The Call of the Canyon

I don't use a boxed curriculum for literature. See this post about that. There is just so much good literature out there. And I feel taking items out of context in a work really does that work a disservice. I understand public schools have to do what they can to expose children to as much good literature as they can (within approved limits), but isn't that part of the luxury of homeschool? Reading whole books? Not just snippets here and there?

Add to that, I know my son's reading level, and although he's a solid reader, I don't think he's ready for Chaucer yet. I have looked at a few books and said a definite "No" for now. Like Aldus Huxley's A Brave New World. Great read, just not at our speed right now. Plus, ex-utero reproduction. Ick. Let's finish biology first!

So I just finished Zane Grey's The Call of the Canyon. I tell my husband that Zane Grey is what Louis L'Amour wanted to be when he grew up. I like Louis L'Amour, don't get me wrong, Zane is less cowboy, more wild west in my opinion.

I wasn't sure I wanted to share this book with my 14 year old son at first. I liked it ok, I suppose in the beginning. But it was told from a woman's perspective. I didn't think he'd understand that. Carly is a Manhattan socialite after World War I. Her fiancee, Glenn came back a changed man after his service in France. The story revolves around his change, his recovery in the wilds of Arizona, how she changed as a person after her visit to see him, and ultimately her evaluation of the worth of her life outside of work.

Once Carly was in Arizona, I really fell into the book and started strongly considering it for my son. It could have gotten very trite, very fast as an idle love story. But Carly is challenged to meet the tasks before her in Arizona, something she wasn't used to in her life back home of constant entertainment and materialism. "She could hate an obstacle, yet feel something of pride in holding her own against it." Oh, what this book says about us right now!!! So many teens are exactly where Carly was, lounging, pondering, entertaining, chatting. Carly didn't realize what a pointless existence she was living until she was faced with battling for survival. Until she saw that her greatest contribution as a woman might just be being a support and help-meet to a husband who risked all for her in battle.

"She understood then why she would have wanted to surrender herself to a man made manly by toil; she understood how a woman instinctively leaned toward the protection of a man who had used his hands- who had strength and red blood and virility who could fight like the progenitors of the race. Any toil was splendid that served this end for any man."

Ok, yeah, that sounds very anti-feminist, more so than the rest of the book, but it does show how veterans who did fight for our country must feel when they come home to those who didn't or won't make the same sacrifices. Carly comes to see herself as someone for whom motherhood and marriage can be a powerful, meaningful tool for advancing the human race, specifically in America.

"On the one side greed, selfishness, materialism: on the other generosity, sacrifice, and idealism. Which of them builded for the future? She saw men as wolves, sharks, snakes, vermin and opposed to them men as lions and eagles. She saw women who did not inspire men to fare forth to seek, to imagine, to dream, to hope, to work, to fight. She began to have a glimmering of what a woman might be."

The vocabulary was spot-on. Perfect for his level. I'll add a vocab list by chapter next week. Email me if you need it sooner. I will give the caveat that Grey uses the phrase "make love" a few times, and it means flirt, not what the phrasing means now. Point that out to a young reader that may not get that in the reading.

Happy reading!

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