Home | Religion

Norman Maclean’s Black Ghost and Jacob at Peniel
By: Sabovision

Norman Maclean begins his final book with a short story titled “Black Ghost”. In this essay I will make the case that Maclean’s short story “Black Ghost” and the narrative of Jacob wrestling at Peniel (Genesis 32: 22-32) run exactly parallel. Given Maclean’s religious background, his style of writing, and his close attention to the Bible as a source for telling stories, it should be of no surprise that the narrative in Genesis serves as a framework for telling the story of a fire at fish creek as a possible encounter with God in nature.

First I will begin with a word about Maclean, and then make my case. Norman Fitzroy Maclean was born in Clarinda, Iowa on December 23, 1902. The oldest of two children, he would formulate few memories of Iowa as he would move to Montana when he was 7 years old. He was the first son of a fiery, theologically sophisticated Scottish Presbyterian minister named John Norman Maclean and a devoted mother named Clara (Davidson) Maclean.

On February 28, 1909 The Reverend John Maclean accepted a call from the First Presbyterian Church, Missoula, Montana and the family (including Norman’s brother Paul) moved to Missoula. In Montana, the boys were home schooled by their father in religion, literature and fly-fishing until 1913. Maclean wrote of this in A River Runs Through It:

I cannot tell you how much of life 15 minutes can be when you are six, seven, eight, nine or ten years old and alone with a red-headed Presbyterian minister and cannot answer one of his questions and he won’t go on to the next and there is no one else in the room he can turn to and ask and it is going to be the same way tomorrow.

Maclean’s home education stressed the economy of writing the American language , the rhythm of the Bible, and the art of fly-fishing. The best treatment of this period of his life can be found in his short story “The Woods, Books, and Truant Officer".

In 1920 Maclean enrolled at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire and graduated with an A.B. in 1924. Maclean is an interesting addition to the Dartmouth student body as he came from a non-typical background for the college. In fact, Maclean fit the profile that the new president Ernst Martin Hopkins was searching for. Hopkins was interested in diversifying the student body of Dartmouth and the son of a Montana preacher, educated by a public school, fit his view of diversity. At Dartmouth Maclean was equally interested in the act of writing as he was in learning this craft, as historical recollections indicate he spent considerable time working in the editorial offices of the Jack-O-Lantern, watching and participating in sporting events, and playing poker than some of his more scholarly classmates. Maclean graduated in 1925 and finished a very respectable 92nd of 378. From 1924 to 1926 Maclean was a teaching assistant at Dartmouth in the English department and began to develop his craft of teaching.

In 1928 Maclean began to teach at the University of Chicago in the English department; he retired 45 years later a distinguished professor and award-winning teacher. In 1940 he received his PhD. from the University of Chicago. His dissertation was titled The Theory of Lyric Poetry in England From the Renaissance to Coleridge. While teaching at The University of Chicago Maclean won the coveted Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching an unprecedented three times. He served as dean of students from 1942-45, from 1943-45 as the director of the Institute on Military Studies at the University of Chicago, from 1952-66 as chair of the Committee on General Studies in the Humanities, and as the William Rainey Harper Distinguished Professor of English from 1962 until his retirement in 1973.

In 1931 Maclean married Jesse Burns, his father performing the ceremony on 24 September. In 1942 his daughter Jean was born and in 1943 his son John was born. In 1968 his wife Jessie died and this event really changed his life, as it marks the beginning of a period of intense literary output until 1987. After his retirement in 1973 an award was created in his name for teaching excellence, and a scholarship hall was named after him at the University of Chicago.
Maclean’s first book was published under unusual circumstances. During World War Two Maclean served as “Acting Director for the Institute on Military Studies” (1943-45) and co-authored, with Everett C. Olson, a Manual of Instruction in Military Maps and Aerial Photographs. He published the novella A River Runs Through It in 1976. The 1949 Mann Gulch fire took place near Helena, Montana, which killed 13 smokejumpers, became the subject of his book Young Men and Fire (1992). Norman Maclean became too ill to write in 1987 and died at the age of 87 on August 2nd ,1990 in Chicago. In 1992 Young Men and Fire was published.

When discussing Maclean’s life it is worth a look at Maclean’s father, as his religious and theological understanding of the world begins with his father, and Maclean makes note of this influence on his writing when he comments in 1985, while writing Young Men and Fire, that his father “…put hard marks on him that were not lost”. Furthermore, when commenting on his success with A River Runs Through It, Maclean says that his father is “co-author” of the book.
Maclean began working intensely on Young Men and Fire in 1975, after completing the final draft of A River Runs Through It.

Young Men and Fire is about an incident that took place on August 5, 1949. At the time, Maclean was staying at his cabin for the summer while teaching at the University of Chicago for the balance of the year. Each day he would go to the post office and collect his mail. The postmistress had the habit of keeping everyone informed of local news and she told Maclean about the tragedy at Mann Gulch. At this point he contacted his brother-in-law at Wolf Creek, and they went to the location together. It was during this early trip that he saw a deer emerge from the smoke and this event is recorded in “Black Ghost”. He and his brother-in-law poked around a bit and viewed the fire burning itself out on the Willow Creek side of the gulch.

Young Men and Fire is prefaced by a short story titled “Black Ghost”. Some view this story as Maclean’s attempt to write the story of Mann Gulch as he wrote A River Runs Through It, as narrative with Maclean as a central actor, and clearly the editors were wise to include it. The story is a semi-fictional account of Maclean’s early experience with a fire that chased him up a hillside, an attack by a mysterious “man” and his recovery. What is striking about the story is the symmetry to Jacob’s wrestling (Genesis 32:22-32) at Peniel with the “man”. In “Black Ghost” Maclean is attacked by something, possibly a local drunk pressed into service to fight the fire, but he is not sure.
The geological similarity begins the comparison. In Genesis Jacob and his family cross the river Jabbok and that sets the physical landscape for the struggle. In “Black Ghost” Maclean makes note of “Fish Creek” and the role that it will play as a fire line in his struggle. Both actors are being forced into their situation by external factors; Jacob is being pursued by Laban (Esau), and Maclean by fire.

Maclean stresses the supernatural aspect of the story immediately when he introduces the story and writes, “I had once seen a ghost”. As each narrative begins, both Maclean and Jacob are alone, but starting out they have company, in fact they are safe with the company they travel with. To make the transition from a group to an individual in the narrative Maclean switches from the plural “we” to the singular “I” in the narration between the first and second paragraph on page 5. As the story progresses Maclean speaks only in the singular. The change first occurs when he writes, “It came so close it sounded as if it were cracking bones, and mine were the only bones around”. Genesis 32:24 recounts that although Jacob left with his family, “Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.”

As in the narrative about Jacob, the reader of “Black Ghost” does not know for sure who the attacker is, but the construction of the story indicates the adversary is possibly human, possibly supernatural and we are left with a lurking doubt. Maclean raises this doubt when he writes, “Halfway or more toward the top I heard a voice beside me when the roar of the main fire was reduced for a moment…The voice may have come down with a burning branch, or it may have belonged to a member of our pickup crew…” Genesis 32:26-28 raises intentional confusion with the reports that “He said…”; the reader does not know the subject of these statements and the confusion is furthered when the narrator refers to the adversary as a “man” and Jacob claims that “For I have seen God face to face and yet my life is preserved”. Did he wrestle with God, with a man or with a God-man? Many less academic accounts of the Genesis passage refer to this story as “Jacob wrestling with the angel” as this type of being seems to cover the “God-man” aspect, without calling upon the name of Christ. The passage in Genesis is intentionally mysterious. Maclean mimics this literary style when he writes, “The black ghost had a red face. In more leisurely times he could have been an alcoholic…Then suddenly in his face there was a blowup, a reflection of something either behind him or in him…” Furthermore-a point that is especially revealing-Maclean refers to the attacker as “what” and “he” in the same sentence. Maclean writes, “Here I stopped and went looking for what had done it, but he was far up the hill…” This is intentional confusion generated by Maclean between an object or a person, or possibly a person as an object.

The combat is recorded in Genesis as a draw between Jacob and the “man”. In “Black Ghost” even this becomes unclear. Genesis reports (32:25), “When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob he struck him on the hip socket.” Maclean, with characteristic economy, writes “…and he slapped me.” Both final blows deliver the character to their fate, Jacob to a name change, and Maclean to a race against death. What stands out for most readers in each narrative is the suddenness with which the attacks come to both Jacob and Maclean. In the biblical narrative all of a sudden Jacob is attacked and he is engaged in a fight. The narrative reads, “Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.” No warning, no construction of the circumstances or description of the assailant, just a sudden movement to the act of wrestling. In Maclean’s narrative the attack also comes out of nowhere and explodes on the reader; Maclean’s account reads, “…and he slapped me in the face.” The abruptness of each attack marks something unique to each narrative that makes the reader center on this action and raise the question, why? To what end is this done?
Biblical commentator John S. Kselman notes that after wrestling, Jacob “reaches full maturity” as does Maclean in “Black Ghost” when in the end of the story he runs all the way to a cabin of a woman who he is sure will offer safety and comfort. After the terror subsides Maclean also matures. Maclean writes, “After a pail and a half of cold water I no longer needed an Indian mother, and I wanted to make this clear.”
Shared Narrative Elements

Genesis 32: 22-32 Maclean’s “Black Ghost”

The family crosses the river Jabbok Maclean crosses Fish Creek

Jacob is pursued by Laban (Esau) Maclean is pursued by fire

Jacob begins in the safety his family Maclean begins in the safety of firefighters

Jacob is left alone Maclean is left alone

Jacob is not warned of the attack Maclean is not warned of the attack

The attacker could be human The attacker could be human

The attacker has supernatural qualities The attacker has supernatural qualities

The narrative conveys confusion The narrative conveys confusion

The attacker could be God The attacker is both referred to as a “what” and a “he”

The combat is a draw The combat is a draw

The attack delivers one critical blow to Jacob The attacker delivers one critical blow to Maclean

The blow changes Jacob’s fate The blow changes Maclean’s fate

Jacob reaches “full maturity” after the attack Maclean reaches “full maturity” after the attack

Similar to the larger text of Young Men and Fire, Maclean draws parallels to well-known biblical narratives that match the story. In 1977 Maclean called attention to the heavy theological tone of his work when he wrote, “One of my editors admitted to me that he spent two evenings looking through the Bible and Biblical concordances for the source of the title of the book, A River Runs Through It”.

Article Source: http://journal.ilovephilosophy.com

Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It, p. 82 Maclean makes use of this phrase “the American language” in “The Woods, Books, and Truant Officers”(83) A research trip is planned to Dartmouth for the Fall of 2003. I have received all Maclean’s records from Dartmouth. His transcript indicated that he took a year of philosophy (2 courses), however it does not indicate any reading list for these courses. I am hopeful that more research will uncover the works assigned in these classes. N

Please Rate this Article

 

Not yet Rated

Click the XML Icon Above to Receive Religion Articles Via RSS!
Additional Articles From - Home | Religion
Sign Up as an Author.
Submit Articles
Member Login
Top Authors
Most Popular Articles
Submission Guidelines
Ezine Notifications
Article RSS Feeds
New Stuff
Forum
Link to Us
Contact Us

Powered by Article Dashboard