Southern Spaces

In the Big Jim incident and in a later episode describing a battle between two hometown gangs, the physically slight and scrawny Guthrie improbably casts himself as a fighter of great power and renown, licking the biggest of kids. Guthrie's fighting skills in this regard remind one of Tom Sawyer, who frequently bests his classmates in battle. Over the course of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, another story of a reckless youth inspired by the Old Southwestern Humorists, Tom gets into several scrapes, from his first meeting with a new boy in town whose "citified air" (8) irks Tom, to his quarrels with his "bosom friend [ . . . ] Joe Harper" (55). Tom and Joe "were sworn friends all the week and embattled enemies on Saturdays" (55). For Twain, as for Guthrie, a willingness and ability to fight are signs of a healthy boyhood. Fighting does not keep Tom Sawyer and Joe Harper from remaining fast friends; the same is true of Woody and Big Jim. Fighting is also a demonstration of the boy hero's masculinity. For while it is true that Guthrie allows his protagonist a greater insight into the politics of fighting than Twain does, it is also true that he allows young Woody to win.

When we recall Guthrie's slight stature, we may conclude that the author's real talent lies in his prodigious powers of exaggeration rather than his fighting skills. Guthrie's excessive bragging likens him to great "yarnspinners" (Blair and Hill 205) like Jim Doggett, the boastful protagonist of Thomas Bangs Thorpe's "The Big Bear of Arkansas." In Bound for Glory, however, the point of such bragging is quite different from that of Thorpe's "Big Bear." Guthrie is respectful of the powers of nature, as Doggett is, but his focus is always explicitly and consciously political. Woody, Big Jim, and Little Jim are aware of their common interests and the power of the mob. They naturally fall to redistribution of wealth amongst the "workers" of the fight game.

Like the fight with Big Jim, the battle Guthrie describes between two rival gangs is an opportunity to comment on the inequities of capitalism. Like Twain, Guthrie both romanticizes boyhood innocence and deplores the corrupting influences of the adult world. Guthrie describes the effect of Oklahoma's boom and bust oil speculation economy on his home town, especially its children:

Woody characteristically sides with the underdog and uses his talents with language to further the cause. He writes the new gang's "Declaration of Independence" in the form of a letter of challenge to the old gang:

Like a young Thomas Jefferson in "dirty overhauls," Woody again crafts a scenario of childhood troubles reinvented as political lesson. The battle which follows is nothing less than the American Revolution recast as a socialist revolt, freeing the young workers of Okemah, Oklahoma, from the tyranny of a ten-year-old King George. These exaggerated exploits not only further Guthrie's socialist ideals; they elevate the character of young Woody into an idealized home-spun hero, a model of American virtue. The incident speaks to Guthrie's socialist politics, his respect for the workingman, and his innate faith in democracy and equality. However, as in the fight with Big Jim, Guthrie wins the fight before his lofty political principals are articulated.

While Woody the fighter brings Tom Sawyer to mind, Woody the peacemaker is conversely reminiscent of Huck Finn, another Old Southwestern-inspired, youthful dialect speaker who seeks to avoid conflict. While forced to live amongst corrupt adults, Huck tries to ensure that no one is seriously harmed by the actions of himself or his companions. Always the outsider looking in, young Woody is likewise constantly taken aback at human cruelty, so much so that one can imagine him muttering under his breath, as Huck Finn did, "Human beings can be awful cruel to one another" (182--emphasis original). And while Guthrie retains his capacity for empathy with the downtrodden into adulthood, the most affecting of these episodes unfold during his youth.