Butkowski 1

Matthew Butkowski

Mrs. Tharme

AP English Literature

January 17, 2017

Through A Psychological Lens: Cold Mountain

A soldier’s dangerous journey home, made even more perilous by the ongoing Civil War

and the harshness of the wilderness, Cold Mountain, written by Charles Frazier, examines

change of character through past incidents as well as current circumstances and how these

changes come to affect the character’s personality, mentality, feelings, wants, and needs. Each of

the central and minor central characters has had their personalities and views changed due to

certain experiences and circumstances, and as such their feelings and mentality have clearly been

forged by their pasts.

Inman’s main objective for the majority of the story is to return to his hometown to be

with Ada, a friend of his whom he hopes will marry him. His primary motivation for his journey

is to escape the realities of the war in which he participated in, as many of his fondest memories

recall a bloody battlefield on which he fought and killed. Due to this, he has become quick to

react to many situations, and always has his LeMat’s ready if the situation calls for it. His

experiences have hardened him, and he no longer trusts those he doesn’t know as easily. For

instance, upon his first meeting with Veasey (pg 115), he quickly takes out his gun, without even

being aware of the current situation (though his assumption is correct), in order to solve the

problem he believes is occurring. This demonstrates how much the war has affected him by

showing just how quick he has come to react to any given situation. Although, he is still kind-

hearted and helpful, as his encounters with other people prove. Such examples include a meeting
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Inman and Veasey have with a man named Junior along their way (pg 205). They offer to help

Junior by dislodging a dead bull which is in a river and contaminating the water which flows to

his house. Additionally, Inman meets a woman on the side of the road on his journey, who was

mourning over the loss of a family member. Inman offers to help this woman by digging a grave

and placing her deceased relative in the grave. Finally, Inman receives help along the way from a

girl named Sara. As he is staying at her house, a group of Federals come and take her pig, which

was to be used for a meal. Soon after, Inman reclaims the animal for Sara by killing the Federals,

and returns it to her. Overall, Inman has changed through being hardened by his war experience

and thus falls back on the offensive most of the time when dealing with a new situation, but is

still ultimately a good person at heart who would rather stay out of trouble than not.

Ada is perhaps the character that changes the most throughout the story. This is mostly

due to the circumstances required of Ruby that she must accommodate for if they are to maintain

Ada’s land, it’s upkeep, and make it through the winter. However, her past experiences have also

shaped her. Before Ruby arrives, most all of what Ada knew had come from her father’s

teachings or from what she herself learned by participating in activities of her own interest.

Among her interests include learning piano, dabbling in drawing, and reading. Additionally,

since Ruby has not been taught how to read, Ada spends their extra time reading her own books

to Ruby, who offers her views on the readings. Once Ruby arrives to help though, Ada must step

out of her comfort zone in order to make it through the winter. Ada dwells on her past often, and

any slight hint of it will draw her into a memory that she holds significant to her. Linking with

this the fact that she takes her time when making decisions, especially those which involve

getting rid of things she has an attachment to, as many of these objects hold memories of the

past. A prime example of this is when she must choose to get rid of her piano or her cabriolet,
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each of which represents a memory of her youth, and a part of herself. She ultimately chooses to

part with the piano (pg 96), but as she sees it going, it reminds her of a holiday party, some time

ago, in which she and Inman had met, complete with the first time Inman had held her. All in all,

Ada enjoys exploring different areas of interest for herself (and staying within them), and thus

has trouble learning how to do new activities, but is quite capable of doing those which she

already knows how to accomplish.

Ruby has grown up learning to adapt to her circumstances in order to survive. Left behind

most of the time by her father as a child, she has had plenty of experience in making do with

whatever presents itself, and isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. She is primarily driven by need to

stay alive, because she was not taken care of as a child, so she herself had to do so. Thus, her

view has been formed by her past, which is to plan a task and do it according to the

circumstances provided. She is a planner, a do-it-yourselfer, and does not waste time when a task

must be done. Her life motto might best be summed up by a quote from Thomas Jefferson,

“Never put off for tomorrow that which can be done today.” Above all though, Ruby is an

independent. Through her past experiences, Ruby has acquired the know-how of how to do much

with little, and has a knack for hard bargaining. One such example of this trait is when she trades

away Ada’s piano for a variety of necessities to help them last through the winter. Like Inman,

Ruby was shaped by her past circumstances, and thus can be considered tougher than one might

think. Ruby’s change, however, comes when she and Ada find her father, Stobrod, on Cold

Mountain after being shot. It is at this point Ruby must put away her disappointing past with her

father so that she may be able to save him from dying. She does this by using her knowledge of

the area to their benefit, finding shelter, and using various plants and food (which was brought

with them) to heal her father. It is here that Ruby is able to realize that the past is the past, and
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that the changes in her father may not make up for it, but he has certainly become a new person,

and she can attempt to respect that instead of leaving him as he did to her years ago.

Stobrod’s character is first shown to be one of little importance, only being a part of

Ruby’s unfortunate past and not caring much for her in the first place. However, as Stobrod

comes back into play, it is shown that he has indeed changed since he left for the war. At this

point, he has ceased his participation in the war, and has since taken up residence on Cold

Mountain along with a group of other outliers, who raid houses in the town. However, he has

even begun to break away from them too. Instead, his new interest lies in music, and he has

become a skilled fiddler, as neither the war or the society of outliers engage him, and his

participation in each has become minimal. His personality has changed as well, he does not wish

to bother anyone, but instead makes an effort to actively show his daughter Ruby how he has

changed and attempt to patch up their former father-daughter relationship. Stobrod says that this

change in him came about unexpectedly, when he was asked by one of his fellow men in the

army to play a tune for his daughter, who was quickly dying. Stobrod obliges, and plays the girl

a made-up tune, which she says was fine. With that, she dies soon after, and Stobrod considers to

take up fiddling more seriously than he ever had before (pgs 294-295). Stobrod himself even

believes it is this event which caused the change in him, and Ada too finds it curious and akin to

miracle that, of all people, Stobrod would offer himself up as proof that no matter how far one

has gone down a wrong path, there is always another one towards redemption. It is this path that

Stobrod has been attempting to return to, so that he may no longer be looked at as an outcast and

disappointment to his daughter, but rather, a respectable individual who is trying to right his past

wrongs.
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Veasey, while not playing the biggest role in Inman’s journey home, also demonstrates a

change in character from his past wrongdoings. Inman first meets Veasey as he is about to throw

a young woman off a cliff while she is sleeping, as so nobody knows what happened between

himself and the woman. By the end of their first encounter, Veasey is left tied to a tree with a

note from Inman describing the events which had happened, proving to the village that Veasey is

a hypocrite (as he is the village’s preacher). By their second meeting though, Veasey appeals to

Inman by explaining that he was exiled, knows of his misdeeds, and is now attempting to follow

a new path to right them. The trouble with this is that Veasey is easily taken over by both himself

and others, as is shown at the motel he and Inman stay at when they meet one of the waitresses

(pg 163). Additionally, Veasey would rather avoid getting his hands dirty if it means he may be

harmed in the process, as shown when Inman and Veasey come across a beehive and Veasey

says he swells up when stung, and that Inman should get the honey (pg 154). This may be true,

or it may be a lie to get out of doing the work. However, later, in a similar scenario when they

come across a giant catfish, it is Veasey who dives in to try to wrestle it to land where they can

kill it and eat it, demonstrating a change of character for himself (pg 158). A final example of

Veasey’s change comes directly before he dies. As the Home Guard begins firing upon those

they have caught (Inman and Veasey among them), Veasey steps forward in an effort to stop

them, saying that “It is not too late to stop this meanness.” This is the most clear example of a

change in Veasey, as he acknowledges his wrongs in his past, but even as late as it is for him,

wishes to change himself, and he urges the Home Guard men to do the same. It is somewhat

unfortunate then, that Veasey is among those who fall dead in this shooting, even as Inman

survives.
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In certain respects, Oswald Yuan Chin Chang’s literary criticism “Home, Journey and

Landscape in Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain: The Mirroring of Internal Processes in the

External World and the Literary Construction of Space” agrees with this claim. Chang uses the

novel as evidence for his claim, and says that when Inman is presented with predictability his

feelings are as follows, ““if a man dedicated himself to the idea that the future will inevitably be

worse than the past and that time is a path leading nowhere but a place of deep and persistent

threat” (p. 16).”, and follows up by commenting “He has lost his orientation and his will to

live.”. In this respect, Chang uses the novel to support his claim by quoting Inman and focuses

on the idea of the future being worse than the past (and for Inman, a violent recent past), and that

this has influenced his will to live, which has recently left him. Of course, as explained earlier, it

has also influenced a number of other aspects which define Inman’s character.

To conclude, Frazier’s novel is, on the surface, a tale about a soldier, deserting his

regiment, and returning home as well as how the girl he loves is faring, but goes much deeper

than that. It thoroughly provides an in-depth analysis of each central and minor central

character’s change through their past and their current circumstances, as well as examining how

these changes affect each character’s view on life. With this comes a change in personality,

moral belief, mentality, and feelings towards the world around them. It is quite evident then, that

Frazier’s novel is not only what it appears on the surface, but is also a message which indicates

that the character of people is defined by their past experiences and incidents, and that these are

what form their views, personalities, feelings, and overall way of life. Word Count: 2131

Works Cited

Chang, Oswald Yuan Chin. "Home, Journey and Landscape in Charles Frazier’s Cold

Mountain: The Mirroring of Internal Processes in the External World and the Literary
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Construction of Space." Contemporary Literary Criticism, edited by Lawrence J. Trudeau, vol.

396, Gale, 2016. Literature Resource Center, Accessed 22 Jan. 2017. Originally published in

Nebula, vol. 4, no. 4, 2007

Frazier, Charles. Cold Mountain. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1997. Print.