Conrad Richter's three novels of the Southwest provide us with provocative portraits of women on the frontier and at the same time suggest a feminine perspective on western achievement. Each novel focuses on a central female character whose story is told by a male narrator recalling the experiences of his boyhood and youth. The boy is in each instance a family relation of the man who is married to or closely associated with the leading female character. The boy thus provides a sympathetic but essentially external view of the woman: characterization is limited to what the boy knew, nuances of motivation remain mysteries, and the women emerge as essentially idealized portraits shaped by a man's nostalgia for a lost youth. Though such an approach may be frustrating for a reader interested in psychological probing of character, Richter's mode is eminently suited to portrayal of an essentially symbolic perception of Southwestern life.
The first of these novels, Sea of Grass (1937), is actually a double story: a tale of family relationships and a tale of the transition from open range country to an agrarian economy in New Mexico. But Richter has interwoven these two stories through the symbolic associations of the leading characters: Jim Brewton personifies the old pioneer spirit, the aggressive, conquering male who thrives in the open though harsh realities of the sea of grass; his wife Lutie is associated with the taming of that pioneer spirit by her instinctive hate for the sea of grass, her ties with Brice Chamberlain (the eastern lawyer who champions the nesters), and her femininity. Though there is no intrinsic tie between the domestic tale and the historical theme (for what happens to the sea of grass would likely have occurred whether Lutie left her husband or not), the symbolic associations in the story are so strong that the domestic and historical themes seem to be interdependent. In this way, I believe Richter suggests a perspective on the historical theme through his handling of the Brewton family fortunes. (pp. 120-21)
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