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Chapter 1
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Adventures of Augie March, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Fate, Fortune, and Luck
Self-Discovery and Identity
Love and Sex
The Myth of the American Dream
Control vs. Freedom
Family
Summary
Analysis
Grandma Lausch keeps Augie and his brothers occupied. In the summers, she arranges jobs for Simon and Augie. Georgie, who is disabled, goes to a special school instead. When the weather is fine, Grandma spends her afternoons in the arbor at the local park, hoping to attract the attention of a second husband. She never succeeds. Augie’s first job, when he’s still wearing short pants, is distributing flyers for Sylvester’s Star Theater. Proprietor Sylvester gives Augie a stern warning about not stuffing the bills down the sewer. Augie doesn’t. Mostly, he’s a conscientious employee, although he does hand out stacks of flyers to the other kids at Georgie’s school.
Grandma’s enterprising spirit is a clear expression of the “American Dream,” or the idea that anyone in the United States can be successful if they work hard. The implication is that if Simon and Augie work hard and save their money, they’ll be able to eventually transcend their impoverished childhood circumstances. Note how, even at her advanced age, Grandma still hopes for a second husband, suggesting the importance of love and family as sources of safety and stability. Augie’s comment about short pants, meanwhile, points toward a quirk of early-20th-century fashions. Boys typically wore short pants, or “knickerbockers” until their early teens, at which point they switched to full-length, adult pants, signifying their transition out of childhood.
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One summer, when they’re a little older, Grandma Lausch ships Simon off to work as a bellhop at a Michigan resort and sends Augie across the city to work for the family of Mama’s cousin Anna Coblin. Anna’s husband Hyman distributes newspapers. The Coblins’ son Howard recently rebelled, ran off, joined the Marines, and went to Nicaragua to fight rebels.
Augie’s obedience to Grandma Lausch, who isn’t even his real grandmother, stands in stark contrast to Howard’s disobedience. As a child, Augie willingly lets Grandma and others dictate the path of his life because he has yet to discover ideas of his own destiny.
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Although she’s a poor housekeeper, Anna Coblin is a formidable woman. She believes in eating well and marrying young. In fact, no sooner has Augie arrived than she begins plotting his marriage to her daughter Freidl. She spends her days crying and fretting dramatically over Howard. One day, she catches Augie trying to play Howard’s saxophone. She’s horrified.
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Anna’s younger brother, called Five Properties because he’s always boasting about his real estate holdings, lives with the family, too. Five Properties is an immense hulk of a man whose philosophy on life can be boiled down to you get what you deserve. He survived World War I in Europe and has been financially successful since his immigration to the United States, where he drives a dairy truck.
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Anna’s husband, Hyman, is a “sport” who keeps to himself and doesn’t argue with his wife. Once a month when he goes downtown to the mail carrier’s meeting, he treats himself to American food, a little stock market speculation, and a visit to burlesque show. But he’s kind, patient, and generous with Augie and the rest of his family.
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Money sits around the Colbin household in stacks and poured into jars, but Augie never steals any. He notices that he tends to rise or fall to meet the expectations of the people around him. And since the Coblins consider him good, he is good. Once a week, he visits his own home. The Marches are far poorer, but everything is clean, bright, and orderly. Augie frets that Mama, Grandma Lausch, and Georgie might not need him and Simon around.
But Mama fusses over Augie, and Grandma relishes his as an opportunity to gossip. She has history with Five Properties, whom she’d tried to set up with Mr. Kreindl’s niece. Five Properties turned the plain-looking girl down, and Grandma is still annoyed. So is Mr. Kreindl, whom Augie catches trying to change Five Properties’ mind.
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On weekdays, Augie and Hyman rise at 4 a.m., eat a quick breakfast at a local diner, and distribute the newspapers to the delivery boys. Then, at 8 a.m., they have second breakfast with Anna and Freidl before Anna gets down to the day’s work of lamenting Howard’s life choices. One Sunday, Hymen gives the kids money for the movies. Sometimes Anna lectures Augie about her favorite Hebrew Bible stories, which all involve divine wrath and punishment.
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