The Tree of Man(1955)Theme

The Tree of Man(1955)Theme

v  A domestic novel about Parker family.

            The Tree of Man is the fourth published novel by the Australian novelist and 1973 Nobel Prize-winner, Patrick White. It is a domestic drama chronicling the lives of the Parker family and their changing fortunes over many decades. It is steeped in Australian folklore and cultural myth, and is recognized as the author's attempt to infuse the idiosyncratic way of life in the remote Australian bush with some sense of the cultural traditions and ideologies that the epic history of Western civilization has bequeathed to Australian society in general

v  Spiritual Issues :-

            In the novel, ‘The Tree of Man’, Patrick White deals with  ambivalence in everything, good and evil, joy and suffering, love and hate, life and death, male and female,  macrocosm and microcosm, drama and actuality.  The action of the novel progresses through the stages of innocence, experience, and death and reconciliation. He draws Australiaas a cold and empty and hollow, a country which seems dull and deadly – a background for his works. The novelist White points out that man is spiritual seekers. He transcends laws and commandments of religion. Spiritual related him to the eternal and the infinite. This shows that man has a higher dimension which transcends his physical and social personality. He is essentially spiritual. His true Religion leads his towards of realization of divinity within

v  Stan’s Longing for Permanence:-

            Stan is the protagonist of this novel. In the novel White portrays the married life of Stan Parker, a farmer of Durilgai and his wife Amy. The word ‘tree’ in the title of this novel stands for Stan’s quest of growth, for inexhaustible life. In Stan we find ‘the melancholic longing for permanence, while Amy stands of motion in life. Stan’s mother expects him to be teacher of a preacher. He should teach the people ‘the word of poets and God; but the young Stan sets out ins each of permanence. He removes all the bushes from his farm and whishes that his wife should live peacefully in his ‘honest house’ Here they take roots. They milk cows and grow cabbages. Amy plants garden. The neighbours also join them.

v  Married Life and Tension :-

            Another influence that proves to be a shaping force in the development of the action of this novel is the benison between the husband and the wife. When Stan takes Amy home just after his marriage, his cart jolts through the windy countryside. On the way, he dos don’t waste his time by talking to her or by showing her the beautiful scene around. He identifies himself simply with the permanence. Referring to Amy’s response to such a cold treatment White remarks, “She had begun to hate the wind, and the distance, and the road, because her importance tended to dwindle. She is a radical woman. She is restless and hungry of Stan’s love. The rose bush which she plants in the first days of her marriage serves as an outward sign of her emotions. Amy’s rose bush is juxtaposed to Stan’s tree. The giant size of the trees overshadows the robe bush. We find the same image of rose bush in White’s earlier novel, ‘The Aunt’s Story” and also in Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”.

v  Stan’s spiritual rebirth.  

            Later on, Amy becomes older and harder. The roses and cabbages of her youth are replaced in her middle age by the shrubs. After her adultery with Leo, she reaches the climax of her frustration and despair. She realizes that she has never been worthy of Stan. This illumination of her should make her weary. On the mirror of her room, she writes the word, ‘Leo’ an act shameful if desirable, but soon she rubs it off savagely. Stan is aware of her affair with Leo. His discovery of Amy’s infidelity leads him to his loss of faith in God as well as man. So his life continues. He endured tension and feel that ‘only the present is real’. Both Amy and Stan accept each other’s mastery. After a temporary psyche death there is a gradual evolution of Stan’s spiritual rebirth.  

v  Generation Gap:-

            Another importance and vividly drawn theme in the novel is the generation gap between father and son.  Stan’s children, Ray and Thelma are a disappointment to him. They show the inability of love deeply; to express strong emotion, even to form friendships because they revel in their own world of thoughts. Stan is inaccessible and lacks affection, while Amy is possessive. She drives Ray away from her. Thelma does a secretarial course at the College for Business Girls and later marries her employer, Dudley Forsdyke in an attempt to achieve gentility and perfection. For her, love means a house and other possessions. Her marriage is without love. She has the spirituality and sexuality of her father. Sometimes she rises to great heights but fails to remain there. On the other handy, Ray hates the gentleness in himself and ruins his life. He shares familiar fascination and disloyalties of Amy he deserts his first wife, Elsie who has a with whom Amy develops a strange attachment. Later on, Ray leaves his mistress, Lola and is shot in the stomach. Thus the writer very cleverly juxtaposes the fire within and without the fire of passion.

v  Predicament of Man:

            The predication of man in Durilgai- the settlement which had began with Stan’s house is to live in nature. The people who lived in the colony were not disturbed by any higher values of life. They were simple folks and believed in living rather than other things. Patrick White offers his commenting sayings

            “One lived. Almost no one questioned the purpose of living. One was born one lived.”

            Stan was an exception to this kind of lives. He, time and again refers to lightening. “ natural phenomenon which stand for a number of thing.” A kind of punishment for sings, making one aware of horror of life or a flash of thing point towards truth.  Thus is the predicament.

v  Search of Identity:-

            It has the major preoccupation thematically that it refers to the identical issue of Australia. He writes the Australian history artistically and metaphorically. That is why it is said,

“It (The Tree of Man) is a book of Australian geneses.”

            Here Stan is the outsider who developed his own history. White depicts no conflict between aborigines and settlers. It gives a picture of Australian life. He gives Australian experience in 19^th century through the chapter of the novel. Vastness and Natural richness of the continent is visible. It is convey through the wild life, thick forest, aural calamites, by the descriptive power of at the atuheor. The gradual change is depicted through

Stan-Ray-Elsie’s son.

            Stan is found in search of identity which e achieves through his grandson. Basic problems faced by the society are articulated very well by him. Day to day requirement,  protection from calamities, anxiety of losing culture, psychological loneliness, connection with cities are some them.

v  Typical Common Wealth Text

            Above all themes along with the following two points it becomes a typical common wealth text-

a.       Like common wealth writer, he uses English language but he doesn’t mind following Austrian touch. It is deliberately creative English. E..g later spelling- changes, structure-proverbs-metaphor-idioms-Australian atmosphere etc.

b.      He does not hesitate in bringing Australian informal English into literary text. He gives reference to Australian life, birds, tress, season, animal. He plays with grammar change spelling ect.

      Thus this text become a typical commonwealth text. Here Australian experiences are articulated in vast form.

v  Conclusion:

            Thus Patrick White tries to detect the metaphysical and philosophical problems. He discuses basic issues of life. E.g. life and death, future, love, marriage, relation with past, nature and man etc. Thus are the themes of Patrick White in His book ‘Tree of Man.