Document Information
- Section & Chapter: Part Two, Chapter 33
- Scene: After Jim and Marcus clash, Jim drives the tractor at normal speed in field showing Marcus no leniency.
- Draft: Early Manuscript
- File location: Box 3, folder 7
Discussion Questions
- Gaines made some minor edits to a few sentences in this section of chapter 33. Identify a couple of those changes and what chapter correlates to this one in the published version of the novel. Why might Gaines have made those edits before publication? Could it be for clarity, to place scenes in order?
- Gaines revised this chapter's order before publication of the novel. Instead of remaining chapter 33, it became chapter 35. What differences do you notice between the manuscript draft, the typescript draft of chapter 33, and the published version? Are they all different? How do those differences change your sense of the scene and chapters as a whole in this order?
Chapter Thirty-Three
We didn’t have any more to say to each other after that. He stayed on his side of the house, I stayed on mine. He stayed on his side of the gallery, I stayed on mine. There wasn’t of any dividing line on the gallery – no wall, no fence or anything that – but there was a board on the floor neither one of us was crossing. When he got hungry, he went up to Mrs. Laura Mae to eat. Whether he washed his hands and face up there, I can’t tell, but he wasn’t using my washpan and tub any more. I didn’t tell him not to use it, I didn’t care if he did or not. But since we weren’t speaking he took it for granted I didn’t want him using any of my things.
Monday, in the field, I didn’t have no pity on him. I drove the tracker just like I was supposed to drive it when three people were working back there. When he fell back I threw him a sack that I had brought from the yard.