All the King's Men (Cliffs Notes)

www.cliffs.com

ALL THE KING'S MEN Notes including • Life and Background of the Author • List of Characters • Introduction to the Novel • Critical Commentaries • Character Analyses • Critical Essays • Essay Topics and Review Questions • Works by Robert Penn Warren • Selected Bibliography by L. David Allen, Ph.D. University of Nebraska

LINCOLN, NEBRASKA 68501 1-800-228-4078

www.cliffs.com ISBN 0-8220-7004-9 ©Copyright 1982 by Cliffs Notes, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

1

www.cliffs.com

LIFE AND BACKGROUND OF THE AUTHOR Most writers are satisfied if they are successful in one or two areas of just one literary genre. A few have been successful in two genres. In comparison with the usual career of a writer, however, Robert Penn Warren's career is astounding. He is a prize-winning novelist who has written ten novels. He is also a prizewinning poet who has published thirteen collections of poetry. Indeed, he is the only American writer to have been awarded Pulitzer Prizes for both poetry and fiction. In addition, he is one of the most important critical theorists in America in the twentieth century, and, with Cleanth Brooks, he has written and edited several textbooks for literature and rhetoric that have had a major impact on the way those subjects are taught. He has also written other literary criticism, a number of fine short stories, plus biography and drama, as well as authored several works that analyze and critique our social customs. Most of these accomplishments as a writer were achieved during a full career as a college teacher who was uniformly acclaimed by his students. This amazing career began in Guthrie, Kentucky, where Robert Penn Warren was born on April 24,1905. His father, Robert Franklin Warren, was a businessman, and his mother, Anna Ruth Penn Warren, was a school teacher. Robert Penn Warren was their eldest son. Warren attended school in Guthrie until 1920 when, at the age of fifteen, he began high school in Clarksville, Tennessee, just across the border from Guthrie. He graduated at the end of that year, and that fall, at the age of sixteen, he began college at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. There he met a number of stimulating people. Although he had originally planned to become a scientist, he found his freshman science course rather boring. His freshman English course under John Crowe Ransom was, however, intensely interesting to him. Ransom's invitation to take "English 9," an advanced composition course, helped Warren to decide that he wanted to study literature instead of science. As a result, he took courses from Donald Davidson, who stimulated an interest in Beowulf, Chaucer, modern poetry, and writing, and he also took classes from Walter Clyde Curry, whose literary approach combined an interest in philosophy with an interest in history. Ransom, Davidson, and Curry were all members of the Fugitives, a group of faculty and students interested in poetry. They gave great emphasis to a rigorous, careful examination of poetic structures. Poems, written by members of the group, were read aloud while others followed on mimeographed copies. A probing and frank discussion of the merits and of the weaknesses of the poem followed. Warren was brought into this group by two fellow students who were members, Allen Tate and Ridley Wills. They brought him to meetings as a sophomore, although Warren did not officially become a Fugitive until the spring of his junior year at Vanderbilt. Association with the Fugitives gave Warren a sense that poetry was a vital force that was important to the world of ideas and to life; it also laid the basis for his later work in literary criticism. Allen Tate also helped Warren launch his career as a writer. While at Vanderbilt, Tate urged Warren to show his poetry to the editors of The Fugitive and The Double Dealer, and he was soon publishing them. For example, Warren had twenty-four poems in The Fugitive during his junior and senior years; the first, "Crusade," was published in June 1923. Several years later, during the summer of 1928, Tate also helped Warren to get a commission to write a biography of John Brown. Appearing in November 1929, John Brown: The Making of a Martyr was Warren's first published book. Warren graduated summa cum laude in 1925. That fall he began graduate study in English at the University of California, Berkeley. He was a teaching fellow, and his major interests were Elizabethan tragedy and sixteenth- and seventeenth-century English poetry. Compared with the literary atmosphere that

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

2

www.cliffs.com

he had been involved in at Vanderbilt, where the major topics of discussion were poets such as Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot, the interests at California were, he thought, fifty years behind the times, with Marx and Engels central figures in the discussions. Warren received his master's degree from the University of California in 1927. He immediately began further graduate study at Yale. In 1928, he was named a Rhodes Scholar to Oxford University; he was granted his B. Litt. from Oxford in 1930. His two years in England gave him a chance to look at his background from a distance and to gain a degree of detachment from it. While at Oxford, Warren got to know Cleanth Brooks, who was also a Rhodes Scholar and a Vanderbilt alumnus; this friendship led into an extremely successful collaboration on several textbooks. Before he left Oxford, Warren had written "The Briar Patch," his contribution to the agrarian manifesto I'll Take My Stand, and had been commissioned to write a long story for American Caravan (his first published story, "Prime Leaf," appeared in American Caravan in 1931). When he returned from England, Warren began a forty-three-year teaching career. In the fall of 1930, Warren was made Assistant Professor of English at Southwestern College in Memphis. That same year, he married San Franciscan Emma Brescia, to whom he had become engaged in 1925. For the 1931 academic year, Warren moved to Vanderbilt, where he was Assistant Professor of English for three years. While at Vanderbilt, Warren wrote a novel that was rejected by several publishers; a second novel two years later met the same fate. Another particularly important period in Warren's career began in 1934, when he became Assistant Professor of English at Louisiana State University. His stay at LSU coincided with the height of Huey Long's power, and Warren had a chance to watch, first-hand, Long's political maneuverings. Critics have long tried to find the sources for Warren's fiction in his experiences, a tendency that has been fueled by the similarities between Willie Stark and Huey Long. It is true that All the King's Men seems to have had its genesis in 1937-38, while Warren was at LSU; his poetry certainly suggests that he was thinking seriously about decency, democracy, and power at the time. Cleanth Brooks was also at Louisiana State at this time, and Warren’s collaboration with him produced several textbooks that had a major impact on literary study: An Approach to Literature (1936; edited by Brooks, Warren, and John T. Purser); Understanding Poetry (1938); Understanding Fiction (1943); and Modern Rhetoric, with Readings (1949; also published without readings as Fundamentals of Good Writing: A Handbook of Modern Rhetoric). In 1935, Warren, with Brooks, Charles W. Pipkin, and Albert Erskine, founded The Southern Review. His first collection of poetry, Thirty-Six Poems, was published in 1935, and his first novel, Night Rider, was published in 1939. A Guggenheim Fellowship allowed Warren to spend the1939-40 academic year in Italy, where he wrote Proud Flesh, a verse drama that was the forerunner of All the King's Men (the central character is very similar, at least in outline, to Willie Stark; the role of Jack Burden became essential to make the novel work). Warren also edited a collection of short stories by southern writers during this period. In 1942, Warren left LSU to become Professor of English at the University of Minnesota. Warren did not particularly want to leave Louisiana State, but opposition had indicated the demise of The Southern Review, and Louisiana State would not meet the salary offered by Minnesota. Warren took this as an invitation to leave, and he did so. He spent seven years at Minnesota, leaving there to become Professor of Playwriting at the Yale Drama School in 1950; in 1961, he became Professor of English at Yale, and in 1973, he became Professor Emeritus at Yale. During his years at Minnesota and at Yale, Warren continued to produce high-quality material in a variety of genres, both as a writer and as an editor. He also continued to win awards for his writing. He was named

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

3

www.cliffs.com

Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 1944; he won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction (for All the King's Men) in 1946 and for poetry (for Promises: Poems 1954-1956) in 1957. He was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1959, and he was awarded the National Medal for Literature in 1970, in recognition of his total contribution to literature. After his retirement in 1973, Warren did not stop writing; indeed, he had at least one volume published in each year (through 1980.) He also continued to gather awards, including the Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award given in America; it was presented in the Rose Garden of the White House in June 1980. Warren died in 1989.

AWARDS AND HONORS 1928 Rhodes Scholar, Oxford University 1936 Houghton Mifflin Literary Fellowship 1939 Guggenheim Fellowship 1944 Consultant in Poetry, Library of Congress 1947 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (for All the King's Men) Guggenheim Fellowship 1949 First honorary degree, University of Louisville (other honorary degrees are not listed here) 1952 Elected to the American Philosophical Society 1958 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry Edna St. Vincent Millay Prize of the Poetry Society of America National Book Award (All were given for Promises: Poems 1954-1956.) 1959 Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters 1967 Bollingen Prize in Poetry (for Selected Poems: New and Old 1923-1966) 1968 Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts 1970 Van Wyck Brooks Award (for Audubon: A Vision) National Medal for Literature (for total contribution) 1974 Delivered the third annual Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities for the National Endowment for the Humanities 1975 Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Emerson-Thoreau Award 1976 Copernicus Award for the Academy of American Poets (for general achievement, but with special recognition of Or Else)

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

4

www.cliffs.com

1980 Medal of Freedom (America's highest award presented to a civilian)

LIST OF CHARACTERS Willie Stark Governor of one of the southern states (most critics assume that it is Louisiana); the son of a dirt farmer in the rural northern part of the state, he challenges the entrenched interests from the southern part of the state and wins, making many enemies in the process of changing the benefits provided by the state government.

Lucy Stark Wife of Willie Stark; a former school teacher who married Willie while he was County Treasurer in Mason County, she becomes estranged from him while he is governor, although she does pose for photographs with him occasionally.

Tom Stark The governor's son; he is a potential All-American football player until an injury crushes his spinal cord; he also provokes one of the most severe threats to his father's position because of his sexual activities.

Jack Burden A trouble-shooter for Governor Stark; the product of the state's political aristocracy and a former Ph.D. student in history, he does research on the Boss' political enemies in an attempt to discover their illegal activities, and he carries out various other tasks.

Sugar-Boy O'Sheean Willie Stark's bodyguard and driver; he is devoted to the Boss and would do anything for him.

Sadie Burke Willie Stark's secretary and long-time mistress; she first met Willie when she kept tabs on him during his first campaign for governor, when she was a "pigeon" for the Harrison gang, but she stays with him after he denounces Harrison and campaigns for MacMurfee, as well as during his subsequent campaigns for governor.

Tiny Duffy Lieutenant-Governor during Willie Stark's last term in office; he a political hack who is treated badly by Willie Stark, but it is he who gives Adam Stanton the information that causes him to assassinate Willie Stark.

Malaciah Wynn A constituent of Willie's from Mason County; Willie arranges for good attorney to represent Malaciah's son on a murder charge.

Slade The owner of a speak-easy during the Depression; because he supported Willie's refusal to drink a beer when Willie did not want one, Slade received one of the first liquor licenses and one of the finest business locations after Prohibition was repealed.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

5

www.cliffs.com

Judge Montague Irwin A former Attorney General who supports one of Willie's political opponents for the Senate nomination; he allowed himself to be bribed once, in 1913 or 1914, to save his home and plantation; he is Jack Burden's actual father, although Jack does not learn this until after the Judge has committed suicide.

Sam MacMurfee The head of one of the factions in the state Democratic party; he was governor just before Willie Stark, and he continues to battle Willie Stark in every way he can.

Dolph Pillsbury The chairman of the County Commissioners in Mason County when Willie Stark was County Treasurer; because of Pillsbury’s insistence, J. H. Moore gets the contract to build the schoolhouse, which turns out to be built with faulty bricks; this indirectly initiates Willie Stark's rise to political power.

Joe Harrison The governor of the state when Willie Stark is County Treasurer; his decision to back Willie as a dummy candidate in order to split the MacMurfee vote backfires, leading to his defeat by MacMurfee and his later eclipse as a political force after Willie becomes governor.

Hugh Miller Willie Stark's first Attorney General; he resigns when Willie decides to protect Bryam B. White from impeachment, but Jack Burden indicates that Miller might enter politics again at the end of the book.

Governor Joel Stanton Governor of the state in about 1915; he protected Judge Irwin when charges were leveled against him; he died in the early 1920s, but his spirit has an effect on several of the characters in the novel.

Adam Stanton Son of Governor Stanton and a first-rate doctor; he is the same age as Jack Burden and a childhood friend; he decides to become director of the medical facility which Willie Stark is building; when Adam learns that his father--whom he had venerated--protected Judge Irwin, he kills Willie Stark, overwrought because all his ideals have crumbled and because his sister has become Willie's mistress.

Anne Stanton Sister of Adam Stanton, daughter of Governor Stanton, and mistress of Willie Stark; four years younger than Jack Burden, she is the girl whom Jack first fell in love with; they finally marry after Willie Stark's death.

Jack’s Mother A woman from the pine hills of Arkansas; she has been married four times, but never to the man whom she really cares for, Monty Irwin; until the end of the book, Jack cannot make up his mind about how he feels toward her.

Ellis Burden The "Scholarly Attorney," the man whom Jack Burden thought was his father; Ellis brought Jack's mother from Arkansas to Burden's Landing, but when he discovered that she and his best friend had had an affair, he left her and went to help the unfortunates in the Skid Row section of the capital.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

6

www.cliffs.com

Theodore Murrell The Young Executive, the most recent of the husbands whom Jack's mother has had.

Bryam B. White One of the men involved in a scandal during Willie Stark's first term as governor; Willie's decision to protect White leads to impeachment proceedings against Willie and to strained relations between Willie and Lucy Stark, but their subsequent battle confirms Willie Stark's political clout.

Mabel Carruthers Judge Irwin's second wife; she was thought to have been rich enough to ease the Judge's financial problems in 1913 and 1914, but, in truth, she had no money at all.

Mortimer L. Littlepaugh Counsel for the American Electric Power Company who had been pushed aside to reward Judge Irwin for dismissing a case against the Southern Belle Fuel Company; after trying unsuccessfully to get Governor Stanton to investigate Irwin's conduct, Littlepaugh committed suicide.

Miss Littlepaugh The sister of Mortimer L. Littlepaugh; she makes her living as a medium, and she gives Jack Burden a letter from her brother that seals his case against Judge Irwin.

Lois Seager The beautiful, well-to-do woman to whom Jack Burden was married for a time after he quit working on his Ph.D., but before he began working for Willie Stark; he walked out on her when he began to think of her as a person rather than as merely a beautiful sexual nonentity.

Gummy Larson A major supporter of Sam MacMurfee; he is given the general contract for the hospital which Willie Stark is having built in order to seriously weaken MacMurfee's threat to Willie's senatorial ambitions.

Hubert Coffee A political hack who works for Gummy Larson and Sam MacMurfee; he tries to bribe Adam Stanton into giving the general contract for the hospital to Larson.

Sibyl Frey One of the girls with whom Tom Stark has a sexual relationship; she becomes pregnant, and after the child is born, she allows Lucy Stark to adopt the child.

Marvin Frey Sibyl's father; he is used by MacMurfee in an attempt to weaken Willie's political power and to gain a Senate seat.

Willie Stark The child whom Sibyl Frey gives birth to and who is adopted by Lucy Stark in the belief that it is her son's child and her grandchild.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

7

www.cliffs.com

Lavinia Mastern Jack Burden's grandmother.

Cass Mastern The brother of Lavinia Mastern; as a college student, he had an affair with a married woman that led to her husband's suicide; his papers came to Jack Burden, and Jack tried to use them as the basis for his Ph.D. dissertation in American History, but he could not understand Cass Mastern's motivations.

Gilbert Mastern The older brother of Lavinia and Cass Mastern; he earned a fortune and rescued his brother and sister from poverty after their parents died; he had political plans for his brother until his brother became an abolitionist after the death of Duncan Trice.

Duncan Trice A young banker in Lexington, Kentucky; he befriends Cass Mastern when Cass comes to Lexington to go to school, and he introduces Cass to the pleasures of drinking and gambling; when Trice discovers that Cass is having an affair with his wife, he commits suicide.

Annabelle Trice The woman with whom Cass Mastern has an affair; she becomes guilt-ridden after her husband's death, and she sells the slave who found the hidden wedding ring that made it clear that Duncan's death was suicide; this act causes Cass Mastern to leave her and to become an abolitionist.

INTRODUCTION TO THE NOVEL All the King's Men is, without reservation, one of the great American novels. It may rank behind the greatest of the Faulkner novels--The Sound and the Fury, Absalom, Absalom!, and perhaps Light in August--and behind Melville's magnificent epic of the sea, Moby-Dick, but it belongs among the ranks of other novels that have received more attention, novels such as The Scarlet Letter, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Great Gatsby, A Farewell to Arms, and Invisible Man. Unfortunately, however, All the King's Men simply has not received the attention it richly deserves. One of the reasons for this unjustified neglect seems to be a misconception about the subject matter of this novel. The cover of at least one edition, for example, proclaims that it is a novel about "the rise and fall of an American dictator!" Even granting that this is an exaggeration typical of the people who write blurbs for the covers of books, this blurb does a disservice to the novel. This novel does trace the rise of a political boss, his reign in office, and his death, but it also does much more than that. It shows the political background and the political climate that produced such a person. It evaluates his actions from several perspectives. All the King's Men would be a good novel if it were only about the rise and fall of Willie Stark (who is a political boss, not a dictator), but it is also a novel about Jack Burden, a man who has lost his past and must find it. Jack Burden's story introduces an examination of the role of history in individual lives and in the life of a social group. It also introduces into the novel an explanation of the ways in which one person's actions affect other people and ripple outward from the center, touching both the present and the future. Jack Burden has lived most of his life as though he were wrapped in a cocoon, and his story shows the process by which he is forced to emerge from this cocoon into a new life.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

8

www.cliffs.com

All the King's Men, therefore, is not just the story of Willie Stark, with Jack Burden only one of the supporting cast. Nor is this novel just the story of Jack Burden, with Willie Stark only one of the supporting cast. The lives of these two men are so intertwined that the story of one is, must be, the story of the other. Their stories reinforce one another, but they also clash and set up reverberations that echo throughout the novel, thus enhancing the thematic richness and depth of the novel. All the King's Men is also structurally complex. That is, the description of events moves back and forth in time in order to show the relationships between the past and the present, to show how people and events come to be as they are. For example, the events in Chapter One take place in 1936 and show Willie Stark to be a man who gets along with the common people, but they also show that he is a man who can be ruthless in dealing with his enemies. The next two chapters cover events that happen between 1922 and 1936; they show how Willie Stark became a political figure after starting out as an ineffective idealist and how he developed into the tough politician that Warren describes in Chapter One. These two chapters also show how Jack Burden came to be involved with Willie Stark. Chapter Four then moves the reader even further back, to sometime between 1918 and 1921, when Jack Burden was a graduate student in history. This excursion into the past gives us a further idea of Jack Burden's character and of why he is as he is--a man who will dig out damaging information about a man who was his friend and who had been almost like a father to him. Chapter Five then picks up where Chapter One ended. Throughout the novel, there are other excursions into the past, though they are not as extended as these mentioned here are. By showing how and why the characters developed as they did and the events were shaped as they were, Warren gives us a greater depth of understanding, a means by which we can measure the characters and the events they shape. Nothing in life is ever neat and simple, and Warren's structural complexity of the novel helps to demonstrate that idea, and, at the same time, it adds depth to the characters and to the themes. All the King's Men is a novel that bears rereading; indeed, several readings are necessary before even the best readers begin to see and put together all of the various facets of the novel. Fortunately, All the King's Men is also a novel that remains readable after several readings; it offers readers something new each time they pick it up. All the King's Men is, clearly, one of the finest novels yet produced in America.

CRITICAL COMMENTARIES CHAPTER ONE All the King's Men is, on one level, a novel about a political strong-man in the South during the 1930s. This aspect of the novel focuses on the political situation into which this man thrusts himself, the conditions from which he arises and tries to change, his rise to power, and the resulting changes that occur in him. If this were all that the novel did, it would be an interesting study of politics and of a political figure. All the King's Men, however, is more than simply a political novel, for it is also the story of another man, a former newspaper reporter who works for the politician. As he tells us the story of the politician, the reporter also tells us about himself, about finding himself. Because the reporter was once a student of history, he also explores the effects of the past on the present; indeed, his discovery of the truth about his own past leads him to a new understanding of himself and of the political figure. The result of this second strong character in the novel makes All the King's Men into a rich and powerful, moving book, one that does not suffer in comparison with any other novel written in America. The first chapter introduces several important elements. One of the most important of these elements is the setting, the place of the action and the situation out of which that action grows. One thing to note about this Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

9

www.cliffs.com

novel is that it does not name the state in which it takes place, nor does it name the capital of that state. Many who have read this novel have assumed that it takes place in Louisiana (with Baton Rouge its capital), but it is obvious that Robert Penn Warren wished to avoid this kind of narrow identification; instead, he would have us view the events of the novel as events that could occur in any state in which the same conditions prevailed. Another reason for avoiding a narrow identification of the state involves a narrow identification of the main character, Willie Stark. If the state is Louisiana, then Willie Stark must be considered a fictionalized portrait of Huey Long. While there is evidence that Warren had Huey Long in mind when he created Willie Stark, there is also evidence that he drew from other sources in creating the fictional character. By avoiding having his novel set in a definite state, Warren forces the reader to think of Willie Stark as a man who is formed by the conditions in which he was raised and by the situation which he feels he must fight against. Willie Stark is more than just one political figure in one particular place; he is a person who could exist wherever human beings live. The novel opens with a two-and-a-half page description of the highway from the capital city to Mason City. This description is important because it does more than simply tell us about a highway; it tells us a good deal about a particular part of the state, the part of the state in which Willie Stark grew up. The dominating impression is of the heat, the heat that shimmers up from the roadway and obscures whatever is further down the road. It is a heat that dazzles people and makes them forget what they are doing. (This shimmering mirage-like quality of the roadway in the heat is also characteristic of the way that Jack Burden views life and experience.) A second quality of this highway is that it is new; it is a road on which cars can whiz along at high speed, unlike the bumpy, rutted dirt road that Jack later describes when he tells of his first trip to Mason City fourteen years earlier. Along the highway, during this trip in 1936, are the cotton fields worked by blacks, and these fields are in the southern part of the state. The further north one travels, the red hills emerge, and the stands of pine, many of them burned-over, are reminders of the days when the pine trees were milled until there were no more pine logs to take to the mills. It is poor country. This is the country in which Mason City is located, and it is the country in which Willie Stark grew up. Of course, the main purpose of this chapter is to introduce Willie Stark, Governor of the state. The chapter does this by showing Willie in two different situations, one in which he is among "home folks," the other in which he is involved in a piece of political in-fighting; he appears to be quite a different man in each situation. Standing in front of the people of Mason City, people whom he has known all his life and who elected him to office in the first place, Willie Stark is a "good ol' boy." He enters the drugstore quietly, without a fuss. He waits until he is recognized instead of loudly demanding service. He chats with the people, calling them by name. And when he is called upon to make a speech, he does so very subtly. He talks about how a man has to come home at times and about how he himself is not "politickin'" now, although he will be back another time to ask them for their votes. Now, it is true that Willie did come back to see his father, but it is also true that he brought a carload of reporters and a photographer with him. In short, Willie is a shrewd politician, using this occasion to make a visit to the farm and to his home county but also to remind the voters of the state where his roots are and how devoted he is to his family. While Willie Stark may seem to be simple and easy-going when he comes into town that day, he becomes hard and decisive after he learns that Judge Montague Irwin has endorsed a MacMurfee candidate for the Senate. He gets rid of the reporters and the photographer as quickly as possible. Then after eating the evening meal with his family, he leaves immediately with Jack Burden and Sugar-Boy for Burden's Landing to have a talk with the Judge. His conversation with the Judge is quiet and drawling, but there is no mistaking the threat behind what he says. He means to have his way, and he means to make the Judge

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

10

www.cliffs.com

regret opposing him. He makes this very clear when he and Jack and Sugar-Boy are in the car again: he tells Jack to find something which will be politically damaging about Judge Irwin, no matter what it is and no matter how long it takes. Willie Stark is the political power in the state, and he intends to remain at the top, no matter what it takes to do so. Although the main focus of this first chapter is on Willie Stark, Jack Burden is also introduced to the reader. Jack is of sufficient value to Willie to ride in the car with him and his family, rather than in the other car. He is also close enough to be kept at the farm when the others are sent back to town. He is the person to whom the assignment of finding incriminating information about Judge Irwin is given. At the same time, however, Jack Burden comes from the old aristocracy of the state; Burden's Landing was named for his ancestors, and he is close to Judge Irwin, close enough for the Judge to prod him about his political associations. Thus, although Jack Burden might seem like just another political henchman at first, by the end of the first chapter, enough information has been provided about him to suggest that he is a much more complex character than that. Finally, this chapter introduces the motivation for the subsequent action: Jack's search for information about Judge Irwin's past is one key idea; the results of the use of that information is another; and Willie Stark's political activities form yet another. There is, however, a fourth idea that winds itself throughout the novel, an idea that seems to have little to do with the subsequent action. This concept involves an exploration of the past, partly in search of Judge Irwin's secret dealings, but it also introduces an exploration of the past that Jack Burden must achieve if he is to see his past in relation to his present and thereby find himself and give some meaning to his life. This concept is introduced in this chapter, as Jack recalls his growing up in Burden's Landing when they arrive in town that night, as well as Jack's remembering his first meeting with Willie Stark at Slade's pool hall in 1922.

CHAPTER TWO The stories of Jack Burden and Willie Stark become almost inextricably intertwined when Jack first meets Willie, just after Willie became Treasurer in Mason County. Then, when Willie became embroiled in a political controversy, the Chronicle sent Jack out to Mason City to cover the story. Later, the Chronicle also sent Jack out to cover Willie Stark's first campaign for Governor. Chapter One described events that, for the most part, took place in 1936, and we later learn that this novel is being written (or the story is being told by Jack Burden) in 1939. This chapter, in contrast, focuses primarily on events that occur between 1922 and 1932. As Jack tells about what Willie Stark was like and what happened to Willie in those early days in his political career, we inevitably learn a great deal about Jack Burden. We also learn a great deal about the political tradition that shaped Willie Stark. In the nameless southern state in which this novel is set (obviously Louisiana because of Warren's geographical references to neighboring states and also because of the topography), the county political organization seems to be exactly like the state organization, except that it operates on a smaller scale. In Mason County, for example, the political "boss" is Dolph Pillsbury, who is also the Chairman of the County Commissioners. It is he who determines who runs for office and who wins; he decided what post Willie would run for, and whether or not Willie would win; Willie thus became County Treasurer after Pillsbury and the incumbent had a falling out. Pillsbury also determines who receives county contracts. Political ties and family ties are more important than the legal requirements for letting bids. In the county organization, the political boss is the absolute ruler--at least until he makes a mistake. Even though Willie has grown up within this political tradition, he is idealistic enough to buck the system when he sees something going on that he thinks is wrong. (He is also idealistic enough to believe that a lawyer should actually know something about the law in order to be admitted to the bar). Thus, when the

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

11

www.cliffs.com

County Commissioners pass over several lower bids to award a contract for a new school to a contractor who happens to own, in partnership with Pillsburg's brother-in-law, a brickyard that was cited for producing poor quality bricks, Willie protests. Indeed, he mounts a campaign against Pillsburg's candidate, disregarding the political consequences. The strength of the political machine during the 1920s and 1930s is clearly shown in the failure of Willie's campaign. In response to Willie's charges, Pillsbury and his cronies spread rumors that the low bidder on the contract will bring a lot of "niggers" into the area--ignoring the fact that there were two other bids between the low bid and the one that was accepted. This story is effective in distracting people's attention from the real issue, and it is all the more effective because Pillsbury supports it. In addition, Pillsbury's influence is great enough that the newspaper in Mason City will neither print a story on the controversy nor print leaflets for Willie so that he can present his views. When he does manage to get the handbills printed elsewhere, he must deliver them himself, since the boys whom he hires to deliver them are "persuaded" not to do the job. Willie's voice is the voice of a man crying in the wilderness. In addition to being an idealist, Willie Stark is also stubborn and single-minded. In spite of the obstacles and the opposition which he faces, he persists in trying to make his position known. Furthermore, at the next election, he runs again for County Treasurer, even though Pillsbury has given his support to a more tractable candidate. Willie is of course soundly defeated, but it is interesting to note that, in the course of these struggles, Willie comes to take this opposition to him as a personal matter, becoming less concerned with the crookedness of the situation. This entire episode serves to establish the political environment that shapes Willie Stark. It also provides the impetus for Willie Stark's rise as a state-wide political figure, for Willie's opposition to Pillsbury is proved to be right when three children are killed and several others severely injured when a fire escape collapses during a fire drill--because of the shoddy bricks that were used to construct the schoolhouse. People remember that Willie had tried to warn them, and when Willie campaigns against a Pillsburybacked Senatorial candidate, the candidate loses convincingly. Then Willie becomes a candidate for governor of the state. The fact that he does so at all is due to the machinations of one faction of the state Democratic party machine. Indeed, it becomes obvious that the only difference between the county machine run by Dolph Pillsbury and the state machine is that the state machine is large enough to have several factions competing for power. The Harrison faction picks Willie as a dummy candidate in an attempt to split MacMurfee's rural support. They use Willie as a dupe, giving him a fraudulent show of support, a smooth organization, and sufficient people to assure him that he can be governor. For most of the campaign, Willie exhibits the same qualities which he demonstrated in Mason County, and he is idealistic enough to believe that he does have a chance to become governor, even though he knows about the crooked machinations of the political system of the state. He is also idealistic enough to think that what the people want to hear is the truth and a program for good government, backed with dry facts and statistical figures--even though he knows how the people in Mason County responded to his campaign against giving the contract for the schoolhouse to J. H. Moore. Willie Stark is dazzled by the prospect of becoming governor, and he is stubborn enough and single-minded enough to keep polishing his speech and delivering it, even after he becomes aware that it is not effective. When Willie Stark discovers that he is being used, however, several things change, and when he gets drunk for the first time in his life, he changes. As he did in Mason County, Willie takes this new situation personally; he doesn't like it that "they" have treated him like a hick, a clod, and a dolt, and this time he does something about it. He remembers what he knows about people, and he uses it effectively to

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

12

www.cliffs.com

campaign--strictly on his own--against Harrison. He also serves notice that he will return to politics if MacMurfee does not keep his rhetorical promises. The jolt of his discovery that he has been politically "used" strips away Willie's idealism and unleashes his natural flair for practical politics. As a result, the success of his campaign against Harrison establishes him as a potent political force in the entire state, rather than merely in the region around Mason County. In this chapter, Willie Stark becomes a dynamic character, one who learns and changes. Jack Burden, on the other hand, is a static character. He is not an actor, as Willie is. Instead, Jack is an observer who simply watches the people around him. He does his job, and he drinks. When Willie talks to him about his campaign, Jack listens and makes soothing noises; when he does give Willie advice, it is cryptic, cynical, and non-committal. Nevertheless, Willie has a magnetism, a certain electric quality that attracts Jack, and so Jack takes care of Willie the morning after Willie's first drunken binge, and Jack also quits his job at the Chronicle during Willie's second campaign for governor (which he wins) because Jack cannot compromise; he refuses to write editorials supporting MacMurfee, the paper's candidate. Indeed, Jack Burden has no direction and no motivation of his own; he needs someone to give him that direction. After he quits his job at the Chronicle, Jack moves without purpose, and he sleeps a great deal. It is only after Willie Stark offers him a job that Jack emerges from a meaningless drift. Chapter Two of All the King's Men, then, does several things that are important to the novel. It provides a vivid portrait of the political climate and system in the state, and it shows the events that led to Willie Stark's rise to political power. It also establishes Willie Stark's basic character, showing the changes in it, as well as developing the characterization of Jack Burden. All of this is important to our understanding the events of the first chapter, as well as understanding the events of later chapters.

CHAPTER THREE The events described in Chapter Three take place in 1933, two years after Willie Stark is elected governor for the first time and three years before the events described in the first chapter. Chapter Three does two major things: first, it presents some information about Jack Burden's background so that we can better understand him; and second, it establishes the effects that political power has had on Willie Stark by showing us his response to the two impeachment attempts--Byram White's and his own. In addition to these major points of emphasis, this chapter also suggests the attitudes of the citizens of the state to Willie's actions as governor, and it provides several perspectives from which we can evaluate Willie's governorship. The first part of Chapter Three describes a visit that Jack Burden makes to Burden's Landing; the way that Jack tells about this visit reveals a great deal about him. He has rejected Burden's Landing--but he always comes back. He insists that he does not need his mother or her help--but she still has the power to soothe him, as well as to make him angry. He resents her, and he loves her. Jack has, in short, extremely mixed feelings about his home and his past. Jack was born and raised in Burden's Landing, a town named for his ancestors. The home that he grew up in is large and well-built, made with the best materials and furnished with the best furniture and accessories that money can buy. It is in the best neighborhood, facing the sea and surrounded by the homes of prominent people, including a former governor and a well-known judge. Jack recalls being very happy in this house until he was about six years old. When he was six, however, his world fell apart. One day his mother told him that his father wasn't coming home. He wasn't dead, and there wouldn't be a funeral; he just wasn't coming home. His mother told Jack that his father didn't love her. Then, Jack was sent away to school, and his mother married a succession of men. Jack seems to view these men as intruders in his home and in his mother’s affections. He resents them, and he resents his mother for bringing them into their home. He also resents his mother because she made

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

13

www.cliffs.com

life so miserable that her husband, Ellis Burden, decided to leave her and young Jack. But Jack's resentment of his mother is tempered. She is cool and beautiful, and he admires the way that she handles men. He would like to have her approval and her full attention, but he wants those things on his terms, not on hers. That is, he wants his mother to accept him without question even though--or perhaps because--he works for Willie Stark. Jack's resentment of his father is more absolute. Jack cannot forgive the Scholarly Attorney (he rarely uses his father’s name) for walking out on him and his mother. Even more, Jack cannot forgive his father for his religious views, which he mocks every time he thinks of them. Indeed, Jack cannot understand his father, his father's actions, or his father's views; they simply make no sense to him. In short, Jack seems to feel--although he does not seem at all aware of this feeling--that he was, in a sense, abandoned when his father left and when his mother remarried. He could not understand those events then; no one gave him any sense of security when those things happened; and he has not yet accepted them at the age of thirty-five. As a result, he is still adrift, with no personal sense of direction or of belonging. Indeed, he works for Willie Stark because Willie is an active and vital force; it is Willie’s energy that gives Jack a sense of purpose and direction rather than anything within himself. On his own, Jack Burden reacts, rather than acts, and his reactions are usually negative. When Jack gets back to the capital, he is immediately energized and given immediate, explicit orders by Willie Stark, because a political crisis has occurred: a threat of impeachment against Byram White, the state auditor, is being rumored because of White's taking bribes; the threat of White's impeachment grows, and finally it develops into an attempt to impeach Willie Stark himself. Willie's power is threatened, and he is not willing to relinquish that power, now that he has it. Thus, although the Willie Stark of this chapter has his roots in the Willie Stark whom we saw in the second chapter, he is quite a different person, one who has learned his lessons very well. The Willie Stark of the second chapter fiercely believed in the dignity of human beings and in their rationality; both in his campaign against the schoolhouse contract and in his first campaign for governor, he tried to use "the facts" and a carefully reasoned plan of action, assuming that the public would respond to those and vote on that basis. Then, Willie was blinded by the prospect of being governor, which he believed to be a lofty and noble position, one to which a person brought one's best qualities. By the end of that first campaign, however, Willie had learned a great deal about the political realities of his state. Now, not only has he learned his lessons well, but he has adapted to these conditions with a vengeance. He will not be treated again the way that he was treated earlier. Willie Stark, as governor, acts expediently. He makes plans to immediately right the wrongs that rankled him and bring the benefits of government to the people from his part of the state--to his kind of people. And in order to do so, he is willing to take shortcuts. He has rammed bills through the legislature and stacked the state Supreme Court with his men to make sure that those bills are upheld. He permits graft--in a controlled way--because it helps to get things done. He has increased taxes and the cost of leasing state lands in order to have the necessary money to accomplish the things which he wants done. He has effectively shut the door on those people who previously received the benefits of the government. His actions have made him many enemies, and the evidence that Byram White has arranged for substantial profits through his ties with a real estate firm has given these enemies a vantage point from which to attack Willie. Strategically, Willie decides to protect White, not because he likes White, and not because he approves of the deal which White made (he neither likes White nor approves of the deal), but because Willie will not relinquish any of his power to the opposition, and because he wants to make sure that White

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

14

www.cliffs.com

and certain key men in the legislature will do what he wants. Almost immediately, then, Willie becomes a target for impeachment proceedings. Willie responds in two ways. First, he covers most of the state, telling the people what is going on and enlisting their support. He has become a master at crowd control, refining the natural talent which he exhibited when he campaigned against Joe Harrison. It is not just Willie's ability to manipulate the crowds that enlists the support of these people; he is bringing the benefits of government to them, making government work for them. They voice their approval when he speaks to them, and they show their support by invading the capital city when the vote on impeachment is to take place. Second, Willie--through Jack--gathers as much incriminating information as possible about as many of the legislators as he can, and by the time it is done, he has a great deal of information, for Jack is very good at his job. Willie then uses this information to coerce--to blackmail--those who are supporting impeachment into dropping that support. He is very thorough, and he does much of this job himself: He visits these people at their homes, he has them brought to his office, and he hunts them down if they try to hide. He tells them exactly what he has on each of them, and, suddenly, their demands for impeachment are silenced. In quelling this threat to his power, Willie Stark exhibits great energy, drive, and attention to details; it is easy to see why someone like Jack Burden needs, and clings to, someone like Willie Stark. Willie Stark also exhibits a ruthlessness and a contempt for the people whom he is dealing with. This ruthlessness and contempt border almost on being sadistic as he makes people like Byram White grovel; at the same time, however, he seems to hope that these people will challenge him, show some backbone, rather than abase themselves before him. There are, basically, four ways of evaluating Willie Stark's actions, and each of these can be clearly seen in this chapter. First, the people who were previously in power or who received the benefits of the government--the people who attended the party which Jack went to at Burden's Landing and the MacMurfee faction--are upset because things are being changed; they want things to be the way they were. Second, some people approve of what Willie is doing and either ignore or approve of the methods that he uses; Jack Burden and many of the people in the state, especially those who flock to the capital to support Willie, seem to evaluate Willie's behavior in this way. A third position regarding Willie Stark's methods as governor is taken by Hugh Miller, the attorney general. Miller believes that much of what Willie has tried to do is badly needed and that Willie's methods have been necessary (even Judge Irwin suggests this idea); however, Miller is reluctant to protect people like Byram White, and, by implication, he is reluctant to endorse the methods Willie will use to fight the impeachment proceedings. Thus, he resigns. The fourth position taken in response to Willie Stark's activities as governor is the most uncompromising and the most negative. Lucy Stark believes that there are absolute rights and wrongs that everything can be judged by, the means as well as the ends. It is clear that she does not approve of Willie's methods, and she is morally outraged by his decision to protect White. Although she will do nothing to harm Willie, she does withdraw from him. Evaluating Willie Stark, then, is a complex matter, one without any easy solution. On the one hand, he is accomplishing what he set out to accomplish, and these goals are supported by many of the people in the state. Furthermore, the things that he causes to happen provide benefits that are badly needed by many of the people in the state. On the other hand, his methods are, at the very least, unsavory. Even Willie seems to recognize this dichotomy, for he vows to build an outstanding medical center if he survives the impeachment attempt, and he struggles to make sure that the proposed center is kept free of political considerations. One other change in Willie Stark is revealed in this chapter, and this change is important because it plays a role in his downfall and death. There is every reason to believe that Willie Stark was sexually inexperienced when he married and that he was strictly faithful to Lucy until he became governor, or at least until his last

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

15

www.cliffs.com

campaign. After he becomes governor, however, he begins to have extra-marital affairs, beginning with the blonde skater in Chicago. In addition, he has already taken Sadie Burke as his mistress by the time he has his affair in Chicago. Sadie Burke is an interesting character. Her entire life has been a struggle to reach a position of some security and influence. She is intensely devoted to Willie and would do anything for him, but she is also intensely jealous and possessive. Finally, her jealousy over one of Willie's sexual conquests triggers a series of events that will end in the death of Willie Stark. Chapter Three of All the King's Men, then, provides some of the background that will help us to better understand Jack Burden, and, in addition, it also charts the changes that have taken place in the character of Willie Stark. The lives of these two characters are, as Jack points out, closely intertwined.

CHAPTER FOUR Many people--students and critics alike--have some difficulty with this fourth chapter of All the King's Men. The reason for this difficulty is that the story of Cass Mastern is told in this chapter, and this story has nothing to do, directly, with the story of Willie Stark. If this novel is read strictly as the story of Willie Stark, then this chapter is, indeed, a flaw in the novel. To read the novel in that way would, however, be a serious error. Such a reading would relegate Jack Burden to the status of being only a mere narrator, and he is much more than that. At the very least, Jack Burden and Willie Stark stand as equally important main characters. A case can even be made for considering Jack Burden as the sole central character of All the King's Men; we certainly learn far more about him in the course of the novel than we do about Willie Stark. Furthermore, Willie Stark makes the emotional and rational adjustments necessary to survive politically, but this does not mean that he grows and develops; Jack, on the other hand, gradually learns a great deal about himself, and he matures to the point where he can accept himself and his past. His experiences with Willie Stark are extremely important to Jack Burden's learning process--indeed, these experiences seem to trigger the process and to nurture it--and it is for this reason that Willie Stark assumes such a major role in the novel. Now, it may be too extreme to assert that Jack Burden is the main character in All the King's Men and that Willie Stark is only one of the minor characters. Willie Stark's characterization is too well developed for us to consider him to be only a secondary character in the novel. Furthermore, the story of Willie Stark embodies many of the major thematic concerns of this novel. It is, thus, as fruitless to consider All the King's Men to be only Jack Burden's story as it is to consider it to be only Willie Stark's story; Willie's and Jack's lives and their stories are intertwined, held together by their relationship to one another. Chapter Four, then, is a direct part of the story of Jack Burden's growth and development; any relevance it may have to the story of Willie Stark is indirect, but it is of thematic importance. The story of Cass Mastern in this chapter is a "framed story"; that is, the beginning and the ending of the chapter provide a look at Jack Burden as a graduate student in history, and the story of Cass Mastern is told in that context, since it was to have been the subject of Jack's Ph.D. dissertation. Quite obviously, this story is intended to reveal something critical about Jack Burden's maturation, some lack within him, for he does not complete his Ph.D. degree because he never felt that he understood Cass Mastern sufficiently. The description of the place in which Jack lives as a graduate student, which begins this chapter, is a clear contrast to the description of his home in Burden's Landing that began Chapter Three. Whereas Jack's home in Burden's Landing is spacious and well-kept, his apartment is cramped and cluttered. And whereas the furniture in his home in Burden's Landing is elegant, the furniture in his apartment is old, poorly cared

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

16

www.cliffs.com

for, and decrepit. In contrast also is Jack's mother, who is well groomed and well dressed, as are the others who live in their neighborhood at Burden's Landing. Yet Jack and his roommates are filthy, unkempt, and poorly dressed. Quite obviously, Jack takes some pride in maintaining a place to live that is the direct opposite of the place in which he grew up and of what his mother would prefer to see him living in. Indeed, when his mother visits him, Jack makes every attempt to emphasize this difference, and when his mother sends money for Jack to buy some decent clothes, Jack squanders it all on a five-day binge with his roommates. Before Jack relates the story of Cass Mastern, he makes the point that, whereas his two roommates were trying to escape the future (they did not look forward to the teaching positions that awaited them in the "real world" when they completed their degrees), he was trying to escape the present. Instead of playing cards with them, he sat with the papers of Cass Mastern, trying to make sense of them. As noted in the commentary on Chapter Three, Jack felt cut adrift when his father left, when he was sent off to school, and when his mother remarried. His attempts to make sense of Cass Mastern's past is, then, an attempt to regain and understand his own past, since Cass was a brother of Jack's supposed paternal grandmother. Jack does not complete his dissertation. He has all the information he needs to produce an acceptable dissertation, but he says that he does not understand Cass Mastern and his motivations, and he feels that he must be able to do this in order to put his materials, his "facts," in order. At the same time, however, Jack seems afraid that if he does understand, he will somehow find himself lacking in something essential. Why is the Cass Mastern episode so hard for Jack to understand? Essentially, it seems to be because Cass accepts responsibility for his actions and because Cass comes to see that life is, in Jack's words, like a spider web, with all its parts connected and radiating from a common center. That is, Cass Mastern has an affair with Annabelle Trice, the wife of his close friend Duncan Trice. Duncan kills himself when he learns that his wife has taken a lover, and, afterward, Annabelle Trice sells the slave who found her husband's wedding ring under Annabelle's pillow, where he put it to let her know why he killed himself. When Cass learns of these things, he accepts full responsibility for his friend's death and for the sale of the slave, who is later sold and separated from her husband; he also accepts responsibility for Annabelle Trice's agony and for her perpetuating the system of slavery. Now, it is true that Cass carries this matter too far, for he does not consider the responsibility that others also have in these events. That is, he does not consider that Duncan Trice made his own decision to shoot himself or that he, Duncan, did have other options open to him. Cass Mastern does not consider, either, that Annabelle Trice was at least as eager to begin the affair as he was and that she made the choice to sell the slave girl. Instead, he idealistically shoulders all of the responsibility for these events. In addition, he overlays this responsibility with a rather Calvinistic sense of sin and guilt. Then he spends the rest of his life trying to expiate his sin. Jack Burden cannot, of course, understand this sense of sin and guilt. Even more to the point, though, he cannot accept the idea that he is responsible for his actions or the idea that all things are interrelated. He points out that both of his roommates suffered as a result of their huge spree, but he--the one who provided the opportunity for it--was untouched by it, and he is unconcerned about the consequences to his roomates-one of them leaves, disappears, and is never heard of again, and it is all the same to Jack. Then, one day after being unable to understand Cass Mastern, Jack Burden just drifts away himself, leaving everything behind; and even though his landlady sends his books and papers to him, he never looks at them again; he never even opens the box. Jack's attitude toward his present job is identical to the attitude that is clearly established in this chapter. That is, Jack Burden works for Willie Stark because Willie gives him a purpose and a direction, but also

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

17

www.cliffs.com

because it doesn't matter much to him whom he works for. He digs up people's unsavory pasts for Willie to use, not caring how Willie uses the "facts" nor what effect they might have on people Jack takes no responsibility for what he does, nor does he see any relationship between what he does and other events. Even when Willie tells Jack to find out what evil lies buried in Judge Irwin's past, a man who has been like a father to Jack, Jack treats this assignment as a historical exercise, as an abstract problem. The Cass Mastern-Annabelle Trice-Duncan Trice triangle is also paralleled with several other such triangles that are revealed in the novel, and these parallels will be discussed as those other triangles arise.

CHAPTER FIVE Chapter One ended with Willie Stark giving Jack Burden the assignment of finding something corrupt about Judge Irwin, something that might change Irwin's mind about supporting MacMurfee's candidate for the Senate or that might be used in some other way against Irwin if he continues to support Callahan. The events in Chapter One took place in 1936, the time at which the present action of All the King's Men begins. If All the King's Men were simply a conventional novel concerned with what happens, the events in Chapter Two would have been those that followed the events in Chapter One, and so on through the novel. In All the King's Men, however, Warren is concerned with why events happen as they do, and in order to explore this question, he--and the reader--must explore the events in the past that have a significant bearing on the present. Thus, Chapters Two through Four deal with events that take place between about 1920 (approximately when Jack is a graduate student in history) and 1933; if the story of Cass Mastern is considered in its own right, it takes place much earlier, probably in the 1850s. These three chapters provide clues about how Willie became the political kingpin who will now try to use blackmail to gain his ends and about how Jack Burden becomes the sort of person who would agree to dig out information that might be detrimental to the man who had been like a father to him. Since Jack is an extremely complex person, more and more of his past must be slowly revealed in the course of the novel in order for us to fully understand his later actions. Chapter Five returns, then, to the night of the visit to Judge Irwin; it follows the process by which Jack Burden, the dispassionate student of history, ferrets out the information that can be used against Judge Irwin. With the background provided in Chapters Two, Three, and Four, it is easier to follow and to understand the events in this fifth chapter. Several facets of Jack's search are noteworthy. One of these is the visit to the Scholarly Attorney--his father--to try to get information about Judge Montague Irwin, who had been his father's best friend. Obviously, Jack has had some contact with the Scholarly Attorney over the years, for he knows exactly where to find him, and he knows exactly what to expect when he does find him. Ellis Burden, the Scholarly Attorney who left a child, a beautiful wife, a fine home, and a thriving law practice in Burden's Landing, now lives in one of the poorest sections of the capital, where he proclaims a street-corner religion and takes care of "unfortunates." He considers the life he left to be a life of foulness and of corruption, and he will not speak of it. Ellis Burden is considered to be a saint by the people among whom he lives, and he now cares tenderly for George, a former circus aerialist whose wife died in a fall; George is now dreadfully afraid of heights--even of standing up. Ellis Burden is much like Cass Mastern in that he seems to be trying to expiate some sense of guilt, to atone for some sin, in his work with the poor and unfortunate of the city and in his religious fervor. Furthermore, Jack can understand his father and his father's motives no more than he could understand Cass Mastern. Of course, Jack had all of the relevant information about Cass Mastern, but he--and the reader--do not have all the facts behind his father's decision to leave Jack and his mother. Even if Jack did have this information, however, he would not be able to understand his father's actions and motives. Jack

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

18

www.cliffs.com

must grow in knowledge and understanding before he can begin to comprehend what his father has done; he must be shocked out of the protective psychological shell he has built around himself. Jack's attitude toward his father is basically hostile, at least on the surface. For example, Jack tells the Mexicans in the bar below where his father lives that his father is "loco." He ridicules his father's religious philosophy whenever he can. He is cynical about the unfortunates whom his father brings home, and he feels that his father is a sucker for being taken in by these people. Yet underneath this facade of hostility and cynicism is a little boy who wants his father, who wants to love and respect his father, and who wants his father to love and care for him in return. Thus, when he watches his father gently feeding George some pieces of candy, he remembers a time in the house at Burden's Landing when his father gave him candy in the same way, and he calls out softly to his father, trying to reestablish that earlier relationship. Unfortunately, his father does not hear what Jack says, and the moment quickly passes. Jack leaves without the information he came for; once more, he is frustrated by his contact with the Scholarly Attorney. The scene in which Jack calls out to his father should be noted carefully. The contrast between this single moment of genuine emotion and his usual methods of responding to people clearly shows that Jack carefully keeps his relationships with people on the surface. He avoids emotional commitments, and he shies away from expressions of emotion (for example, he is astounded by Sadie Burke's outburst when she discovers that Willie Stark "cheated" on her; Jack tries to laugh it off and to get away as quickly as he can). Jack's emotional--and moral--detachment is also evident in his research into Judge Irwin's past. The Judge's friendship and the fact that, after Jack's father left the family, the Judge took on many of the activities with him that a father would have done, have no effect today on Jack. In his search, Jack tries to be objective about the Judge--again, at least on the surface--as he is about everything else. He weighs the Judge's character as he would weigh an object. He "turns him over and around" to look at him from all sides in order to find a possible flaw, much as a child examines a block. When he does find that flaw, or the possibility of one, he pursues this line of thought tenaciously, uncovering all of the potential leads. The path is twisting and obscure, but Jack follows it carefully to its end, to the conclusion that Judge Irwin had once accepted a bribe. As Jack says, he is very good at his job. In this pursuit of the facts (but not of the situations or motivations behind the facts), Jack seems to be dispassionate and unfeeling. There is, however, an undercurrent of emotion that Jack seems to keep carefully concealed. Even when he is given his assignment by Willie, Jack seems to hope that he will find nothing against the Judge. He tells Willie several times that the search may be fruitless, and in the course of his narrative he indicates that the governor would have to accept the fact that there is nothing to be found, since Jack "does his job well." In addition to this repeated hope, Jack's ironic comment at the end of the chapter about how researchers love truth and his indication at the beginning of the chapter that what he found had meaning for him also reveal the emotional undercurrent that Jack ignores. (In reading these comments at the beginning and the end of the chapter, the fact that Jack is narrating the story some three years later should be kept in mind; a great deal happens to him in those three years.) Anne and Adam Stanton, the children of former Governor Joel Stanton and childhood friends of Jack's, become important characters in this chapter. We learn several things about them, things that will become more important in the last half of the novel. Both Anne and Adam have stronger, more favorable feelings about their father and their background than Jack has about his. The scene in which Anne lights the fire in the Stanton house in Burden's Landing, seeming to kneel in front of the portrait of her father, suggests a reverence for the past quite clearly, and Jack comments on the symbolism. Neither Anne nor Adam thinks very highly of Governor Stark; he does not match up with their image of their father. In this chapter, it is Anne who makes this point, while Adam

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

19

www.cliffs.com

simply ignores any comparison between the two men. Anne also holds Judge Irwin in high regard, for he was her father's friend and therefore cut from the same mold (we shall learn, ultimately, that this is true, but not in the way that Anne thinks it is true). She becomes very angry with Jack for even trying to find out anything about the judge's past. Anne and Adam are friends from Jack's youth, and they all accept one another in the way that such friends do, overlooking each other's foibles. Anne and Adam are, however, quite different from Jack. Both of them serve other people. Adam is a doctor, one of the best, and he is a workaholic, driving himself to treat as many people as he possibly can. Anne is a volunteer worker for a children's home, and although she does help other people, she feels that she has not done enough with her life, that she has not made as much of it as she possibly could have. In short, both of them feel compelled to meet the standards that they believe were set--and met--by the previous generations, and both of them seem to feel that reaching those standards is impossible. Jack, Anne, and Adam must all find the truth about the past; Jack must find it so that he can find himself, while Anne and Adam must find it so they can be freed from the burden it has been for them. The relationship between Jack and Anne is somewhat mysterious. He alludes to the fact that he had once asked her to marry him and she refused him. In spite of that, they are still very good friends; she seems to depend on him in times of trouble, and he seems as devoted to her as he could be to anyone. At this point in the novel, however, their present relationship, as well as their relationship in the past, is merely suggested; it will be examined in greater detail later in the novel. Finally, Willie Stark figures in this chapter, although only briefly. Willie is a man of great personal force and energy, and he shows this in all his actions. He goes walking after he and Jack return from Judge Irwin's, even though it is three o'clock in the morning. Later, we see him bouncing up and down and yelling wildly at his son's football game. He wants his son to be able to do something, rather than simply sit and study. (Tom, of course, does other things--even though they are things which do not turn out the way that Willie hoped they would, for Tom's later actions cause Willie many problems and much pain.) Clearly, it is Willie's energy and force, as well as the fact that he directs people into doing something for the citizens of the state, that draws Jack Burden to Willie Stark.

CHAPTER SIX Jack's search for something disreputable about Judge Irwin covered approximately seven months, ending with his visit to Miss Littlepaugh in Memphis in March 1937. Chapter Six overlaps Chapter Five: that is, part of the action described in Chapter Six is concurrent with Jack's search, and the thematic emphases of the two chapters are similar. Anne and Adam Stanton, however, become much more centrally prominent, and Willie Stark has a greater role than he has had for several chapters. Willie Stark exhibits several sides of his personality that have only been hinted at earlier in the novel. On one hand, business in the capitol is as usual, as Jack and others use information and threats to hush a potential scandal concerning Tom Stark and the young woman who was with him when he wrecked his sports car. When the girl's father, who owns a trucking firm, threatens to raise a ruckus, someone points out to him that trucks do use state highways and that the state does control many contracts with trucking firms. The case is kept quiet. A second facet of Willie's personality can also be seen in the actions surrounding Tom's accident. In spite of Lucy's insistence that he must do something to temper Tom's behavior before something worse happens, Willie absolutely refuses. He wants his son to enjoy life, he says; he wants his son to be a surrogate for him, living out the good times that he never had, climaxing with Tom's football stardom. Another facet of Willie's refusal to discipline Tom is based on the notion that Tom's activities are the manly things to do; Willie insists that, if Lucy had her way, the boy would be a sissy. To some extent, this notion seems to be Willie's reaction against Lucy's strict ideas of what is right and what is wrong. Because Lucy does not approve of Willie's tactics, she has shut herself (figuratively)

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

20

www.cliffs.com

away from him; as a result, he will not allow her to have any opportunity to remove Tom from his dominance. When Willie Stark quelled the move to impeach him, he swore to the people of his state that he would build the largest, best medical facility in the United States. His pursuit of this extravagant promise brings out other facets of his personality, some of which seem, to Jack, to contradict his other practices in getting things done. For example, Willie insists that this hospital will be politically "clean" from the beginning of its construction to its finish. When he travels to various places to find out what makes a medical facility good, he devotes all of his energy to that end, avoiding even the idea of taking a woman to bed with him on those trips. He is absolutely outraged that Tiny Duffy, his Lieutenant Governor, wants the contract for the hospital to go to Gummy Larson, who would then "sell out" MacMurfee. Although this would be a political gain, and a big one, Willie does not want to be a part of anything that even appears to be political maneuvering in order to have any part of the building of this hospital. He is fanatical about this, and he tries to convince Jack that he is sincere, but Jack is skeptical. In addition, he expends a great deal of energy getting things together and planning this project, and he insists that the director of the hospital be the very best man possible: Adam Stanton. Jack, of course, is given the task of convincing Adam to accept the position. The governor's assignment becomes a mandate when Anne Stanton tells Jack that he must make Adam take the job--no matter what it requires. Adam Stanton is, as Jack points out to Anne, a romantic, a man who believes that at some time in the past men acted unselfishly and for high-minded purposes. These men were moral and uncorrupted, and Adam wants to be the same kind of man and to act from the same kinds of motives; Adam is not interested in wealth or the trappings of wealth; his fees are low, and he lives in a poor neighborhood, with his only luxury being a fine piano that he plays very well. He is not ambitious, nor is he interested in power or fame, for he has not spoiled himself materialistically, nor has he tried to make a name for himself (nevertheless, he is known around the country as an excellent doctor, one of the best). He simply forces himself to treat as many people as well as he can. He works long hours and allows himself little or no time for leisure or for relaxation; the trip to Burden's Landing described in Chapter Five is one of the rare occasions when he lets himself relax even a little. As a result of his character, Adam Stanton is indignant that Willie Stark would even ask him to be the director of the hospital; he wants no part of anything that bears the taint of Willie Stark, of his political methods, or of corrupt politics in general. Adam wavers only slightly when Jack points out to him that this would be a chance to do more good than he could otherwise do, to reach out and help more people than he otherwise could. Adam is polite to Jack, and he does not reject the offer outright, but he is clearly upset when Jack leaves; one can surmise that he is upset both because the offer came from a man whom he considers utterly corrupt and because he has been, even momentarily, tempted by the offer. When Anne tries to talk with her brother about taking this position, however, he becomes extremely angry. He apparently believes that Anne should know better, should feel the same way about it that he feels, although he tolerates Jack and the fact that Jack works for Willie Stark. When Anne talks to Jack, telling him that he must find a way to convince Adam to take the job, she does so because she feels that Adam is increasingly using his work as an excuse to withdraw from her and from normal human activity and submerge himself in a world of his own devising. In fact, she is so eager for Adam to take the job that she agrees that changing his view of the past is necessary, but she is not prepared for the violence of Adam's reaction against her and against their father (who had protected Judge Irwin many years ago when Irwin allowed himself to be bribed). Jack's techniques are successful; once Adam knows about his father's shady

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

21

www.cliffs.com

dealings, he agrees to become the director of the hospital. He realizes that no man is immune from corruption--not his father, not Judge Irwin. Anne Stanton is a rather different person in Chapter Six than she has been in earlier chapters. She seems more tense and more nervous as she asks Jack to walk with her before she explains to him why she asked to talk with him. She is also more brittle and snappish with him after he tells her about her father and Judge Irwin. Additionally, she seems bitter about Jack's behavior and about his activities and his attitudes. Furthermore, she is concerned about Adam's withdrawal, whereas earlier she tended to defend him and find excuses for him. She has changed in other ways, too, although Jack does not discover this until the end of the chapter. In a startling revelation, we learn that she has become Willie Stark's mistress. There is some evidence later in the novel that she does not actually do so, however, until after she learns about her father; yet, at the very least, she has seriously considered the idea of sleeping with Willie Stark by the time she talks to Jack. She, like Jack, has been drawn to Willie's energy and his drive, and she, like Jack, finds in that energy and drive a means of avoiding the meaninglessness and drift in her life. In addition, she seems to have glimpsed at least a part of the vision that Willie has, of what he is trying to do. Her reactions throughout the chapter suggest that she is struggling within herself, trying to reconcile the temptation of power (later, power itself) with what she has believed all her life. When Adam Stanton accepts the position that Jack offers him, Governor Stark insists on meeting him. Willie, of course, does not shy away from confrontations, and he obviously feels that it is best that this meeting take place as soon as possible to avoid later misunderstandings. Although Adam has accepted the position, he allows the governor to visit him, and he is polite, but he is also hostile, abrupt, and straightforward in his attitude toward Willie Stark and in his expression of his attitudes. He, of course, insists that he not be interfered with while doing his job. It is during this confrontation that Willie Stark most fully reveals his political philosophy. In the barest essentials, Willie believes in two things: original sin and change. That is, men are born in sin, and because of this, the world is filled with weaknesses and bad situations. However, men are also born with the desire to improve things, and they go about changing conditions in any way that they can, trying to make good out of bad. In addition, what men consider to be bad and what methods they use to achieve change will vary because men approve of change constantly. There is no absolute line between good and evil, nor between right and wrong; man must muddle along as well as he can, simply striving to make things better than they were. It would also seem that Willie believes that the ends justify the means; thus, overcoming human "badness" to reach a goal may require harsh means. This view seems to clearly contradict the view of the world that Adam has had, and still seems to hold. It also seems to contradict Willie's insistence that no hint of corruption will touch the building of this hospital. Obviously, although he does not say so, Willie Stark believes, deep down, that some goals are better than others, that some motives are better than others, that some methods of reaching those goals are better than others. He has not lost all of the idealism that he had as a young man, as a young lawyer, and as a young politican. As for Jack Burden, he has received two shocks in succession. The first came in March, when he learned that years ago Judge Irwin had indeed accepted a bribe. This did not jolt him severely, however, partly because he had suspected the possibility, partly because he does not have an idealized view of human beings, and partly because he has unraveled this discovery himself. Learning that Anne Stanton has become Willie Stark's mistress, however, comes as a severe shock and leaves him numb. These two shocks provide the basis--indeed, create the possibility--for the later change in his outlook and direction.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

22

www.cliffs.com

CHAPTER SEVEN Chapter Seven clarifies a number of things that have been either suggested or implied earlier in the novel. It clarifies what Jack Burden's earlier relationship with Anne Stanton was and why that relationship has remained in a state of limbo. It also clarifies the ways in which Jack has insulated himself from genuine human contact, and it clarifies Jack's general attitude toward life, plus it fills in a number of key details about Jack's past. After his father left, the thing that seems to have been most important to Jack during the years in which he was growing up was his friendship with Adam Stanton. He and Adam did many things together, and most often Anne, who was four years younger than Jack, was always with them. Indeed, as Jack looks back, he realizes that her presence was at least as important to him as Adam's was. It was not, however, until he was twenty-one and Anne was seventeen that Anne meant anything special to him. Then he fell in love with her. His schoolboy cynicism about the relationships between men and women was pierced by her simplicity and her naturalness, and he fell in love. She, too, fell in love with him. During that summer, they explored each other in a variety of ways; their attempt at sexual intercourse is, however, interrupted when Jack's mother returns home. Anne is willing to have him make love to her, and Jack wants to, and the affair would probably have been consummated if his mother and some of her friends had not returned early from a party. Jack does seem to have had a genuine tenderness for Anne, and the relationship obviously has greater meaning for him than he had ever realized before. Although they later fight bitterly over whether or not Anne should go to bed with him, the real reason that she does not (or will not) marry Jack lies in his character and her expectations. At twenty-one--in about 1918--Jack was already very much like he is eighteen years later, in 1936. He has no inner sense of direction, no sense of purpose; there is nothing that he wants to do. He simply drifts on the currents of the summer, reacting rather than acting. And it is this that is disturbing to Anne. She wants him to have a sense of purpose and direction. She does not care what it is; money and position do not seem to matter to her, but she expects Jack to want something badly enough to go after it, to follow it. Of course, her expectations are based on the purposefulness which she has seen in her father and in Adam, and it has become an important element in her own character and in her own life. Given the period in history in which she grows up, she has not been expected to have a predetermined social direction for herself or to have some professional purpose of her own; that must be provided by the man--or men--in her life. As Jack recognizes, it is this lack of meaning and direction in himself that eventually drives Anne Stanton into the arms, and into the bed, of Willie Stark, who does have the vision and the drive which she has been looking for. Jack's marriage to Lois Seager confirms this and other aspects of his character. He knows why he married her: she was very good-looking and a very good bed partner. In contrast, he does not know why she married him. He suspects that the name Burden had a great deal to do with it, since she was socially ambitious. He mentions the possibility that she might have loved him, but he doesn't really believe it. Indeed, he seems to believe that no one could love him; this could well be a consequence of the abandonment he felt--and still feels--after his father left, and his mother remarried, and he was sent off to boarding school. Jack's relationship with Lois seems fine as long as he can depersonalize her. That is, he is quite satisfied with being married to her as long as he can think of her as being only a body or as being only a machine whose primary function is sex. When he finds himself thinking of her as a person, he finds that he doesn't like the person that she is. (This may well be a defense mechanism; one has to be close to another human being to think of him or her as a person, and Jack is not willing to let anyone come that close, since it means that he might be hurt. Especially after Anne refuses to marry him, Jack shuts himself off from any genuine human contact.) When Jack begins to think of Lois as a human being, he reacts, rather than acts.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

23

www.cliffs.com

He reacts against her friends, against her taste in furniture, against her efforts to improve his clothing, and finally, against her. His penultimate reaction is to drift into the Great Sleep, and his final reaction is simply walking out the door and never coming back. In other words, Jack's reaction to difficulties in his life is to gradually withdraw and, then, finally to run from them. He withdraws from Anne and finally drifts away. He withdraws from the story of Cass Mastern and leaves it--or the physical evidence of it--behind him when he leaves; even when it follows him, he does not even disturb the wrapping paper. He withdraws from Lois Seager psychologically before he runs away physically. He even runs away from the fact that Anne Stanton has become Willie Stark's mistress. He simply does not want to face up to his problems, and this reflex goes much deeper than simply a refusal to face the immediate problems; Jack also fears that if he looks too hard at his problems, he will have to face a far more fundamental problem, the fear and loneliness and rootlessness that he has bottled up inside himself. It is a significant sign of the beginnings of change in him that he does examine his relationships with two of the three women in his life (his mother is the third). It is even more significant that he admits Anne's liaison with Willie Stark has its roots in a flaw within Jack Burden. Jack is not, however, quite ready to emerge from his shell; he is not yet ready to accept full responsibility for his actions and for the consequences of those actions. He still feels that he must insulate himself from other people, that he must repair the damage done by the realization that Anne Stanton had held such a significant position in his life for so long. The first step in repairing Jack's defenses is to reduce all human action to what he calls "an itch in the blood," a twitch in a nerve. Anne's response to him that summer, and his feeling for her, were--or so he tells himself--nothing more than that, nothing personal at all. And, with that decided, he leaves Long Beach, California, to return home.

CHAPTER EIGHT At the beginning of this chapter, Jack Burden meets an old man who has a facial tic--that is, his left cheek involuntarily twitches to a kind of rhythm, and this tic has been a part of him for so long that he is not even aware of it. Jack takes this tic, adds it to the idea of a mysterious itch in the blood that governs human behavior, and comes away with the theory of the Great Twitch. According to this theory, something in the universe sends out a bit of current, and somewhere, somebody twitches, and does something. There is, thus, no logical reason why things happen to human beings, and, therefore, there is no human responsibility for one's actions. Jack, of course, is trying to repair the damage done to his psychological "shell" when he recoiled and felt betrayed by Anne Stanton; now he is trying to deny that he is responsible for anything. Unfortunately for Jack, his efforts at closing himself off from the world again are not as effective as similar efforts have been in the past. For one thing, he has, however tentatively, admitted the possibility that he is, in some measure, responsible for Anne Stanton's decision to become Willie's mistress. For another, he is simply unable to dismiss what he felt for Anne; that feeling comes back to haunt him when he talks to Anne and even when he sees a young couple playing tennis at Burden's Landing. Not only that, but he makes the first tentative steps toward admitting his part in Anne's decision--admitting that he had been the way he was and that he had given her the information about her father, information which had freed her to take this step. Later, when Jack watches Adam perform the prefrontal lobectomy, he cannot think of the man on the operating table as a mortal, living human being. Instead, he thinks of the whole procedure as being done by a carpenter working with inanimate materials. In addition he makes no changes in his job; it is business as usual. When Hubert Coffee, working for Gummy Larson, tries to bribe Adam, Jack manipulates Adam so that it appears that Governor Stark is ready to prosecute--and thus is making an effort to keep the hospital

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

24

www.cliffs.com

"clean"--and also Jack’s actions make it seem that Adam makes the decision not to take the case to court (to protect Anne). When MacMurfee uses Marvin Frey and his daughter to accuse Tom Stark in a paternity suit and thus to threaten Willie, Jack is ready to find whatever political "dirt" he can on both of the Freys and help thwart MacMurfee’s plans to run for the Senate. Clearly, a wedge has been driven into the opening in Jack’s psychological armor. When Lucy Stark calls him and asks him what is happening, Jack is honest and sympathetic with her, although his meeting with her makes him rather uncomfortable. In addition, when Willie Stark wants the information that Jack has found out about Judge Irwin, Jack refuses to give it to him until he himself has talked to the judge about it. Several things about his refusal are of particular interest. First, Jack claims to have promised two people that he would talk to the judge first--himself and someone whom he doesn't name (he had explicitly promised only Anne). Second, Jack is afraid that the information which he has on Judge Irwin is politically potent, yet he hopes that the judge will be able to tell him that it is not true, that he did not take a bribe. Jack has, in short, begun to have some feeling for people toward whom his feelings had been, at best, neutral. This last decision, to talk to Judge Irwin before giving the information to Willie Stark, opens the way to a series of jolts that move Jack Burden closer and closer to a significant change in his attitudes toward life in general and toward other people in particular. These jolts come in rapid sequence. First, Jack observes the judge refuse to bend under pressure. Then he sees Judge Irwin admit that he did, indeed, take a bribe; yet the judge still refuses to bow under pressure. Third, Jack learns that Judge Irwin kills himself, cleanly, with a shot through the heart. As he learns this, Jack also learns that Judge Irwin, not the Scholarly Attorney, is actually his father. This, in turn, is proof for Jack that the judge might have used this fact to try and stop Jack from giving the governor his information, but he did not. Finally, Jack learns that he is Judge Irwin's primary heir--the heir to the property that the judge accepted a bribe in order to save. The result of this series of shocks is to shatter the preconceptions Jack has had about the people in his life, and to shatter the "ice" that has gripped his heart for so long. He can feel compassion, and even love, for his mother, for he has discovered that she has truly loved someone. He can understand now why the Scholarly Attorney left his wife and child, although he feels that this action was weak. He is, indeed, relieved to find out that the Scholarly Attorney is not his father, since he has always felt tainted by the Scholarly Attorney's weakness. Yet he is somewhat confused in these feelings, since he has very positive feelings about Ellis Burden's gentleness and concern. Finally, he is proud of his real father, Judge Irwin, for accepting all responsibility for his past actions, as well as for the judge's continuing to act on his principles in the face of a threat. He comes to understand what bad happened when his life was shattered and to understand more fully why these things happened. As a result, Jack Burden can begin to accept himself and his past more fully, and he can begin to develop a new perspective on life.

CHAPTER NINE As Jack points out, life is a series of stories within stories; there never is a neat, clear-cut ending to any sequence of events, for the reverberations from one sequence are felt in other sequences Thus, the death of Judge Irwin ends only one particular story, the story of Judge Irwin, including the sins he committed and the choices he made. Learning the details of the story has made changes in Jack's understanding of the world, and he thinks that that story is closed. He is wrong, of course, for the story of Judge Irwin will continue to ripple through Jack's life and actions; his refusal to take part in digging out sordid information about people and his refusal to retaliate against Frey are clear indications of this. More important, at least in an immediate sense, is the effect that the end of Judge Irwin's story has in the story of Willie Stark.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

25

www.cliffs.com

Jack started investigating the judge's past in order to find something that Willie Stark could use against Judge Irwin and persuade the judge to withdraw his support for MacMurfee's senatorial candidacy. The search took too long to be of use for that purpose, but such information is always useful if that is the way one does business. When the business of Marvin Frey and his daughter arose, Willie Stark thought to use the matter of the judge's accepting a bribe years ago in order to persuade the judge to thwart MacMurfee's schemes. The judge's death stopped that plan, however; yet the first ripple from the end of that story was that Willie Stark had to deal with Gummy Larson, to give him the contract for the hospital. The next event that produces a reverberation that intensifies the ripple started by Judge Irwin's death is Tom Stark's injury, an injury that leaves Tom paralyzed. This, in a sense, paralyzes Willie Stark's political maneuvers. He has come to a point at which he no longer has control of the situation. Before Judge Irwin's death, the Boss had been able to get what he wanted by buying or bullying people, and he had been able to do so without giving up anything himself. When Judge Irwin killed himself rather than accept the alternatives offered by the governor, Willie Stark is put into a position in which he has control but in which he has no choice but to give up something important to him: he can have Gummy Larson call off MacMurfee by giving Larson the hospital contract, or he can call MacMurfee and concede the Senate seat that Willie wants for himself. When Tom Stark is paralyzed because his spinal cord has been crushed, there is nothing that Willie can do. He cannot buy anything. He cannot bully anyone. He cannot do a thing to change this situation to suit himself or to fit into his plans. Willie’s inability to do anything forces him to stop and think. At first, he spins his mental wheels. As though it will, somehow, make some difference, he decides that the hospital should be named after Tom. Then Lucy points out that naming the hospital after Tom is not important, that none of the things that Willie has been so concerned with are things that are really important. Exactly what the process is that causes Willie to change his thinking is not shown to the reader; it is, instead, suggested. When Willie leaves the hospital, Lucy goes with him (she has been living with her sister, separated from Willie). Furthermore, Tiny Duffy cannot find Willie throughout the weekend, and he has been thorough in his attempts to do so. The implication is that Willie Stark has spent the weekend with Lucy. Considering the actions that Willie takes on the Monday following his son's accident, it seems likely that he and Lucy have talked a great deal. Given Lucy Stark's previously established belief that some things are right in themselves and that other things are wrong, and given the fact that Willie has been brought up short, and, in addition, when we consider the actions that Willie takes that Monday, it seems likely that Willie and Lucy Stark have talked extensively about what he has been doing, that Lucy has succeeded in convincing him of the rightness of her viewpoint, and that he has made a decision to change his way of doing business. The ripples overlap and intensify one another as Willie Stark makes two decisions--clearly and firmly. First, he tells Tiny Duffy to "unarrange" the deal that was made with Gummy Larson. Tiny had worked hard to get the Boss to make this deal, and he is stung by this decision. Second, Willie tells Anne Stanton that he is dropping her and returning to his wife; he also has a row with Sadie Burke, and we assume that he has told her the same thing that he told Anne Stanton (this assumption is confirmed later). Even his last words to Jack indicate that he plans to take a new direction, that he wants to make things different. The precise effects of these decisions are not revealed in this chapter, since Jack does not learn of them until later. Nevertheless, they contribute to the death of Willie Stark. Willie's decision to return to his wife has upset Sadie Burke so much that she tells Tiny Duffy that Anne Stanton is Willie Stark's mistress and that he should call Adam Stanton with this information. In spite of years of simply accepting abuse from the Boss--or perhaps because of it--Willie's decision to get rid of Gummy Larson makes Tiny Duffy angry enough to use this information and to call Adam Stanton, embellishing the facts more than just a bit.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

26

www.cliffs.com

This phone call brings into play the myth by which Adam had lived, as well as the ripples from the story of Judge Irwin. That is, Adam's reaction to this news is caused by his conception of what human, and political, conduct should be, tempered by his knowledge that Judge Irwin took a bribe and that his father protected Irwin. It is also caused by what seems to be some kind of feeling of personal inadequacy: he seems to believe that the only reason that he was chosen as the director for the hospital was that his sister was Willie Stark's mistress. Such a feeling of unworthiness, of being unable to reach some standard he had set for himself, would also explain why he has driven himself so hard all his life. It does not matter that this standard is unreachable; all that matters is his belief that he should--must--reach it in order to be considered worthy. If he cannot reach that standard, then all other accomplishments, no matter how great they are, are worthless in his eyes. Thus, Adam Stanton shoots Willie Stark out of a sense of honor, of betrayal, of unworthiness, and of confusion. The reverberations from the various stories told in this novel echo in the shots fired, first by Adam and almost simultaneously by Sugar-Boy. Here, the stories of Willie Stark and Adam Stanton mesh simultaneously, but the other stories continue, including the more encompassing story of Jack Burden. It has taken a series of progressively greater and more immediate jolts to shock Jack out of the cocoon-like shell which he built for himself many years earlier, but he is finally beginning to understand the lesson from Cass Mastern's past: a man's actions do not affect him alone; they reach out and touch other people in increasingly wider circles, often with undreamed of repercussions. Having learned this, Jack Burden can emerge and begin a new life.

CHAPTER TEN Earlier in the novel, when he talked about his days as a graduate student of history, Jack Burden said that, whereas his roommates were trying to escape the future, he was trying to escape the present. To that end, he buried himself in the study of the past, particularly in the study of Cass Mastern's papers, trying to understand Cass Mastern. From the perspective of the completed novel, it is easy to see that Jack Burden felt cut off from his past, from a past with which he could identify, and that he was trying to find, in his study of history, something that would give shape and meaning to his life in the present, without which he could not face the present, much less the future. When he fails to understand Cass Mastern--and thus fails to understand his past--he simply leaves it all behind and drifts, letting the various forces control his direction. It is only in this last chapter that Jack's past is fully restored to him, so that he can face both the present and the future. These crises--the death of Judge Irwin, as well as the knowledge that Judge Irwin had been bribed and was, in addition, his father; the knowledge that the Scholarly Attorney was not his father and a general understanding of why the Scholarly Attorney had walked away; the feeling that his mother had loved Monty Irwin; the knowledge that Anne Stanton had become Willie Stark's mistress; the deaths of Willie Stark and Adam Stanton--all of these things, and the events surrounding them, provide most of the building blocks out of which Jack can reconstruct his past. The keystone--the one piece of the past, the one bit of information, that gives the final shape to this reconstruction and locks the pieces into place--is provided by his mother. Although Jack has been totally unaware of it, his mother has also been locked into a pattern by the events that have happened in her life. She seems to have been as shocked by the fact that Ellis Burden abandoned his family as Jack was. Her succession of husbands seems to have been a result of her desire to prove she could attract a man and hold him in the face of this rejection, and her methods of dealing with Jack--which have both attracted him and repelled him--have been attempts to make sure that Jack does not leave her, too. After hearing her scream when she heard that Monty Irwin was dead, Jack wondered why she had not married the judge after his wife had died, often attributing harsh motives to her for not doing so. In this chapter, she fills in the final information he needs by telling him that it was not until Monty Irwin died that she realized that he was the only man whom she ever truly cared for. With this knowledge, and with a good

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

27

www.cliffs.com

deal of thought, she has decided to leave Theodore Murrell, her latest husband, and to let him have the house, since her decision had nothing to do with him and since living on the Row means so much to him (knowing that Jack does not particularly care for that house). This revelation tells Jack that his mother did, indeed, care for someone and that events have shaped her actions, as they shaped his. As a result, he can accept the idea that she did, indeed, care for him, and this makes a great deal of difference in his ability to accept her and his past. Before he can put this keystone into place, however, Jack has to assimilate other events that have drastically altered his life. In particular, he must assimilate the death of Willie Stark--the Boss, the governor, the man who gave focus and direction to those he came in contact with. For a time, then, Jack lives at the Landing, spending the days quietly with Anne Stanton, preserving a fragile balance for both of them, never mentioning what has happened. For a time, that is enough. The matter of Willie Stark has not been fully resolved, however, and that begins to trouble Jack. In finding his resolution to his relationship with the Boss, Jack must do three things: he must find out who was responsible for Adam Stanton's decision to kill Willie Stark; he must decide what he will do with that information; and he must sort out his feelings about Willie Stark and come to some viable conclusions about him. The first task is done simply enough, for he finds Sadie Burke, who tells him that she told Tiny Duffy to do it and how to do it. She did this in the heat of the moment, just after Willie told her that he was throwing her over and returning to Lucy. At first, Jack believes that Tiny Duffy's action was strictly cold-blooded, using another man to get something he wanted. Later, however, Jack reviews this idea, and he isn't quite so sure. He comes to believe that Tiny Duffy is human after all and that he used the opportunity to gain revenge for all those years that Willie had "spit on him" in one way or another. In other words, Tiny Duffy cared about how he was treated, although he chose to accept the treatment he got. Deciding what to do with this information is more difficult. Jack’s first impulse is to spread the word and, thus, to "get" Duffy. He quickly sees that this is not a truly satisfactory solution. For one thing, it would involve Anne Stanton, dragging her through the mud and making her relive the entire sequence of events that cost her her brother and her lover. For another, Jack has the opportunity to refuse an offer of a job from Duffy and to tell Duffy exactly what he has found out. This gains him a great deal of satisfaction at the moment, but that satisfaction is short-lived. He realizes that he treated Duffy as Willie Stark had. He realizes that he tried to use Tiny Duffy to absolve himself of any responsibility in the events that led to the deaths of Willie Stark and Adam Stanton. He realizes that Tiny Duffy was sure that Jack Burden would take the job offered to him because their interests were substantially the same. He sees himself as being a "brother" to Tiny Duffy. This idea, which is essentially the acceptance of his own guilt and responsibility, paralyzes Jack for a time. He goes through another period of numbness as he assimilates all of this. His reaction now, however, is different than it was earlier. Before, he tried to escape from his problems, either by retreating into the Great Sleep or by physically running from his troubles. This time, he drifts about town, avoiding people, reading a good deal in the public library, and seeing many movies. Perhaps he does not actively confront his problems, his new realizations, but neither does he try to avoid them or to seal himself off from them. It takes Jack about six months from the time he decides to find out who was behind the killing of Willie Stark until he has assimilated everything and resolved, to his own satisfaction, how he will live in the future. One event that has, apparently, a great deal to do with changing the direction of his thinking is his chance meeting with Sugar-Boy O'Sheean in the public library. Jack toys with the idea of telling Sugar-Boy that Tiny Duffy was behind the Boss's death. As he probes to find out what Sugar-Boy would do if he had this information, he discovers that Sugar-Boy's devotion is absolute, that he would do anything for the Boss, even after the Boss is dead. As Jack almost acts on impulse, however, he suddenly recognizes that

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

28

www.cliffs.com

telling Sugar-Boy would be exactly the same thing that Duffy did when he called Adam Stanton. It also dawns on him that he can make a choice not to act in the same way. As a result, he tells Sugar-Boy that he was only joking, that he doesn't have the information--even though he realizes that Sugar-Boy might well kill him for that kind of joke. Although he feels that this was the right decision, as he thinks about it, he also comes to understand that killing Tiny Duffy would have given Sugar-Boy's life a meaning it will otherwise lack, for it would have given him a chance to do something for the man whom he admired so much. This meeting takes place in February, about half-way through Jack's hiatus, and it is not until May that Jack takes up his life again. The first step is to go out and visit Lucy Stark. Her faith has kept her going, and one aspect of this faith has led her to adopt the child who Sibyl Frey had claimed was Tom's. She does not know for sure that the child is Tom's, but she accepts that on faith, and it allows her to have something of her son continue on (Tom died approximately the same time that Jack met Sugar-Boy). In addition, she believes that Willie Stark was a great man--a man who erred, perhaps, and who did some things he should not have done, but a man who contained the seeds of greatness. It is this article of faith that helped her to keep going in the past and that now helps her to continue. It seems as though Jack has come close to attaining this same kind of faith in Wlllie Stark's potential greatness, for he visits Lucy in order to have this faith confirmed and strengthened. Having come to these resolutions about his relationship with Willie Stark and his administration, as well as having come to final terms with his past, Jack Burden is ready to pick up the pieces of his life and to move forward. Part of this assessment and motivation involves taking responsibility for his past and tying up the loose ends. Thus, Jack marries Anne Stanton and brings the Scholarly Attorney home to live out his last days with them. He also plans to write the book about Cass Mastern that he abandoned years before. When the book is written, he says, and when the Scholarly Attorney dies, that chapter in his life will be closed. Jack and Anne will then leave Burden's Landing to start a new chapter--without abandoning the past.

CHARACTER ANALYSES JACK BURDEN AND WILLIE STARK Jack Burden and Willie Stark are, of course, the paired central characters of All the King's Men. Jack Burden is important because he is the narrator of the novel and because he is the character who undergoes the greatest change; he is also the character about whom, ultimately, we learn the most. Willie Stark, on the other hand, is the most powerful, the most dominating character in the novel, and it seems to be, primarily, his story that Jack Burden tells. Each character needs the other: without Willie Stark, Jack Burden's life would be insignificant; without Jack Burden, Willie Stark's life would have little shape or meaning. Both Willie Stark and Jack Burden are complex characters, and both of them are presented complexly. Both of these men act in ways that seem contradictory, but these apparently contradictory motivations are rooted in the past, in the things that they did or that happened to them when they were younger. The events of the past, then, are necessary to an understanding of these characters in the present. In fact, these events out of the past make Jack Burden and Willie Stark both more complex and more understandable. Between the late summer of 1936 and the early fall of 1937--the present time of the novel as far as Willie Stark is concerned--Willie exhibits a number of characteristics, some of them seeming to contradict others. One of the main characteristics which he exhibits is his enormous energy. Indeed, the man seems hardly to need to sleep; for example, when they return to his father’s place after visiting Judge Irwin, Willie Stark goes for a walk in order to think things through rather than go to bed, even though it is three o'clock in the morning. Later in the novel, he spends hours working on plans for the hospital which he has sworn to the

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

29

www.cliffs.com

people that he would build. Furthermore, all of the evidence points toward the idea that he has always been a person who needs little sleep, one who has the drive to use every waking hour profitably. We have many scenes of Willie Stark studying law late into the morning hours after putting in a full day's work. There are also suggestions that Jack has been awakened from his slumbers and is summoned because Willie Stark is working on some project. There are also the whirlwind visits to Willie's political opponents at unusual hours of the night when he is threatened by impeachment. All of this evidence shows us that Willie Stark has immense amounts of energy and drive. Not only does this energy go into the projects and crises which he faces, but it is also channeled into all of his other activities. His sexual appetite is apparently great; he has Sadie Burke and Anne Stanton as "regular" mistresses, and he takes other women to bed with him whenever the opportunity presents itself. He shows great enthusiasm for the football team, especially when Tom is performing well; he yells and jumps and throws his arms around people. When Tom is in the hospital, Willie paces the halls and refuses to rest until some kind of resolution is reached. Even in death, Willie Stark hangs on to life more tenaciously than he might have been expected to. Another of Willie Stark's primary characteristics is his ability to hold a crowd spellbound, to move them emotionally as he wishes them to be moved. He does just the right things in the drugstore in Mason City in order to make sure that the crowd’s allegiance to him is reinforced. When he makes a speech in the town square a little later, he makes sure of two things: that he has this crowd spellbound by his oratory and that his speech makes good copy for the newspapermen who have accompanied him on this trip. Although this ability to hold and to emotionally capture a crowd seems to be an innate ability, he did not always use it as effectively as he does in the novel's present. His speech to the crowd in Mason City is effective in uniting the crowd behind him; Jack can recognize that Willie is going to give them the "Stark treatment," the mannerisms that have developed over the years, particularly the bulge and the glitter in his eyes. The speech after the impeachment attempt has been curbed is effective in controlling a much larger crowd and calming it, just as are his speeches across the state when he needs to rally support for himself as the impeachment attempt is mounting. His speeches against Joe Harrison effectively rouse the anger of the people of the rural areas of the state and ultimately contribute to Harrison's defeat. It is these speeches against Harrison that mark the beginning of Willie Stark's career as an effective public speaker, and the difference between his later speeches and the earlier ones shows a change in his attitude, both toward himself and toward the people to whom he speaks. Willie's earlier speeches reflected his idea that the people of his state were interested in good, effective government and that they would decide rationally on the basis of a reasonable plan that is rationally organized and rationally presented. As a result of this belief, his earlier speeches are filled with facts and figures and explanations. Furthermore, he delivers these speeches woodenly and calmly, more in the manner of an uninspired college professor delivering a dry and dusty lecture. He wants nothing to get in the way of a rational consideration of his program. In contrast, his later speeches are delivered emotionally, with great intensity. They are filled with devices that rouse the audience--inciting its anger and inviting its response. These speeches are designed to project an image of Willie Stark as the kind of person whom these people can trust, the kind of person who works for them and follows their wishes. These later speeches recognize the emotional nature of the people whom he addresses, and Willie Stark seems almost contemptuous of them as he manipulates them as he wishes. Willie Stark has been labeled as a political demagogue because of the nature of his speeches and because of the way that he manipulates people. Willie Stark did not begin that way, however. He was forced out of his belief in the basic goodness and rationality of people. He discovered that the public would not or could not respond rationally to his rational proposals. When he got angry about his treatment by the Harrison people,

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

30

www.cliffs.com

he discovered that the people would respond to his emotion and to his appeals to their emotions. He also discovered that he could manipulate the emotions of a crowd very effectively. Willie Stark is a political demagogue, but his ability to move a crowd is only part of what makes him a demagogue. Much more important is his sense of mission, his vision of what could be. A major part of his mission is to bring the benefits of government to his kind of people, to the rural parts of the state. For years, the state has been run by people from the Gulf areas, and the benefits of government have gone to the people and the businesses there, leaving the other parts of the state with few benefits. Willie Stark's original program, which he worked on and polished nightly during his first campaign for governor, was a program to bring such things as decent roads into all parts of the state and to spread the tax burden to those who were paying less than their fair share. Although his methods of achieving his goals seem to have changed, the goals themselves have not. Willie began with an idealistic vision of what he could accomplish as governor, and he retains that vision to the end, with the hospital, which is to provide care for all the people of the state, regardless of their financial position, as the most concrete manifestation of his dream. In any evaluation of Willie Stark, two things have to be weighed. On the one hand, he has provided many things for his state, and he has done so in the face of stiff opposition from the MacMurfee faction of the party and from the other, older entrenched interests in the state. On the other hand, his methods are less than savory. He has stacked the state courts to make sure that his changes are adjudged legal (remember, though, that U.S. presidents have done the same thing for the same reasons). He also allows some graft in order to have things proceed more smoothly (but remember that previous administrations did the same kind of thing--sometimes for less worthy purposes, as in Governor Stanton's protection of Judge Irwin). Willie Stark also uses blackmail to make sure that his power is left intact and that his goals are met (a comparison of his tactics with those of his opposition will, however, suggest that he is only fighting fire with fire). In other words, there seems to be no question that Willie Stark's aims are admirable. There also seems to be little question that his methods of achieving his goals are reprehensible in an absolute sense--but also that they are conditioned by established practice and by the methods used against him. Just before his death, of course, Lucy Stark persuades her husband that his methods are wrong, and on his deathbed, Willie does tell Jack that things "might have been all different." Perhaps it is not so much the methods that Willie Stark uses to achieve his goals that are reprehensible, but rather the attitudes which he has, the ways that he applies the methods. He comes to think of the people whom he must deal with as "scum," and he treats them that way. When Bryam White is caught trying to get some extra money for himself, Willie decides to protect White. This decision is made strictly on the basis of power: Willie wants to protect the power that he has, and he will use whatever means necessary to do so. In dealing with White, however, he does not simply tell the man what he is going to do; nor does he merely berate him for his stupidity and venality; instead, Willie Stark makes White cringe and grovel before him, and he appears to enjoy doing so. He heaps abuse on Tiny Duffy, even spits on him--and he seems to enjoy watching Tiny stand there and take it. He seems to enjoy watching the state legislators capitulate when he lets them know what he has on them. He is obviously cynical about human beings, believing that something to discredit them can always be found and that the threat of having this information revealed will always bring them to their knees (at least figuratively, but sometimes literally). He even seems cynical about his speeches, using them to manipulate people, while conscious of the fact that he is doing so. Even here, however, it is not simple to evaluate Willie Stark negatively. For one thing, he says that he would like to see one of these people stand up to him (unfortunately, he is not alive to appreciate the fact that Tiny Duffy finally does something about the way he has been treated). Willie also admires people like Adam Stanton who will not bow down before him, although he is not prepared for someone like Judge Irwin, who kills himself rather than accept the choices which he is offered. Furthermore, a part of Willie Stark's negative view of people seems conditioned by his religious background. That is, although he is not a

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

31

www.cliffs.com

religious person, and although religion does not play a major role in the novel, there are indications that the ideas of original sin and of the sinfulness of man are pervasive in the culture in which Willie Stark grew up. Although Willie Stark may use these ideas for his own purposes, there can be little question that he is drawing on an important part of his background when he does so. Willie Stark is a complex character, filled with conflicting desires and motives. There can be no easy judgments of him or of his actions. Likewise, Jack Burden is also a complex character, and simple judgments of him are also likely to be mistaken. To a certain extent at least, Jack Burden can be described as being a "frozen" personality. That is, most of his attitudes and perceptions are frozen into a mold created when he was six years old. When the Scholarly Attorney left his family, Jack was bewildered; he didn't understand his father's desertion, and he had no idea of the motivation behind it. When Jack's mother sent him off to school and remarried, he felt completely abandoned; he didn't understand her actions, either. Now, it would be too much to claim that Jack is emotionally a six-year-old, but it would be accurate to say that some of his patterns of response were created when he was six. For example, Jack takes a perverse delight in contradicting his mother whenever he can. He chooses to attend the state university because she wants him to go to an eastern university. He squanders the money she sent him for clothes on a drinking spree. He argues with her about his working for Willie Stark, and he is candid in pointing out why Willie Stark has done what he has done when his mother's friends bring the topic up. He sneers at the furniture with which she has filled the house. He resents her, and he resents her ability to get through his defenses, yet at the same time, he wants her to care about him, to soothe him as she sometimes does. He keeps returning to see her, and he watches over her after Judge Irwin's death. Indeed, one of Jack's major problems is that he is not sure that she cares for him, and his doubts about this have their roots early in his life. What she wants for him may be a concern for him, but he feels that she is probably just trying to get her own way and to arrange things for the sake of appearances. Jack does not understand his mother's motivations, and he does not understand human motivation in general. As a result, he does not understand human emotions. During the summer in which he falls in love with Anne Stanton, he has no idea of what Anne is going through or why she does the things she does; he can only react and observe and try to flow with the tide. He doesn't understand at all what Anne wants of him when she asks what he's going to do. He does not understand that she could have doubts or feelings for anyone else, even temporarily. Jack does not understand why Lois Seager married him, nor does he understand what she was feeling during their arguments--if he even understands that she had feelings. He does not understand the Scholarly Attorney's religious philosophy, his choice of a place to live and of a way to live, nor his concern for the unfortunate. Even though Jack has seen Willie Stark's career develop, and even though he has seen the changes take place in Willie Stark's attitudes and methods, he does not understand what it is that drives Willie. Jack does not understand how Willie feels about the hospital nor does he understand Willie's obsession about fulfilling his promises to the common people. And, of course, Jack does not understand why Cass Mastern acted as he did; he simply has no comprehension of the emotions that drove Cass Mastern to act as he did. Because he does not understand human motivations, then, Jack Burden finally formulates the theory of the Great Twitch. This theory postulates that all human actions are caused by the same forces that produce the tic in the face of the old man whom he meets: somewhere, an impulse originates, and somewhere else somebody does something. This idea, however, is merely a more formal statement of the thought that guides most of Jack Burden's opinions, since he has long believed that there is no real reason behind the things people do; they merely act as some mysterious impulse dictates, or they react. Because this is the case, there is no responsibility involved in the way a person acts. Because he believes this, Jack can simply

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

32

www.cliffs.com

go ahead and do his job. He can dig up all of the sordid information that he can find on someone, and it doesn't mean a thing to him personally. That person is not responsible for his actions, and Jack feels that he has no responsibility for what he finds nor for what he uses to destroy someone else nor what Willie Stark does with that information. One person's actions do not affect another person in any way--or so Jack believes throughout much of the novel. Jack is, quite predictably, emotionally removed from the things that happen around him. He felt nothing when his college roommates were kicked out of school; he felt no responsibility for that, even though he financed the spree that caused it. When he is forced to become emotionally involved with Lois, he walks out on her. He is acutely embarrassed when Sadie Burke vents her anger about Willie Stark's affairs in front of him. He is uncomfortable when he must face Lucy Stark's open and honest emotions. Yet he cares nothing about the people about whom he digs up information, and he feels no responsibility for what happens to them. He asks Anne and Adam Stanton for information about Judge Irwin, totally disregarding any feelings that they might have. Jack even holds Willie Stark at arm's length. Because Jack feels no attachments to anyone or to anything, and because he feels that human actions are without cause and without effect, he has no direction in his life, no motivation to do something on his own. He is entirely dependent upon external forces seizing him and pushing him in one direction or the other. Falling in love with Anne Stanton was simply something that happened to him, and he flowed along with the tide of events without even attempting to exert any kind of control over what was happening; the closest he came was to argue with her over her actions. His choice of college was a reaction to his mother's choice, rather than a positive choice of his own. He seems to have drifted into his job at the Chronicle and into the study of history. He falls into the Great Sleep when he cannot summon up enough will power to complete his Ph.D. dissertation about Cass Mastern and again when he is near the end of his marriage to Lois. He quits his job at the Chronicle in reaction to an assignment to write columns supportive of a political stance he objects to, and he again spends a great deal of time sleeping until Willie Stark finds him and offers him a job. While he is working for Willie Stark, he simply accepts the assignments which Willie gives him; he never takes the initiative in any action. As long as there is some external force to give him direction and to push him forward, however, Jack does his job very well, indeed. Jack has withdrawn into himself, refusing to reach out to others. To a large extent, his withdrawal is the result of three emotional traumas which he has suffered. He loved his father (the Scholarly Attorney), and he felt secure with him, but Ellis Burden withdrew from him without a word, not even a goodbye. He loved his mother and wanted her to cherish him, but she sent him away to school, and she married a succession of men. He fell in love with Anne Stanton and felt loved by her, but she withdrew from him. Jack is afraid--although he may not be aware of it--that he will be hurt again if he allows his emotions full rein, if he becomes involved with another person. Beneath his self-constructed shell of cynicism and indifference, however, Jack is a vulnerable and even a caring human being, but it takes a series of jolts to jar him out of the cocoon he has built around himself. Although he accepts the assignment to dig out negative information about Judge Irwin in the same way that he accepts other such assignments, he discovers that he actually cares about the results of this investigation. He catches himself hoping that he will not be able to find anything. He also seems disappointed when he does find out about the bribe, although this is muted because he has prepared himself for it. Jack is shocked by the revelation that Anne Stanton has become Willie Stark's mistress--so shocked, in fact, that he reviews his relationship with her and admits that his attitude, his personality, had something to do with their cancelled engagement. He is also sufficiently shocked that he reviews his marriage to Lois Seager and realizes his emotional detachment from her. Jack is jolted by Judge Irwin's refusal to accept the choices offered to him, by the judge's willingness to accept the responsibility and the consequences for his actions, and by the judge's suicide. He cares enough to admire Judge Irwin's stand, even though he thinks that it is

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

33

www.cliffs.com

impractical, but he cares enough about what happens to Judge Irwin to urge him to reconsider and to give him the time to do so. He cares enough about Judge Irwin to hope that--and to ask whether--his death was clean and quick. Jack is also jolted by the discovery that Judge Irwin was his father; this knowledge releases a number of emotions in him--pride, relief, sadness, and tenderness being most apparent. This knowledge also provides a key piece of information that gives Jack the beginnings of an understanding of his own past. The final, shattering blow to Jack Burden's shell is delivered by Adam Stanton when he kills Willie Stark. After that event, Jack has little choice but to restructure his life, a process he had already begun after Judge Irwin's death. What kind of person is Jack Burden after all these events have taken place? The novel ends before the process of redevelopment is complete, but some indications are provided. In the first place, Jack shows signs of caring for other people and of respecting their feelings. He returns to be with Anne Stanton, to just be there and to give her what support he can, without intruding on her grief. He accepts Sadie Burke, and he accepts her verbal jabs and her anger without flinching or moving away as he once did; he also makes a special effort to visit her and to comfort her. He recognizes and respects Sugar-Boy's feelings about Willie Stark. He visits Lucy Stark without the embarrassment he once felt, and he empathizes with her need to believe that her husband had the seeds of greatness in him. He brings the Scholarly Attorney home to live with him, and he no longer feels the need to make fun of the old man's religious beliefs. To a great extent, then, this ability to care about, and to accept, other people is the result of Jack's learning to accept himself, at least to some degree. A second major change in Jack's character is seen in the last chapter of the novel, when he begins to take charge of his own life and to make plans for the future, rather than just drifting through situations as he has done most of his life. Most of these plans involve tying up many of the loose ends in his life. Thus, he marries Anne Stanton. He now plans to write the book about Cass Mastern that he abandoned many years before, and he plans to sell Judge Irwin's house, which is now his, and to cut his physical ties with Burden's Landing. In addition to such plans as these, however, Jack also makes tentative plans for moving into the future, plans that will tie his past and his future together. That is, he anticipates becoming involved in Hugh Miller's campaign for governor. To be sure, the change in Jack Burden is by no means complete by the end of the novel, but he has recognized that a person must be responsible for his or her actions and that one person's actions do affect other people. He has also come to accept his emotions, and he can care for other people. He is no longer as cynical as he once was. In short, he is ready to move into the future, no matter how tentative those movements may be at first. Thus, the story of Willie Stark is the story of Jack Burden; their lives are, for many years, intertwined and largely inseparable. Nevertheless, the life of Willie Stark ends, and this causes the life of Jack Burden, which continues on, to take a new direction. Even then, however, the effect of Willie Stark on Jack Burden will never be obliterated.

CRITICAL ESSAYS A CHRONOLOGY OF EVENTS Some of the dates listed below are provided quite differently in the novel; most, however, have been deduced by comparisons between events whose dates are known and events whose dates are not known. For

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

34

www.cliffs.com

example, the novel does not state when Jack Burden was born, but it does indicate that he was twenty-one in 1918; thus, he must have been born in 1897. In the following chronology, a question mark (?) beside a date indicates that no sure means of determining the exact date can be found in the novel. 1829? 1848? 1849? 1851 1854 1856 1861 1896 1897 1903 1907 1910 1912 1914 1915 1918 1919 1920

1922 1924 1926 1930 1933 1934 1936 1937

1938

1939

Cass Mastern is born. Gilbert Mastern takes charge of his brother and sister. Cass Mastern is given charge of a plantation. Cass Mastern begins college in Lexington, Kentucky. Duncan Trice shoots himself; Cass Mastern returns to Mississippi. Cass Mastern frees his slaves, studies law in Jackson. Cass Mastern enlists as a private. Ellis Burden marries the girl from the Arkansas mill town. Jack Burden is born (Jack's mother and Monty Irwin have been lovers for at least nine months). Ellis Burden leaves his wife and child. Judge Irwin mortages his property. Judge Irwin pays part of the mortage. Judge Irwin fails to meet his interest payments. Foreclosure proceedings begin in March; Judge Irwin marries Mabel Carruthers; Judge Irwin pays the mortage in full in May. Judge Irwin resigns as State Attorney General and becomes counsel for the American Electric Power Company; Jack Burden begins college in the fall. Jack, twenty-one, falls in love with Anne Stanton, seventeen. Jack attends law school. Jack begins working for the Chronicle. (When Jack begins his tenure as a graduate student in history and when he is married to Lois Seager are almost impossible to determine; there is some evidence that Jack was married to Lois after he left graduate school and that both of these events took place while he was working for the Chronicle; but that is all that can be determined.) Jack Burden meets Willie Stark for the first time; Jack covers the school bond scandal in Mason County; Willie Stark loses reelection as County Treasurer. The schoolhouse tragedy in Mason County occurs; Willie successfully campaigns for the defeat of Pillsbury's candidate. Willie Stark's first unsuccessful campaign for governor. Jack quits his job at the Chronicle; Willie Stark is elected governor; Jack begins working for Willie. Byram B. White accepts a bribe and thus ignites impeachment proceedings against Willie. Willie Stark is reelected governor. Willie Stark and entourage visit Mason City and Burden's Landing; in August or September, Jack begins his search for evidence against Judge Irwin. In March, Jack finds damning evidence against Judge Irwin; Anne Stanton becomes Willie's mistress; Adam Stanton becomes director of the hospital; Marvin Frey accuses Tom Stark of getting his daughter pregnant; Judge Irwin shoots himself; Willie Stark does business with Gummy Larson; Tom Stark is injured in a football game (in October?); Adam Stanton kills Willie Stark; Jack visits Sadie Burke in a rest home (in December?). Jack refuses to take a job with Tiny Duffy; in February, Jack meets Sugar-Boy in the library; also in February, Tom Stark dies; in May, Jack visits Lucy Stark and then returns to Burden's Landing; Jack Burden and Anne Stanton are married; Jack brings the Scholarly Attorney to Burden's Landing to live with them. Jack is telling this story, probably in February or March.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

35

www.cliffs.com

THE CASS MASTERN EPISODE Most of the events from the past that are introduced into All the King's Men have a clear bearing either on the life of Willie Stark or on the life of Jack Burden. The story of Cass Mastern, however, seems to have little bearing on anything in the novel, even though it was to have been the topic of Jack's doctoral dissertation in history and even though it is the story of his supposed paternal grandmother's brother. Indeed, many readers have had difficulty with this episode, and some critics have argued that the presence of this episode in the novel constitutes a serious flaw. Such arguments notwithstanding, the Cass Mastern episode is an integral part of the novel and serves several important purposes. This story stands as a clear indication of Jack Burden's inability to understand the past and as a measure of his lack of a moral base upon which to act. In addition, the story of Cass Mastern contains incidents that are parallel to other incidents in the lives of both Willie Stark and Jack Burden. The Cass Mastern story establishes the basic patterns of events that these other incidents follow; as these patterns are resolved in different ways, they play off against one another, and a fuller view of the complexity of human behavior emerges. In short, the Cass Mastern episode is directly involved in the thematic explorations of the novel. Cass Mastern is one of three children of a poor backwoods couple. His older brother, Gilbert, left home early and became a wealthy plantation owner in Mississippi. After the elder Masterns die, Gilbert takes Cass and his sister Lavinia (Ellis Burden's mother) under his care. Lavinia is sent to a finishing school, and Cass is tutored and given responsibility for managing a small plantation, which he does very well. Then he is sent to Transylvania College in Lexington, Kentucky. There, introduced by Jefferson Davis, Cass Mastern becomes acquainted with Duncan Trice, who educates him in a variety of matters. He also introduces Cass to his wife, Annabelle. Nothing of importance seems to happen that first year, but during Cass' second year in Lexington, he begins an affair with Annabelle Trice. This affair lasts for a year and a half, until Duncan Trice learns of it and kills himself; his suicide appears to be an accident, but he makes sure that his wife knows that it is not, and later Annabelle Trice sells the slave who found her husband's wedding ring under the pillow. Cass Mastern takes upon himself the responsibility and the guilt for his friend's suicide, his mistress's reactions, and the sale of the slave, which separated her from her family. He tries to atone by finding the slave and setting her free, but he cannot trace her. He then runs the plantation, which Gilbert had given him, successfully enough to pay off his debts completely. When he has paid these debts, he frees his slaves and tries to run the plantation with hired labor. This is unsuccessful, so he goes to Jackson to study law. When the Civil War begins, Cass Mastern enlists as a private--although he could have been an officer--and, refusing to shoot another human being, he waits to die. The first, and most directly relevant, function of this episode is to show Jack Burden's blind spots, his view of the world, and his detachment from other people and from events. After he has worked with these materials for a year and a half, Jack knows the facts very well. Not only has he got the facts from the papers at his fingertips, but he has gathered other information about the world in which Cass Mastern and his brother Gilbert lived. The problem that Jack has with writing his dissertation is not a lack of facts; indeed, Jack is very good at ferreting out the facts, and he has done this in order to fill in the sequence of events in which Cass Mastern was involved. Instead, the problem is Jack's lack of understanding when it comes to human beings and human motivations: he cannot fully understand Cass Mastern. To an extent, he understands Cass' early life, plus the drinking, gaming, and whoring that Cass does when he arrives in Lexington, and he is able to understand the affair between Cass Mastern and Annabelle Trice, at least on the surface. But Jack cannot understand Cass' reactions and motivations after he learns that Duncan Trice's death was a suicide, rather than an accident. Jack cannot understand why Cass Mastern accepts the responsibility and the guilt for the affair, for his friend's death, for the sale of the slave girl, and, ultimately, for the institution of slavery. At this point in his life (he is a graduate student during the early 1920s, when he is, perhaps, twenty-two or twenty-three years old), Jack cannot accept the idea that one person's actions

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

36

www.cliffs.com

affect another person in any way, nor can he see why a person should accept responsibility for anything that happens. Thus the Cass Mastern episode reveals both what Jack is like and what he must learn in the course of the novel. The affair that Cass Mastern has with Annabelle Trice, the wife of his best friend, parallels several other triangles in the novel. The most prominent of these is the affair between Monty Irwin and Jack's mother, who is married to Ellis Burden, Irwin's best friend. Like Duncan Trice, Burden dotes on his wife, and he is blind to his wife's affair for quite some time. Unlike Trice, however, Ellis Burden does not kill himself when he discovers what has happened. Instead, he leaves everything behind and turns to street-corner religion and to caring for his fellow man. In doing so, he combines several characteristics of both Duncan Trice and Cass Mastern: like Trice, Ellis Burden cannot accept and cannot face a situation; like Cass Mastern, he seems to accept the guilt and to turn to service to his fellow man as a means of atonement. Like Annabelle Trice and Cass Mastern, the guilty lovers (Jack's mother and Judge Irwin) do not marry and do not continue their affair. Obviously, Judge Irwin does not take the responsibility for his friend's departure, nor does he change the course of his life. On the other hand, he does not deny responsibility for his actions. As he does with the bribe and the death of Mortimer L. Littlepaugh, he seems to acknowledge that he has erred and has failed to live up to his own standards, but then he seemingly resolves that he will try to live the rest of his life more uprightly. Because of the other parallels, there is an implication that neither Judge Irwin nor Jack's mother planned this affair or even willed it; they were cast into close proximity and an affair developed because of passion. The comparisons between these two triangles suggest the complexities of human motivation; they also suggest the complexities of trying to evaluate the actions of the participants. For example, is Judge Irwin more callous and less moral because he does not feel the intense guilt and need to atone that Cass Mastern feels--or is he simply more pragmatic and more accepting of the sinful side of human nature? Questions such as these become more complex still when other triangles in the novel are noted. In a sense, Willie Stark, Anne Stanton, and Jack Burden are involved in a triangular relationship, although it is of a different kind. Jack and Anne, of course, are not married, but there is a special bond of longstanding between them. It is to Jack that Anne turns when there is some difficulty or when she needs someone to talk to; Jack has always considered her to be someone special, and he is totally numbed when he learns of her affair with Willie Stark. Indeed, toward Anne, Jack seems to feel the same kinds of feelings that Duncan Trice and Ellis Burden felt toward their wives, even though he is not married to her and even though he seems unaware of the strength of his feelings. In addition, Willie Stark and Jack Burden have approximately the same kind of relationship that Cass Mastern and Duncan Trice or Monty Irwin and Ellis Burden had: if Jack has a close friend, it is Willie Stark, and Willie Stark can talk with Jack in a way that he cannot talk with his other associates. Thus, the basic relationships in this triangle are similar to the other two triangles, but there are differences as well, and it is these differences that add to the complexity of the exploration of human motivations in this novel. One difference between this relationship and the other two is that the affair between Willie Stark and Anne Stanton seems to have been undertaken quite deliberately. That is, it seems likely that Willie Stark suggested a liaison to Anne before she comes to Jack with the request that he find a way to convince Adam to accept the directorship for the hospital; she later indicates that it was only after she had learned about Judge Irwin's bribe and her father's protection of him that she had decided that there was no reason why she shouldn't become Willie's mistress. Another difference is that Willie Stark feels no qualms whatsoever about what he is doing; it seems probable that he is aware that Jack knows of the affair, but that does not seem to bother him. In addition, Anne admits the truth about her affair to Jack. Both of these differences, of course, can be attributed to the fact that Anne and Jack are not married and, indeed, have no steady relationship. A fourth difference lies in Jack's two-part reaction to the discovery that the woman whom he

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

37

www.cliffs.com

has idealized is now having an affair with another man. His initial reaction is to run from this information; his trip to California is similar to Duncan Trice's suicide and Ellis Burden's abandonment of his wife in this respect. However, Jack uses this trip to relive his relationship with Anne Stanton; although he attempts to attribute everything to "the Great Twitch," he admits to himself that he bears some responsibility for Anne's decision (apparently as Ellis Burden accepted some responsibility for his wife's infidelity). Furthermore, Jack returns to face the situation, rather than escape permanently; when the affair is ended by the assassin's bullet, Jack is there to provide whatever comfort he can, to try to pick up the pieces of his life, and to try and begin again. After comparing the actions of the people involved in these triangles, each reader must decide which characters reacted most sensibly under the circumstances they were faced with. The novel itself does not make such judgments for the reader; instead, the variations of response are presented in order to show how different human reactions to similar situations can be. The fact that the Cass Mastern episode focuses so definitely on triangular relationships also provides a focus and a point of comparison for the other triangular relationships in the novel, providing the basis for the evaluation of the actions of the people involved. There is one other triangular relationship that has a major impact on the novel but that varies significantly from the pattern established in the Cass Mastern episode. This is the Lucy Stark--Willie Stark--Sadie Burke triangle. There are some difficulties in comparing this triangle with the others. First, Willie Stark's sexual proclivities bring a number of other women into the equation. Nevertheless, Sadie Burke is Willie Stark's first, and primary, mistress, and she is the most enduring of his mistresses. In addition, Willie Stark returns to Sadie Burke after his other sexual flings, or at least he does so until near the end of the novel. In this triangle, Sadie Burke plays the same role that Cass Mastern plays; Lucy Stark has approximately the same role as Duncan Trice; and Willie Stark plays approximately the same role as Annabelle Trice (that is, he is the erring spouse). There is no indication of when Sadie Burke becomes Willie Stark's mistress; it seems to be an established fact by the time Jack starts working for Willie. Furthermore, there is no indication of whether or not Lucy ever really learns about this affair; if she does, she gives no sign of it, although it may be one of the reasons that she moves out of the Governor's mansion. If she does know of Willie's many infidelities (there are indications that many people in the state know about them, so it would be hard for her not to know), she seems to accept them as being simply another of the aberrations that Willie has evidenced since he became governor. In this variation on the triangle, the erring spouse decides to return to the other spouse, an action that is not even contemplated in the other triangular relationships. In addition, it is the outsider--Sadie Burke--who becomes upset enough to take action. She certainly does not accept responsibility as Cass Mastern does, nor does she admit error and go on living as Judge Irwin does, nor does she forsake her lover as Willie forsakes Anne. Instead, she becomes angry at being thrown out--as though she were the wronged party in the affair--and takes the steps that lead to the assassination of Willie Stark. Even when Sadie is compared with the wronged persons in the other triangles--Duncan Trice, Ellis Burden, and Jack--her actions are directed toward the person who has done wrong to her (as she conceives it), rather than turning inward as the others do. There are, then, at least four different variations on each of the basic positions in the triangle. What a person does in any particular position depends, of course, on the background of that person and on his or her personality. By presenting these four triangles, the novel enriches the reader's view of human nature. The question is not whether or not adultery is a proper thing; these episodes suggest that someone is always hurt in some way when adultery takes place. Instead, the question is how human beings react in the face of sin or wrongdoing--both their own and that of other people. The question is also how the wrongdoing affects the people involved, directly and indirectly. These, certainly, are major thematic concerns of the novel as a whole, concerns that are explored in other contexts as well. In this way, the Cass Mastern

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

38

www.cliffs.com

episode focuses attention on one kind of relationship between people, providing a point of comparison for other, similar incidents, and it is therefore tied into two of the major thematic concerns of the novel. The Cass Mastern episode is an integral part of All the King's Men, even though it does not seem so at first glance.

ESSAY TOPICS AND REVIEW QUESTIONS 1. What is the source of the title All the King's Men? What significance does this title have? Why do you think Warren used this title rather than the title of the play from which the novel was developed (Proud Flesh)? 2. What are the two major roles that Jack Burden plays in this novel? How are these roles tied together? Is the novel unified? 3. At the end of Chapter Nine, Willie Stark makes this remark on his deathbed: "It might have been all different, Jack. . . . You got to believe that." What might have been different? How does this statement comment on Willie's past actions? Do you think he would have changed had he lived? 4.

Discuss the relationship between Jack Burden and Judge Irwin. What is the emotional and thematic significance of withholding their true relationship to one another until so late in the novel?

5.

The Cass Mastern episode may at first seem to be simply a digression in the novel, although it is not. What role does the Cass Mastern episode play in the novel? How does it comment on other actions and on other characters in the novel?

6.

Discuss the irony of the statement at the end of Chapter Five: "That is what all of us historical researchers believe. And we love truth."

7.

What are the elements in the character of Willie Stark? It has been said that he has created his own end. Is this an accurate statement? Why, or why not?

8.

Of the many characters, which do you find the most believable? Why? The most sympathetic? Why?

9.

How well does this novel fulfill the requirements of tragedy in the Aristotelian sense of the term?

10. Discuss the character of Adam Stanton. Is his assassination of Willie Stark believable? Is it a true outgrowth of his personality? Why? 11. Discuss the character of Anne Stanton. Is her affair with Willie Stark believable? How might it be related to her character, to her beliefs about the past, and to her experiences in life? 12. Compare and contrast Anne Stanton, Sadie Burke, and Lucy Stark, the three primary women in Willie Stark's life. 13. What are some of the major themes in this novel? How are these themes developed? In what ways are they related to one another?

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

39

www.cliffs.com

14. In an introduction to one edition of All the King's Men, Warren comments that "the politician rises to power because of the faculty of fulfilling vicariously the secret needs of others, and in the process . . . discovers his own emptiness." How does this idea apply to Willie Stark? 15. Jack tells the reader at the end of the novel that soon he and Anne will go out into "the awful responsibility of Time." What is this "awful responsibility"? How has Jack arrived at an understanding and acceptance of responsibility? 16. What is Jack Burden's theory of the "Great Twitch"? How does he apply it to the events in his life? What events in his life have contributed to his acceptance of this idea? 17. Do you find Judge Irwin's suicide a brave act or a cowardly one? Why? 18. Discuss the strength and weakness of Chapter Ten as a fitting conclusion to the novel. Do you find it convincing?

WORKS BY ROBERT PENN WARREN 1929 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1942 1943 1944 1946 1947 1949 1950 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960

John Brown: The Making of A Martyr. Thirty-Six Poems. An Approach to Literature (edited, with Cleanth Brooks and John T. Purser). A Southern Harvest: Short Stories by Southern Writers (edited). Understanding Poetry (edited, with Cleanth Brooks). Night Rider. Eleven Poems on the Same Theme. At Heaven's Gate. Understanding Fiction (edited, with Cleanth Brooks). Selected Poems 1923-1943. All the King's Men. Blackberry Winter. The Circus in the Attic, and Other Stories. Modern Rhetoric, with Readings (edited, with Cleanth Brooks); also published, without readings, as Fundamentals of Good Writing: A Handbook of Modern Rhetoric. World Enough and Time: A Romantic Novel. Brother to Dragons: A Tale in Verse and Voices. The Southern Review (edited, with Cleanth Brooks, an anthology). Short Story Masterpieces (edited, with Albert Erskine). Band of Angels. Six Centuries of Great Poetry (edited, with Albert Erskine). Segregation: The Inner Conflict in the South. Promises: Poems 1954-1956. A New Southern Harvest (edited, with Albert Erskine). Selected Essays. Remember the Alamo! (a children's book). The Cave. The Gods of Mount Olympus (a children's book). You, Emperors and Others: Poems 1957-1960. All the King's Men (play).

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

40

www.cliffs.com

1961 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1970 1971

1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1985

Wilderness: A Tale of the Civil War. The Legacy of the Civil War. Flood: A Romance of Our Time. Who Speaks for the Negro? Selected Poems: New and Old, 1923-1966. Faulkner: A Collection of Critical Essays (edited). Incarnations: Poems 1966-1968. Audubon: A Vision. Selected Poems of Herman Melville (edited). Meet Me in the Green Glen. Homage to Theodore Dreiser on the Centennial of His Birth. John Greenleaf Whittier: An Appraisal and a Selection (edited). American Literature: The Makers and the Making (edited, with Cleanth Brooks and R. W. B. Lewis). Or Else: Poems 1968-1974. Democracy and Poetry (Jefferson Lecture). Selected Poems: 1923-1975. A Place to Come To. Now and Then: Poems 1976-1978. Brother to Dragons: A Tale in Verse and Voices (a new version of the 1953 poem). Katherine Anne Porter: A Collection of Critical Essays (edited). Being Here: Poetry 1977-1980. Rumor Verified. Chief Joseph. New and Selected Poems, 1923-1985.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY BEEBE, MAURICE, AND LESLIE A. FIELD, eds. "All the King's Men": A Critical Handbook. Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1966. BOHNER, CHARLES H. Robert Penn Warren. Twayne United States Authors Series. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1964. BRADRURY, JOHN M. The Fugitives: A Critical Account. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1958. BROOKS, CLEANTH. The Hidden God: Studies in Hemingway, Faulkner, Yeats, Eliot, and Warren. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1963. CASPER, LEONARD. Robert Penn Warren: The Dark and Bloody Ground. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1960. COWAN, LOUISE. The Fugitive Group: A Literary History. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1959. COWLEY, MALCOM, ed. Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews. New York: The Viking Press, 1959. (Interview with Warren on pp.165-86).

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

41

www.cliffs.com

GRAY, RICHARD, ed. Robert Penn Warren: A Collection of Critical Essays. Twentieth Century Views. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, 1980. GUTTENBERG, BARNETT. Web of Being: The Novels of Robert Penn Warren. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 1975. LIGHT, JAMES F., ed. The Merrill Studies in "All the King's Men." Columbus, Ohio: Charles E. Merrill Publishing Company, 1971. LONGLEY, JOHN L., JR. Robert Penn Warren. Southwest Writers Series. Austin, Texas: Steck-Vaughn Company, 1969. ------------,ed. Robert Penn Warren: A Collection of Critical Essays. New York: New York University Press, 1965. MOORE, L. HUGH, JR. Robert Penn Warren and History: The "Big Myth We Live." Gravehenge, The Netherlands: Mouton and Company, 1970. SOCHATOFF, A. FRED, ed. "All the King's Men": A Symposium. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Institute of Technology Press, 1957. STRANDBERG, VICTOR. A Colder Fire: The Poetry of Robert Penn Warren. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1965. -------------. The Poetic Vision of Robert Penn Warren. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1977. WALKER, MARSHALL. Robert Penn Warren: A Vision Earned. Edinburgh: Paul Harris Publishing, 1979. WEST, PAUL. Robert Penn Warren. Minnesota Pamphlets on American Writers. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1964.

Cliffs Notes on All The King’s Men © 1982

42