Train Dreams

Living on the Northwest frontier in the age of railroad expansion, Grainier experiences firsthand the collision between the vast expanse of wilderness and the promise of progress through technology. This ultimately results in the erosion of the natural world, and the novel explores this tension between industrial progress and the environment through the Spokane International Railway, Grainier’s clinging to the past, and the howl of the wolf-boy in the theater.

Working construction for the Spokane International Railway, Grainier experiences conflicting emotions that exemplify this tension. After they finish a job, “the first locomotive crossed the 112-foot interval of air over the 60-foot-deep gorge, traveling on the bridge they’d made […] The men cheered and whooped. Grainier felt sad. He couldn’t think why. He cheered and hollered too” (11-12). This industrial progress—a bridge strong enough to bear a train—has conquered the seemingly impossible, but at the expense of the gorge’s natural beauty. When Grainier inexplicably feels sad, he subconsciously mourns the loss that accompanies technological progress. However, he is also excited about the feat. The idea of industry “winning out” over nature is evident again when the machinery used in logging is described: “The engine was an old wood-burning steam colossus throbbing and booming and groaning while its vapors roared like a falls, the horses over on the skid road moving gigantically in a kind of silence, their noises erased by the commotion of steam and machinery” (13). The sound of the machines overpowering the horse noises represents how industry is conquering what was once wild. Only the engine can be heard, and the natural world is forgotten.

Additionally, Grainier clings to the past to avoid the push toward industrialization. The location of his home, so remote that when he dies it takes months for him to be discovered, indicates his desire to reside in a world untouched by humanity. Despite this longing, though, the world progresses around him while he holds on to vestiges of the past. When he helps Eddie Sauer move Claire Thompson, “Grainier took his mares and his wagon. Eddie had his sister’s husband’s Model T Ford […] Grainier preceding by half a mile because his horses disliked the automobile” (87). By choosing a now-outdated mode of transportation, Grainier demonstrates his reluctance to accept change; furthermore, the horses themselves, representative of nature, choose to keep their distance from the vehicle as well. Over time, Grainier only reluctantly accepts select technology that emerges, like “watch[ing] television whenever he was in town” (113). However, by the time of his death in 1968, he had not “spoken into a telephone” and only dared to ride “once on an aircraft” (113). Even though Grainier holds tight to the past, society trudges forward with new technology, leaving the wilderness and Grainier’s way of life in its wake.

Inevitable progress is also symbolized in the wolf-boy’s unsettling howl in the Bonners Ferry theater. At first, the audience laughs at the boy’s approach, deeming his wolfishness a mere costume. However, they stop when he laid his head back until his scalp contacted his spine, […] and opened his throat, and a sound rose in the auditorium like a wind coming from all four directions, low and terrifying, rumbling up […], the originating ideal of all such sounds ever made, of the foghorn and the ship’s horn, the locomotive’s lonesome whistle, of opera singing and the music of flutes and continuous moaning music of bagpipers. And suddenly it all went black. And that time was gone forever (116).

Starting as a wind, the “rumbling” that is both “low” and “terrifying” is animalistic. However, as the sound intensifies, it takes the shape of industry and culture, resembling the noises of ships and trains. This shift, which is depicted in one long sentence, represents the progression from untethered wildness to industrialized civilization. When the stage goes dark and “that time was gone forever” (116), the narrative closes its exploration of the topic, suggesting that progress is inevitable and highlighting what has been lost as a result.