I just finished The Hunger, by Alma Katsu, and I couldn’t help but see signs and omens everywhere, particularly since they were explicitly mentioned in the text itself.
In this book, the ill-fated Donner Party meets starvation and cannibalism and something else; they are stalked by what appear to be human-like wolves. A sense of foreboding haunts every page. And, as you’ll see in our chosen passage, the company’s bad fortune and disastrous end are foreshadowed from the beginning.
Let’s begin, as always, with the text. Here’s today’s passage:
The wagon train had already suffered misfortune after misfortune: signs, all of them, if you knew how to interpret them. Just last week, she opened a barrel of flour to find it infested with weevils. It had to be thrown out, of course, an expensive loss. The following night, a woman–Philippine Keseberg, young wife to one of the less savory men on the wagon train–had delivered stillborn. Tamsen grimaced, remembering how the darkness of the prairie seemed to enfold the woman’s wailing, trapping it in the air around them.
Then there were the wolves following them; one family lost its entire supply of dried meat to them, and the wolves had even carried off a squealing newborn calf.
And now, a boy was missing.
“The wolves,” Tamsen said. She hadn’t meant to connect the two incidents, but she couldn’t help it.
This passage appears on page 19 and portends the events in the remainder of the book. All of these disparate elements are linked. But let’s look more closely at the idea that these initial misfortunes suffered by the wagon train were “signs, all of them, if you knew how to interpret them.” There are four signs Tamsen delineates:
- A barrel of flour infested with weevils
- A stillborn child delivered by the wife of an unsavory man
- Wolves stalking the wagon train
- A child that went missing in the night
How can we interpret each of these signs? What do they mean? I thought I’d look to another text to add to the discussion. Enter 10,000 Dreams Interpreted, by Gustavus Hindman Miller. While we are taking these out of the dream context, I think looking at these signs as symbols can help guide our reading of the text.
First up, weevils. Weevils are beetles, and a beetle “denotes poverty and small ills.” Flour on the other hand “denotes a frugal but happy life.” Next is a stillborn child, a sad and ill omen on its own, but it also “denotes that some distressing incident will come before your notice.” Third is the pack of wolves stalking the wagon train and setting upon a newborn calf. A wolf devouring a lamb is said to denote that “innocent people will suffer at the hands of insinuating and designing villains.” Finally, losing a child in the darkness “portends many provocations to wrath” and that “trials in business and love will beset you.”
It doesn’t take a seer to read the signs above; they all point to bad, bad luck. However, delving into the signs as symbols adds meaning to the text. The image of the weevil contaminating the flour is a metaphor for poverty and small ills contaminating a frugal but happy life. The wagon train company starts out frugal and happy and hopeful, but misfortune haunts them and poverty (of rations and kindness) and other small ills contaminate their community.
The stillborn child portends that distressing incidents will come before your notice. Distressing incidents are, indeed, already upon the Donner/Reed Party. The stillborn child could be a metaphor for the wagon train itself. Everything is ready, they have started on their journey, and yet it will all come to naught. The wailing of the mother and the unsavory father of the stillborn child add even more despair to the description. This child, like the next, was lost in the night, and the company, too, will be lost in darkness.
The missing child portends trials to come. Indeed, trial upon trial will be heaped upon this group as it fractures and splinters. The newborn calf, innocent children, and the ill in the party succumb first. But the evil (be it disease, human, or supernatural) does not stop once the weak are gone. The idea that the loss of a child means you will be provoked to wrath also plays out in the story. As times get more desperate, as rations are depleted and the winter approaches, wrath and fear appear throughout the company.
Finally, the wolves descending in the story actually are and represent insinuating and designing villains. In this story there are many in the party who see themselves as villains because of their past desires or sins or perceived sins. And then there are those in the party who actually are villains, who plot against the others and attempt to manipulate the situation to their own benefit. But one of the things I enjoyed most about the book is that it explores the vast areas of gray. The monsters have redeeming qualities. The heroes have sinned. Life is fraught and complicated and beautiful.
How do you interpret the signs in the text? What else do you see in this passage?
Textual Play 