Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Man Who Was Almost a Man, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Manhood and Violence
Racism and Power
Economic Oppression
Summary
Analysis
As he’s heading home from the fields for dinner, Dave Saunders thinks about some of the other, older workers in the field who always talk down to him as if he were a little boy. Dave thinks to himself that he’s not afraid of those other workers, even though they’re bigger than him. He concludes that if he just had a gun, he’d be able to prove he’s a man and shut them up. In fact, he decides that at 17, he’s enough of a man that he deserves a gun. He plans to ask his mother for money so he can buy one.
From its opening lines, the story quickly establishes that Dave’s views of masculinity are shaped by the people around him and, more specifically, by how they treat him. Further, it makes clear that this version of masculinity is rooted in violence and power. Dave’s quest to buy a gun is inspired by these violent ideas about manhood.
Themes
On the way home, Dave stops by Joe’s store. He feels confident at first, but once he sees Joe—a white man—his courage begins to slip. Joe asks what Dave wants, and Dave responds by vaguely asking if he can borrow a Sears Roebuck catalog to look at overnight. Joe questions if Dave is going to actually buy something, since his mother doesn’t yet let him have his own money. Dave indignantly responds that he’s nearly a man, which makes Joe laugh. Eventually Joe’s questions lead to Dave admitting that he wants to buy a gun. Joe tries to talk Dave out of it at first, but he eventually agrees to let Dave borrow the catalog.
When Dave arrives at Joe’s store to buy the gun, he finds that he doesn’t have the courage he expected to have. Some of this may be because Joe is a white man—even without saying anything, he seems to intimidate Dave, emphasizing how much more authority white men had in the South in the early twentieth century. Joe’s laughter at Dave’s claim that he’s a man emphasizes this point—clearly Joe doesn’t see Dave as a man yet. This is partly because of Dave’s young age, but it’s also possible to infer that Joe’s ideas about race also plays a role in his dismissive behavior toward Dave. The fact that Dave’s mother holds his money further suggests Dave’s status as a child, while also establishing the role that money plays in granting or thwarting independence in the story.
Themes
Dave feels triumphant for getting Joe to give him the catalog. As Dave is leaving, Joe has an idea, and mentions that he actually has a gun Dave could buy. Joe explains that it's an old gun, and when Dave asks, promises that it will come fully loaded. He says that Dave can have the gun for two dollars. Dave brags that he can get that much money together as soon as he gets his pay. Joe promises to hold the gun at the store for him in the meantime. Dave takes the catalog with him when he goes.
Because he tried to talk Dave out of buying a gun in the previous scene, Joe seems to realize that selling Dave a gun may not be a good idea, but ultimately, he is more interested in getting the sale, foreshadowing one of the many ways in the story that Black characters will be judged by white men according to their economic value. Dave’s attempts to demonstrate what he believes is a convincing display of masculinity, bragging about his money and how easily he could buy the gun, again show his sense that masculinity is defined by the ability to show physical and economic power.
Themes
When Dave makes it home, his mother, Mrs. Saunders, chides him for being late and for coming to dinner before washing up. Then his mother notices the catalog where he had put it on the table. She questions him about what it is and where he got it. When Dave admits he got it from Joe’s store, his mother suggests using it in the outhouse. Dave pleads for her not to do that, and, reluctantly, she returns the catalog to him. Dave is nervous and distracted as he washes up for dinner, such that his mother threatens to take the catalog from him and burn it. Dave is able to get her to relent, and then pores over the catalog, so engrossed with it that he doesn’t realize his mother has put food on the table.
As the only female character with a major role in a story focused on manhood and masculinity, it is worthwhile to pay attention to Dave’s mother’s situation and viewpoint. Her role is domestic, as indicated by the fact she is making dinner when Dave returns from his work out in the fields. At the same time, she also treats Dave like a child, chiding him and threatening to burn the catalog. Her desire to use the catalog as toilet paper in the outhouse also points to Dave’s family’s limited financial situation, and his mother’s role as the one who figures out how to keep their home running despite meager resources
Themes
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Soon, Dave’s father, Bob Saunders, and his younger brother enter the room and sit at the table. Dave’s father also asks about the catalog, to which Dave replies that it’s just a catalog. Dave gets excited when he comes upon the catalog’s listings of guns, but then he realizes his father is watching and catches himself. He shifts to eating his dinner. While he eats, Dave decides not to mention the gun at all to his father—he knows that talking about money in front of his father won’t go well. Instead, he plans to corner his mother alone.
Dave’s father does not have many lines in the story, but from his introduction, it becomes clear that his presence hovers over Dave and that he is the source of many of the ideas about masculinity that Dave has internalized. Dave’s father doesn’t even have to say anything—just his stare and Dave’s nervous reaction is enough to communicate that he is always judging Dave, and that there is danger—possibly physical danger—for Dave should his father judge him wanting. This scene also illustrates the ways in which Dave and his father don’t communicate: Dave decides not to even attempt talking about the gun with his father, suggesting that he is afraid of speaking openly with him.
Themes
Dave’s father tells Dave to stop fooling with the catalog, and then asks Dave how he’s getting along with Jim Hawkins, the plantation owner. Dave responds that it’s going well, and that he plows more land than anyone else. Dave’s father responds that Dave should keep his mind on his work.
Dave’s father is clearly the dominant force in this family, but this conversation makes clear that his entire focus is on making the white plantation owner, Mr. Hawkins, happy. Put another way: Dave’s father has internalized his white employer’s views as his own. To Mr. Hawkins, both Dave and his father are economic investments, and their value is related to what they can produce for him as field workers. Dave’s father’s insistence that his son focus on nothing but his work may be heartless, but it is also realistic—an accurate description of what Mr. Hawkins wants from his workers. It also implies the degree to which Dave’s family is completely dependent on Hawkins for their income.
Themes
When Dave’s father and younger brother leave the kitchen, Dave begins working up the courage to ask his mother about the gun he wants to buy. He continues to look at pictures of the gun in the catalog and imagines what it would look and feel like in his hand. His fantasy about owning it becomes ever more elaborate, as he makes promises to himself about how he will polish the gun and keep it in pristine condition, and how he will keep it loaded.
Dave’s elaborate fantasy about the gun is also a fantasy about being treated like a real man. And similar to his ideas about manhood, his ideas about the gun are all external: about how good it will look, how it will command respect, and how it will hold the threat to deal out violence.
Themes
Dave opens the catalog for his mother to the page with the gun on it, but his mother doesn’t understand what he wants. Dave doesn’t even dare to point at the gun, but eventually his mother understands and asks if Dave has gone crazy. She tells him to “Git outta here!” and stop asking about it. Dave argues that she promised to get him one, but she responds that she doesn’t care what she promised. Dave says that he’ll never ask her for anything else again. Dave’s mother remains firm and declares that he will never touch a penny of the wages that Mr. Hawkins pays to her for Dave’s work.
The fact that Dave corners his mother after the other male members of the household have left the room suggests that Dave realizes her position as a woman makes her more vulnerable to his influence. Still, Dave’s mother doesn’t give in right away. Her main advantage is that she holds the wages that Mr. Hawkins gives to her for Dave’s work. While the hierarchy of power on the plantation is clearly ordered by race and gender—with white men at the top, then black men, then black women—Dave’s mother shows how money also plays a role and how it can even temporarily reverse the usual hierarchy.
Themes
Dave tries a different approach to convince his mother to buy him the gun. He says that the family needs a gun because his father doesn’t have one yet. His mother replies that even if the family did get a gun, Dave wouldn’t be the one to have it. Dave replies that he worked hard all summer. He says he only wants two dollars out of his own money. He promises to give the gun to his father. His mother asks in a low voice why he even needs a gun. She thinks it’ll only bring him trouble. Dave replies that he’ll hide the gun, and then adds that he’s almost a man now. His mother asks who will sell Dave the gun, and he tells her about Joe at the store. His mother confirms that the price is only two dollars while she slowly puts the dinner plates away. Finally, she turns to him.
Dave and his mother agree on some ideas about masculinity: they both believe that a father is the head of a household. Dave therefore appeals to the authority of his father in order to convince his mother to let him buy the gun. He also appeals to his mother’s fear—she recognizes that as a Black man in a white-dominated society her husband is vulnerable. A gun could help protect him, in theory. Dave’s mother has a feeling that giving Dave the money to buy the gun will only lead to trouble, but she ultimately puts this feeling aside, and there is a slight sense, that this may also be because, as a woman on the plantation, she doesn’t question what the men do.
Themes
Dave’s mother promises to let Dave get the gun on one condition: he has to bring it straight back for his father. Dave agrees and asks to go get it right away. Dave’s mother finally pulls out the money from under her dress. She doesn’t agree that Dave needs a gun, but she concedes that Dave’s father does. She tells Dave that he needs to come right back to her with the gun (and that if he doesn’t his father will lick him good). Dave agrees, takes the money, and runs back toward the store. His mother calls after him, but he doesn’t listen.
Dave’s father continues to exert influence on his wife and son, even after he has left the room. Meanwhile, he remains Dave’s justification for buying the gun—and the fact that Dave’s mother agrees that Dave’s father should have a gun shows that she, too, buys into the idea that manhood requires the ability to wield violence; but also implies that she sees that her family faces physical threats—perhaps because of their race—that a gun might allow them to face. The transfer of money from Dave’s mother to Dave shows that she is losing her ability to tell him what to do. Further, it shows the basic power of money: once Dave has the money, he stops listening to her.
Themes
The next morning, the first thing Dave does is reach under his pillow for the gun. He holds it loosely and feels its power. He knows that he could kill anybody, “black or white,” and he believes this means everyone will have to respect him. He tests the gun’s weight and marvels at it.
While Dave was initially motivated to buy the gun on account of mockery from the other older field workers (who are Black), his quick realization that he could also shoot a white man indicates the true source of his oppression. The gun’s weight foreshadows its power—and also its danger.
Themes
The night before, he did not come straight home as his mother asked him to. Instead, he went out to the fields until he knew his family was asleep, testing the weapon out by aiming it at imaginary foes. He did not fire it, however, and is not sure that he knows how to fire it. When his mother had come to him in the middle of the night asking for the gun, he lied and told her he had hidden it somewhere outside.
The fact that Dave doesn’t know how to shoot the gun suggests that buying the weapon was not enough to instantly turn him into the type of man he wishes to become. He aims at imaginary foes, showing that his ideas about the gun are still based more in fantasy than in reality. Dave’s lies to his mother suggest that, at this point, he can only get what he wants through trickery, not strength.
Themes
Now in the early morning, Dave wraps the loaded gun to his thigh with a strip of old flannel and skips breakfast to head down toward the barns before it even gets light outside. Mr. Hawkins stops him, looking at him suspiciously because Dave is early. Dave lies, however, and says he’s just going to hitch up the mule Jenny to plow the fields. Mr. Hawkins says that since he’s up so early, he may as well plow a stretch down by the woods, and Dave agrees to do it. Dave hitches up Jenny and starts to plow, still feeling the weight of the gun on his thigh.
Strapping the deadly weapon to his bare thigh seems reckless, and demonstrates that Dace doesn’t understand the gun’s potential danger. The first conversation between Dave and Mr. Hawkins quickly establishes the relationship between the two of them: Mr. Hawkins is not just Dave’s employer, he controls every aspect of Dave’s work. Mr. Hawkins eyes Dave with suspicion when he sees him awake so early in the morning, suggesting that he views Dave as an unreliable worker and that Dave’s father is correct to worry about Dave’s relationship with Hawkins.
Themes
Dave plows two whole rows with the mule Jenny before even taking the gun out. He talks to the mule, excitedly telling her what the gun is and what it can do. Finally, he decides to test the gun. The gun feels loose in his fingers. He closes his eyes and shoots it. The sound half-deafens him and the force jerks his arm. He hears Jenny whinny and gallop away. His hand hurts so much from the kickback that it goes numb. The gun is now at Dave’s feet, and he’s not entirely sure what happened. He grits his teeth and kicks the gun, angry at it for hurting his arm. Jenny is far away over the fields.
The scene of Dave trying to shoot the gun is comic, with him clearly not knowing what he’s doing. He can’t even hold the gun tight when he tries to test it, and he closes his eyes when he’s about to shoot. The outcome of the first test shot seems comic, too, with the kickback hurting his arm and the blast half-deafening him. Dave thought just having a gun would make him a man; his inability to use the gun hints at all the aspects of manhood he has overlooked: skill, knowledge, responsibility. Dave’s ideas about the gun have all been masculine power fantasies. This scene punctures those fantasies.
Themes
Dave chases after the mule Jenny, calling for her to hold on. When he catches up with her, he finds her trembling. Her left side is wet and red with blood. Dave looks closer and can’t believe he shot the mule. He tries to restrain the mule to get a better look. A crimson stream is flowing down her leg. Dave panics. He knows he has to stop the blood or else Jenny will bleed to death. He chases her for half a mile until she stops, breathing heavily. He leads her back to where he left the gun, then tries to plug up the hole in her side with damp black earth rubbed over his hands. Jenny keeps resisting as more blood flows out, forming a pool. Dave feels that there must be something he can do, but soon the mule sinks to her knees, and then dies.
While the aftermath of Dave firing the gun at first seems comic, now it’s revealed as tragic—he accidentally shot the mule—which not only further punctures his former fantasies about the gun, it shows that such fantasies have deadly consequences. Dave’s efforts to regain control of the situation by catching the mule and plugging up the wound suggest he won’t let go of his delusions about the gun easily. That his efforts are futile suggest that these delusions will only lead to more trouble for him.
Themes
Dave’s stomach feels empty. He takes the gun and buries it at the foot of a tree. He tries to cover the blood with dirt but stops when he realizes it’s no use—there’s no hiding the big dead mule, Jenny. Dave doesn’t want to tell his boss Mr. Hawkins that he shot the mule, so he comes up with a lie: that Jenny stumbled and fell on the point of a plow. Dave realizes this lie isn’t very plausible and slowly walks across the field.
Dave begins to accept that he’s in trouble. The corpse of the mule is too big to hide, and likewise, Dave won’t be able to hide from the inevitable punishment he’ll receive for killing the mule. Even as he accepts this, however, he is unwilling to abandon the gun. The fact that he chooses to bury the gun (knowing that when he’s caught, it will certainly be taken from him) suggests that on some level he still buys into the idea that the gun could give him power.
Themes
At sunset of that day, two of Mr. Hawkins’ men are burying the mule Jenny at the edge of the woods. Mr. Hawkins remarks that he doesn’t know how in the world it happened. Soon Dave’s family arrive to the gathered crowd, asking where Dave is. Mr. Hawkins points him out, and his mother grabs him and asks what he did. Dave says he did nothing, but his father also demands that he explain what he’s done. Dave tells his lie about Jenny being impaled after falling on the point of the plow. Mr. Hawkins asks if anyone has ever heard of such a thing, and the crowd murmurs. Dave’s mother insists that Dave tell the real truth. At this moment, one man notes that the mule’s wound looks like a bullet hole, causing Dave’s mother to ask what he did with the gun. The crowd focuses on Dave. Mr. Hawkins asks if Dave really had a gun. Dave’s father catches Dave by the shoulders and shakes him vigorously, demanding that he tell the truth. Dave looks at the dead mule and begins to cry while Dave’s mother, Dave’s father, and Mr. Hawkins continue to ask him what happened.
The story jumps forward in time, to the consequences of the discovery of the dead mule. While no one immediately accuses Dave of killing the mule when it is first discovered, it becomes increasingly clear that things are looking bad for Dave. When Dave’s mother asks Dave what he did, Dave denies doing anything. When his father asks, he tells an elaborate but implausible lie. Finally, when Mr. Hawkins asks, Dave has no choice but to tell the truth. Once again, this shows the hierarchy of the plantation—Dave can straight up lie to his mother, and evade his father, but he can’t do anything against the white plantation owner Mr. Hawkins, who is the ultimate authority. While Dave’s father has threatened to beat Dave before, this scene is the first time that he physically hurts Dave, which links Dave’s delusions about the gun to his father’s violence.
Themes
Dave finally admits what happened. Stuttering, he swears he didn’t mean to shoot the mule Jenny. His father asks where he got the gun, and Dave admits it was from Joe’s store. Mr. Hawkins asks how Dave happened to shoot the mule. Dave insists again he wasn’t aiming at the mule. Someone in the crowd laughs.
Dave tries to at least convince Mr. Hawkins and his father that his intentions weren’t bad. This elicits a laugh from the crowd, suggesting how little Dave’s intentions matter on the plantation. All that really matters, particularly to Dave’s father and to Mr. Hawkins, is what Dave does.
Themes
Mr. Hawkins comes up close to Dave and informs him that he just bought himself a dead mule. The whole crowd begins to laugh and taunt Dave, who keeps his head down and twists his feet in the dirt. Mr. Hawkins then tells Dave’s father not to worry about it; Dave can just keep working as usual and pay Mr. Hawkins two dollars out of his salary every month. He thinks for a moment, then sets the price of the mule at 50 dollars. Dave’s father demands to know what Dave did with the gun, threatening to beat Dave. Dave lies and says he threw it away in the creek, to which his father replies that Dave must go out first thing in the morning to find it again, return it to Joe, and then give the money to Mr. Hawkins as a first payment on the debt. Dave walks away to the sound of people laughing. He has tears in his eyes and is angry.
Dave got the gun to address being mocked by the other farmhands and so he would be seen as a man, but now he is being laughed at by the gathered crowd. The gun has produced the opposite result of what he hoped. And yet, Dave lies about the location of the gun: he continues to believe in the power it can offer him, and wants it for himself. Meanwhile, note how Mr. Hawkins doesn’t react to Dave killing the mule with an outward show of anger. In pre-Civil War days, a plantation owner would likely have whipped or worse a slave who had accidentally killed a mule. Mr. Hawkins does no such thing. The power that Hawkins wields is not physical at all; it’s economic. For Dave’s moment of bad judgment, he puts Dave into over two years of debt. In this way, the story shows how true power does not rest on physical power, but rather on economic control. And it shows how this economic system is insidious: it allows those in power to seem kind, while putting those they control in ever more powerless positions.
Themes
That night, Dave doesn’t sleep. He is glad at first that he got out of killing the mule so easily, but he also feels hurt, particularly when he remembers how the crowd laughed at him. Dave is also dreading the beating that his father has promised to give him. Dave remembers previous beatings and quivers. He thinks that he is being treated like a mule, and blames his mother for telling on him.
Dave bought the gun because he thought it would allow him to escape feelings of shame, to deal violence rather than receive it; but it has only led him to more shame, to greater threats of violence. The fact that he blames his mother suggests both that he isn’t ready to take responsibility for his own part in killing the mule and that he feels more comfortable blaming someone closer to his level on the plantation hierarchy rather than someone further above him, like his father or Mr. Hawkins. His sense that he is being treated like a mule fits into his pattern of grievance, but is also a key insight: he is treated essentially like a mule, and like a mule his entire value is determined by his economic value to Mr. Haskins.
Themes
Dave thinks about how he fired the gun and gets the urge to do it again. He decides that if other men can shoot a gun, he can too. The house is still and Dave decides the rest of his family must be asleep. He slips into his overalls and goes out toward the woods. He stumbles on the ground, looking for the spot where he buried the gun earlier. He finds it, and digs it up.
The story has shown how Dave is caught in a cycle of shame, violence, and lack of control. He thought that buying the gun would get him out of that cycle, and was catastrophically wrong. But now, still caught in that cycle with no other way out, he continues to cling to the delusion of the gun as the only solution to his problems. This way of thinking is at once both ridiculous and in some ways rational: the gun clearly isn’t a solution to his problems, but there also isn’t any other better solution than the gun.
Themes
Dave blows the dirt off the gun and checks the barrel, which holds four cartridges that haven’t been shot yet. He looks around, and the fields are silent in the moonlight. As he goes to shoot the gun, he closes his eyes and turns his head. But then he decides he wants to keep his eyes open and his head facing forward, so he forces himself to keep his eyes open as he squeezes the trigger. His shot is successful, and the recoil doesn’t cause him to drop the gun the way it did the first time he shot the gun. He empties the remaining cartridges by firing into the empty fields.
Dave demonstrates progress with the gun—this time he keeps his eyes open and he doesn’t drop it. After seeing the negative consequences of the gun firsthand, Dave has finally developed a better understanding of it. He has developed some skill, some knowledge. Still, it is questionable whether this will do Dave any good, since he fires all his remaining cartridges into an empty field, where they are wasted. He has some skill in handling the gun, but no tactical ideas about using a gun. Though it is also possible to read his decision to fire into the field as Dave’s unconscious acknowledgement that actually using the gun against a person will only lead to much worse consequences for him—that the allure of the gun is the fantasy and threat of power it offers, but that the consequences of actually using the gun would show just how weak his position in society truly is.
Themes
Dave starts to walk back home. When he reaches the top of a ridge, he stands tall and proud in the moonlight as he looks down at Mr. Hawkins’ big white house. He feels the gun sagging in his pocket. He wishes he had one more bullet to take a shot at the house. He’d like to scare Mr. Hawkins, to let him know that he, Dave Saunders, is a man.
This is the first time Dave’s violent fantasies have specifically included Mr. Hawkins, recalling Dave’s earlier realization about how the gun could kill anybody “black or white.” Here, Dave directly acknowledges the role that the white Mr. Hawkins plays in oppressing him, rather than passing the blame off to those closer to him, like his father, his mother, and the other field workers. At the same time, Dave’s fantasies remain just that: fantasies. Not only won’t he shoot at Hawkins’ house, he can’t: his gun is empty. The reference to Hawkins’ “white house” also connects Dave’s oppression to the entire political structure of the United States, since the President lives in the White House. The story’s implication is that Dave’s situation is the result of political choices, of public policy, designed to control and extract economic value from Black people like Dave.
Themes
Dave hears a train coming down the tracks nearby. He thinks about his debt to Mr. Hawkins and realizes it’ll take him nearly two years to pay it all back. Dave goes down a nearby road, toward the train tracks. He keeps a hand on the gun, and something quivers in his stomach. The train cars thunder past, grinding on the steel tracks. Dave decides that he’s going to be riding the train that night. He feels hot all over. After a moment’s hesitation, he reaches out and pulls himself atop a train car, lying flat. The empty gun is still in his pocket. Ahead, the railroad tracks gleam in the moonlight, stretching on to somewhere new, to somewhere where Dave could finally be a man.
Dave finds himself in an impossible situation, facing years of debt and beatings from his father. Dave bought the gun because he thought that the gun would allow him to escape this situation, but of course it didn’t. His decision to run away by hopping the train, then, is a different sort of escape from this exploitative and impossible cycle that would certainly dominate the rest of his life. That said, the open-ended final lines of the story leave many aspects of Dave’s story ambiguous. While the open railway tracks suggest the possibility of a new beginning for Dave, his decision to take the gun with him suggests that some things will also stay the same. He is still looking to “be a man,” and it may be that in leaving where he is he can over time discover that being a man is not simply a product of a capacity for violence. But his choice to bring the gun with him suggest that he may be holding on to his old ideas about masculinity, even if they are as empty as the gun in his pocket, and even if the United States makes any sort of true independent manhood for Black Americans to be something always beyond reach. Ultimately, the story leaves Dave as he sets out on a journey, leaving open both the possibility and potential further tragedy of his quest to become a man.
Themes
