The Overstory

The Overstory

by

Richard Powers

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on The Overstory makes teaching easy.

The Overstory: Part 1: Roots—Ray Brinkman and Dorothy Cazaly Summary & Analysis

Summary
Analysis
Ray Brinkman and Dorothy Cazaly are “two people for whom trees mean nothing.” In Minnesota in 1974, they go on their first date. Ray is a junior intellectual property lawyer, and Dorothy is a stenographer who often works at his firm. When Ray first asks Dorothy out, she picks the venue: an audition for a community theater production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Neither has acted in anything since high school, and the audition is “terrifying,” but they laugh about it afterwards. Both of them even get cast in the play: Ray as Macduff, and Dorothy as Lady Macbeth.
Ray and Dorothy are the two characters perhaps least connected to the others in The Overstory, though they still play an important role in illustrating goals with the book. It is notable that they are also introduced as people with seemingly no connection whatsoever to trees—“trees mean nothing” to them. This sets them apart from most of the other characters, though it's possible that they’ll develop a love for nature later in life.
Themes
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Ray tries to back out, but Dorothy convinces him not to, and they both take the parts. Ray is a terrible actor at first, but he quickly improves. He is a very innocent man with a strong sense of responsibility and patriotism, and Dorothy tries to test his limits with her own free-spirited whims. The actual staging of Macbeth includes the scene of the traveling forest, and Ray as Macduff hides among its branches. After the wrap party, Ray and Dorothy have sex for the first time. They talk afterward, with Dorothy first asking Ray probing questions and then Ray slowly suggesting that they are meant to be together and should get married. Dorothy is shocked and scornful at first, but then seems to agree.
A famous scene in Shakespeare’s Macbeth involves an army using branches as camouflage, such that it seems to fulfill a prophecy that the forest itself will physically move. This is then presented as the first time Ray and Dorothy really think about trees, but here it is still only within the context of their growing relationship. They are very dissimilar people, but they immediately share a strong bond with each other.
Themes
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Five years pass, and Ray becomes a partner at his firm. He is a skilled intellectual property lawyer, and his earnestness and sense of responsibility help him in his work. Meanwhile, Dorothy continues at her stenography job. The couple break up and get back together several times, often in dramatic fashion. One time, Dorothy writes Ray a note, saying that she wants to be with him but is deathly afraid of being someone else’s property. Ray responds, and Dorothy shows up one night with two tickets to Rome. While there, the two finally get married on a whim.
Ray’s work as an intellectual property lawyer will act as a vehicle for the book’s ideas about what beings besides humans have intelligence and therefore rights under the law. In contrast to Ray’s profession, Dorothy is extremely concerned about never feeling owned by anyone else.
Themes
Human Nature, Psychology, and Storytelling Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
Dorothy moves back in with Ray and occasionally starts thinking about her own future children. On their first anniversary, Ray writes Dorothy a note proposing a plan: that every year, they should plant something new in their yard. Dorothy reads the note while she’s driving, starts to cry, and ends up crashing her car into a large linden tree. She is uninjured except for a cut on her face, but Ray rushes to the hospital in a panic. When Dorothy sees him, she says, “I’m not going anywhere. Let’s plant something.”
What would be a prop in another book—the linden tree that Dorothy crashes into—is specifically noted in The Overstory, almost like a brief side character. Despite their tempestuous relationship, Ray and Dorothy find a sense of common hope in the idea of planting trees together.
Themes
Humans and Trees Theme Icon
Consciousness, Value, and Meaning Theme Icon
Get the entire The Overstory LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Overstory PDF