A Thousand Acres Themes

A Thousand Acres Themes

Violence Against Women

The hidden horror of this prosperous farm in the center of the American heartland is that Larry Cook began sexually abusing his daughters shortly after their mother's death. Ginny, by Rose's recollection, was the first. Larry began abusing Rose when she was 13 and continued until she was 16. Left unsaid is what happened to the youngest daughter, Caroline, who was in high school—alone in the Chelsea with Larry—when Ginny was married and Rose was in college. Ginny remembered little of her mother other than that she fit easily into the local community and that she had once betrayed her, ordering her to come out from hiding so that Larry could beat her, which he did, with his belt, until she fell (the occasion being a carelessly lost shoe).

Larry's hidden abuse and high status within the community reveal the different inner and outer contours of the American heartland. Questions...
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