“There will always be men struggling to change, and there will always be those who are controlled by the past. ” -Ernest J. Gaines. Although Ernest J. Gaines often told stories of the past, he was certainly not a man controlled by it. Through the creation of his own characters, Gaines attempted to change not only his own character for the better, but to achieve his goal of changing the reader’s character for the better. Emerging from the turmoil of racial and socioeconomic inequality, Gaines became one of the greatest and most influential African American writers of the 20th Century.
He struggled to change the perspective of the world by shedding light on the poverty and social issues present in his homeland. Inspired by his poor childhood, his love for reading, and wisdom passed on from elders, Gaines created literary works that embodied his personal identity. These influences were responsible for the writing of in his 1983 work, A Gathering of Old Men. According to Literature and it’s Times, Ernest J. Gaines was born on a sugarcane plantation in Oscar, Louisiana in January of 1933 (Moss and Wilson 129).
He was raised in former slave quarters by his crippled Aunt Jefferson and attended a one room elementary school. Despite her disability, Jefferson did all she could to raise Ernest and his siblings, and according to Gaines, “I don’t think I ever heard her complain a day in her life. ” (Dawson 839). During his childhood, he studied in school for five months of the year and labored in the field for the next seven months from a very young age. The incredibly poor and harsh conditions in which Gaines was reared greatly influenced his writing, as it focuses on themes related to social class, race, and change (Stanley 120).
These themes are evident in his novel, A Gathering of Old Men. One aspect of his childhood in the book is the place where the black men live, known as ‘the quarters’, same as the former slave quarters that Gaines grew up in. Gaines grew up in a time when large plantations were switching over to the sharecropping system. Under this system, the land was divided among blacks and whites. Because they were white, he Cajuns would get more fertile plots, and the blacks got the worst land. As a result, a great rift grew between black and cajun sharecroppers (Gaines on A Gathering of Old Men).
We can see this directly in the novel, when Rufe says “We had got the worst land from the start, and no matter how hard we worked it, the people with the best land was go’n be in front. .. giving the best land to the Cajuns, and giving us the worst—the bottomland near the swamps. ” (Gaines 106). Although the cajuns are much higher in social class than the blacks, they are still lower than the landowning whites, just as it was on the plantation when Gaines was growing up. One example of this is on page 122 when Gil says to Candy “You never liked any of us. Looking at us as if we were a breed below you. But we’re not, Candy.
We’re all made of the same bone, the same blood, the same skin. Your folks had a break, mine didn’t, that’s all. ” This shows that Candy, who is a white landowner, is prejudiced against the cajuns. When he was fifteen, Ernest Gaines moved to California to further his education. It was here, at a public library in Vallejo, California, when he first discovered his love for reading. He sought out any books that related to himself and his agrarian background. He unearthed short stories about peasant life by Anton Chekhov, Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace harkening to his Military Service, and John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath (Bridges).
But perhaps the most influential of all of the books in that library was the one that was not there. Though all of these works somehow related to his life, Gaines could not find any that were about his people: the poor, black sharecroppers of the Deep South. Gaines began his writing career in search of that book which was distinctly about him, and A Gathering of Old Men was just that book. Though A Gathering of Old Men is a distinct novel in the subtle, Southern style of Gaines, there are several allusions to works he read in the Vallejo library.
One reference to a famous civil war book is in Chapter 8, when Clatoo says of Uncle Billy, “His lips were swollen from where Mapes had hit him. He seemed as proud of his swollen lips as was Crane’s boy in The Red Badge of Courage. “(Gaines 50). Gaines’ style was also influenced by authors he read in the Vallejo Library. For example, the style in which Gaines tells the story of A Gathering of Old Men is very reminiscent of the technique of William Faulkner, a famous Southern writer, which tells the story from one character’s perspective for a chapter.
Gaines uses this approach to bring a variety of voices to the novel and add a layer of complexity that could only be achieved by using Faulkner’s approach. Additionally, A Gathering of Old Men is described as “… an honest novel by an honest, no-frills author who is committed to writing about the old way of life in the rural south… ” by Eddie Lopez in his review of the book when it was first published in 1983. In his opinion, Gaines achieved his goal of writing about his people, and”… does it better than anyone else. ” (Lopez).
The people he drew the most influence from were the wise elderly men and women from his childhood. Since his Aunt was disabled and could not travel, people from all over the plantation came to their house to talk to her and share stories. The eldest members of the plantation community had been around long enough to acquire a vast extent of life experience. These old people shared their experiences with Jefferson, discussing topics such as slavery, Reconstruction, the Great Floods of 1912 and 1927, the Civil Rights Movement, and stories of times gone by (Bridges).
Gaines listened to these conversations, and remembered them years later as he embarked on his career as an author. Some of these stories show through in the novel. For example, there are several references to slavery, such as in chapter 6 when Cherry remarks on stories of his family working the land during slavery, and comments on how the social conditions have not changed significantly since that time. The old men in A Gathering of Old Men also tell stories of the past. For example, on page 27, Chimley says “We was just sitting there talking low, talking ’bout the old days. Additionally in chapter 6, when the old men visit the graveyard, they remark on stories of the past shared with their friends whose bodies now lay to rest in that very cemetery. Gaines once noted, “the sense of Greek tragedy … keeps coming back in my writing” (Lowe 30). One of these elements is catharsis, or the cleansing of emotions of pity and fear that occurs when the reader reads the tragedy. However, catharsis in A Gathering of Old Men is exhibited by the characters rather than felt by the reader.
According to Raphael Lambert in his article in the Southern Literary Journal, the old men designedly seek catharsis through sharing their testimonies with Mapes (115). In the book, the old men have endured seven or eight decades of horrid oppression, and when Mathu, a dear friend who has always stood up for them, is suspected for murder, they find a way to finally purge their long kept emotions of decades of oppression. In chapter four, Mat comments on how he’s seventy two, and that this is his last chance to do something with his life.
He says, on page 38, “Give an old nigger like me one more chance to do something with his life. He gived me that chance, and I’m taking it… I know I’m old, maybe even crazy, but I’m going anyway. ” (Gaines). Later, he remarks “I felt kinda good, knowing me and Chimley and Cherry and the reset was doing something different, for the first time. ” (Gaines 40). This shows that finally taking a stand has emotional significance for the old men, and provides them an outlet for decades of repressed emotions. Ernest J.
Gaines’ story is one of a man searching for himself in a world and time where a black son of a sharecropper faced a great deal social animosity (Dawson 840). His introspection required courage in the face of hardship. Despite the challenges, his love for reading led him to draw on his life experiences and create literature that would ultimately define him. Gaines’ literary career not only teaches his readers about overcoming hardship, but about creating work that reflect the individuality of the author. Some men are controlled by their past, but others, like Gaines, not only overcome their past, but use it to better themselves and others.
