cow dies it is left out back on the manure pile because like Uncle David says we’re all fertilizer in the end. Uncle David is old. So old we don’t even know for sure how old he is. He says when he dies, he wants to be thrown on the manure pile just like the dead animals, but he might be kidding.”

While introducing the setting and elaborating on spring smells, Eldon implies that his favorite season is winter, and the quotation directly connects to Uncle David and his wisdom. Despite Eldon’s young age, Uncle David frequently passes on philosophical ideas using figurative language, even beyond his storytelling sessions. This reinforces Eldon’s curiosity and his uncle’s often puzzling sayings push him to develop his thinking.

“Also on Uncle David’s side of the room there are books. Not just the Bible. […] Father says they each read one verse to the other in Norwegian before they go to sleep. But on Uncle David’s side there are four other books—only I don’t know what they are because the titles and the writing are all in Norwegian. I know they’re thick. Big books.”

The quotation illuminates Uncle David’s character, emphasizing The Importance of Storytelling for Character Formation and Growth. Uncle David’s love of books and reading suggests that stories are part of his worldview and personality. Describing their role in this life reinforces his wisdom. As a first-generation immigrant, he reads books in Norwegian, indicating his sense of cultural and national identity.

“Mother gets the cream money and egg money—and I guess all the money, come to think of it, because I saw Father turning over a check from the elevator for grain one fall, which is practically the only money we ever get. Milk and cream and egg and grain money.”

While Eldon’s mother remains a secondary character in the book, the quotation indicates her crucial role in the family. The family makes a living off the land, while money and material pleasures derived from money are scarce. Eldon’s parents have distinct roles as his father is the one who works hard to provide for the family and his mother manages their economic gains and is the head of the household.

“That night, in the back room, Wayne found a Zane Grey western in a dusty pile. Guns Along the Powder River. The cover was all in color and showed a cowboy with a roaring six-gun in each hand kind of shooting at you out of the picture. So we sat down with that book and read it and don’t you know, we had to be cowboys.”

The quotation illustrates that Eldon and Wayne share a love of stories and find inspiration in heroic figures. Such moments contribute to their bond of brotherhood while also indicating the importance of storytelling in character formation and growth. As children, Eldon and Wayne have a keen interest in stories, and subsequently, Uncle David’s storytelling provides them with spiritual sustenance that is key to their development.

“I like taking the plowshares into town with Father because I’m still young enough to go. Wayne has crossed the line now and has to work around the farm when he isn’t going to school. Unless it’s Saturday night in the spring, Wayne has to stay home.”

The above quotation illuminates Wayne’s character. As an older brother, Wayne assumes more responsibilities around the farm than Eldon and contributes to the hard work that sustains the family. He carries on the chores with patience and endurance while having dreams of a life beyond the farm. His duties contribute to his more realistic and pragmatic mindset, as he experiences firsthand The Challenge of Farming Life in Early 20th-Century America.

“Father says that is the best part of farming—plowing in the early summer—and I can see why he thinks it. I think the same.”

While Eldon’s favorite season is winter, he learns to find enjoyment throughout the different periods of the year despite the hard farming work. For the family, summer is a period of demanding labor rather than relaxation. Despite this, Eldon learns to appreciate parts of farming and learns while watching his father during work.

“Then hay again, and corn to fill the silo to feed the cattle all winter—and how hard it is. Maybe I wouldn’t have known, except that last year at the end of summer I came around the end of the barn and saw Father sitting on the block of oak we use for splitting wood and killing chickens. He was just sitting looking at the ground with his hands and arms hanging down between his legs. His eyes weren’t blinking and he wasn’t smiling. Mother was standing in back of him rubbing his shoulders and neck, just rubbing and rubbing. ‘The days are long,’ she said, in a kind of song like she used to sing to me when the coughing was bad and I couldn’t sleep.”

The scene conveys a melancholic tone that connects to the family’s struggles, offering glimpses of the challenge of farming life in 20th-century America. As Eldon watches his father work, he starts realizing the toll of his endeavors and striving for survival, gaining insights into the adult world. His father’s song indicates the man’s emotional and physical exhaustion over the struggles of farming. In this way, the text challenges an idealized representation of life in rural America, suggesting that living off the land is a simple but highly demanding life.

“Until it’s close to evening and we eat warm apple pie and drink milk thick with cream and barely make it home in time to milk and do chores. That’s how fall starts. Not so bad a start. But when all the grain is up and all the silage in and the hay stacked and the barn and yard cleaned it is time to kill. And I don’t like the killing part.”

The quotation establishes animals as a motif conveying Eldon’s experience of fall, his least favorite season. While fall is a productive period for the farm as harvest time, Eldon fixates on animals’ killing, an essential part of farming life as his mother explains. Because of his emotional connection with animals, he is frustrated over their slaughter.

“The smell, the smell of the blood and the screams and the throat bleeding out is so much, so thick that I can’t stand it.”

The use of vivid imagery in this quotation makes Eldon’s experience immediate to readers, representing animal killing as a traumatizing event for the boy. The smell of blood emphasizes the ugliness of the scene while his father kills the pigs in the barn. The moment is unbearable to Eldon, and his reaction indicates that he is emotionally connected to the animals on the farm, who mean more to him than offering sustenance.

“I can’t help thinking it’s wrong, though Wayne doesn’t think so. Sometimes he seems to get a light in his eyes like Rex gets when Father kills. But the men don’t like it, Uncle David and Nels don’t like it because when Father kills the steer and it goes down and when he cuts the hog and it screams and bleeds to death, when that is done Nels and Uncle David always stand silently, take their caps off and stand silently until it is done. And Father always turns away and spits after he has done it. Nobody says anything for a time while the animals or chickens are dying.”

While Eldon’s father must kill the animals to ensure the family’s sustenance, Eldon senses his aversion after finishing the job. The silent witness of Uncle David and Nels also conveys respect toward the animal and a thankful gesture for providing sustenance to the family. The silence that follows the moment emphasizes this respect, as the men remain speechless, honoring the animals while also feeling bad about their deed.

“But I didn’t care and don’t care now because I know the place is there. The place when fall is gone and winter hasn’t come yet. It is a short time, in one night. And then it snows. First time.”

The liminality of winter described by Eldon represents it as a period of transformation and change beginning with the first snow. Winter involves both external and internal changes. The season brings a complete change in the landscape and alludes to the impact of Uncle David’s storytelling, the culmination of the season. For Eldon, winter brings growth and maturity.

“Soft and curved and white covering the yard and dirt and manure and grass and old leaves, the barns and granaries and machines out by the small tool shed, so that they don’t look like buildings and machines at all but animals. White animals in the new light. First snow. Winter. And winter isn’t like any of the other parts of the year more than any other part isn’t. Spring is close to summer, summer close to fall, but winter stands alone. That’s how Uncle David says it.”

The quotation describes the starkness of the winter landscape with vivid imagery, highlighting Eldon’s view of the season as a unique period of the year. For Eldon, the transformation the snow brings works like magic, giving life even to buildings and machines. The metaphor of the “new light” reiterates the importance of winter as a period of growth for Eldon, which connects to the importance of storytelling in character formation and growth. Uncle David’s influence on Eldon is evident as he recalls his ideas about the winter season.

“Every night in the winter it starts the same. Uncle David and Nels will fill their lower lips and Father will carve and Mother will knit and the yellow flames will make our faces burn, and then Uncle David will spit in the coffee can and rub his hands on his legs and take a breath and say: ‘It was when I was young…’ Then he will tell the story of Alida who was his wife in the old country.”

Eldon notices that Uncle David repeats the same movements before his narration and always starts with the same phrase. This represents the winter storytelling sessions as a kind of ritual that has special significance for the family. Uncle David’s primary story about his old life in Norway indicates his intention to preserve the family history and pass on his life experiences and his wisdom, which is key to Eldon’s growth.

“And that was Alida. She became my wife and let her hair down for me in great coils in the light from tallow candles. I could not live without her. We were married there in the old country and I put the handkerchief on my head to show I would be a good husband. I grew from sharpening tools to using an ax and a bucksaw and we planned to come to America, planned and saved.”

The quotation illuminates Uncle David’s character and his story as an immigrant. He was a hard-working young man and a devoted husband, planning to immigrate to America for his wife in search of a new life. However, his tragedies challenge an idealized immigration story, as Uncle David arrived in America impacted by loss and grief.

“Father makes a small cough like there was something in his throat and Wayne takes a deep breath and Nels looks at the floor and doesn’t move and Mother always cries and it is quiet—so quiet when he finishes the story of Alida that it seems as if time has stopped and we are all back with her and the bread in towels and Uncle David sharpening the tools of the older men.”

Eldon emphasizes that the family often loses sense of time while hearing Uncle David’s stories, immersing themselves in the narrative. Uncle David’s ability to spark their imagination illustrates his gift as a storyteller. More than entertainment, his stories have a powerful impact on Eldon’s emotional world and his family, becoming a communal experience.

“Orud was tall and wide in the shoulder and had a helmet made of steel hammered to a point but soaked in salt until it was red, red like blood. They called him Orud the Red when they went a-viking and he was so terrible that it was said even the men in his boat feared him, and these men feared nothing.”

Orud’s story draws on elements and legends of Norse mythology, which emphasizes the characters’ Norwegian ancestry. By passing on such stories, Uncle David indicates he remains rooted in the culture, history, and customs of his old country that continue to form his worldview. While Eldon and Wayne grow up assimilated into American society, Uncle David preserves elements of Norwegian culture that the boys make part of their identity.

“It was said that Orud had found Melena and taken her to be his wife though she did not want it and that they lived in a cottage under the sea at the mouth of the fjord but that Melena had not forgiven the village for sending the boat which carried Orud to take her. It was said she cursed the village into sickness and waste and when she looked up and saw the village send out a boat she would spread her hair up from the bottom in long strands and catch the boat and sink it in vengeance and laugh at Orud, and the wind and waves were her laughter, and that is the story of Orud and Melena and the house beneath the sea.”

The above quotation expands on the significance of Norse mythology, indicating the value of storytelling across cultures. In ancient Norse culture, myths were designed to explain the mysteries of the natural world and the boundaries of human perception. In stories like Orud’s, the natural elements and people’s interaction with them are central, emphasizing again the significance of the relationship between nature and humans.

“Nobody can know how long it would have gone on, but that winter Alen felt death coming and decided to play his best joke of all.”

Through Crazy Allen’s story, Uncle David conveys lessons on life and death. He describes a person who used humor, even to extremes, against life’s adversities, emphasizing its importance as an attitude toward life. Crazy Allen did not hesitate to use humor while confronting his imminent death and relieving his friend from grief.

“Death never seemed funny to me. All I knew of it was when I had been sick and thought I would die and was afraid, or in the fall when we killed and killed. But it was impossible to think of Crazy Alen without smiling and that meant I was smiling at death, laughing at death and the picture of Alen with his arms and legs out and the foreman trying to get him down the trail.”

Crazy Allen’s story is particularly educational for Eldon, as it helps him confront his fear of death. While Eldon could never laugh at the issue of dying, the story teaches him the value of humor. Thinking about Crazy Allen, Eldon finds himself laughing, demonstrating a different outlook and a developing consciousness.

“But it was different for Wayne. I didn’t know it, but it was different. Somehow the stories had mixed in his mind so they had become a real part of his thinking, so that he believed them.”

Eldon and Wayne’s different perspectives on Uncle David’s stories raise the issue of the nature of storytelling. While both have several questions about his stories, Eldon is content to share his memory and thinks of them as fictional tales. For Wayne, however, they constitute part of his reality. The brothers, therefore, search for meaning while questioning the boundaries between fiction and reality.

“Uncle David coughed a little and spit in the can and looked for a long time at Father and then finished the story. It was about how the young man who was the best cutter of all thought that his new life would last forever only it didn’t. None of it lasted.”

In the story of his youth, Uncle David recounts his early years in America as a woodcutter. In this quotation, Uncle David challenges again the idealized version of American immigration, mourning his lost youth. While he dreamt that his new life in America and his skills as a woodcutter would provide him happiness, this dream did not last for long. Uncle David narrates the story in the third person to emphasize the distinction between his past and present life.

“But now he moved his head up and looked at the sky and the sun caught his face and we could see it plain, see his face in the sun. The wrinkles seemed to leave. The skin seemed to smooth as the sun covered his face. And his hands tightened on the axhandles and the heads of the axes in the snow, the heads trembled a little and it was as if something came from the earth. Some thing, some power passed from the earth up through the silver axheads and through the hickory handles and it started in his arms.”

The scene is the culmination of the narrative and a transformative moment for Eldon and Wayne as they gain insight into Uncle David’s character. Despite his old age, Uncle David summons his inner power to prove to himself he is the man he used to be. For a moment, he becomes young again, working the ax as he used to do, and impresses Eldon and Wayne with his character’s strength. Following this, the boys gain a new perspective on Uncle David’s stories.