Wolfe's "Drug Store": Theme and Variation in the Hound of Darkness

Thomas Wolfe believed Americans were nighttime people, and he filled his first novel with nighthawks: Altamont of Look Homeward, Angel gains depth and life as Ben Gant and his cronies from paper leave their shifts and meet up with doctors, undertakers and socialites at all-night Uneeda Lunch while others sleep. Face of Night, later named Proud Brother, consists of passages on nighttime occurrences and was originally planned for, but not included in, Of Time and River. manuscript version of Bums at Sunset ends on an apostrophe to that, although excised from version in From Death to Morning, is retained in The Complete Short Stories of Thomas Wolfe (277-78). (1) In short novel Proud Brother, (2) narrator grows up among that strange and lonely company of men who prowl night (15) and comes to find the immortal beauty of America.... at heart of of dark, proud, secret ... (16). In 1935, after seeing American West on his trip to Boulder, Colorado, Wolfe asked Perkins to announce forthcoming on at night. Inspired by methods of film structure, in which images can be shortened, altered, and assembled at will, Wolfe imagined panoramic shots of American land, zooms, montage of scenes with characters from all parts of country. He meant to arrange pieces as a great tone-symphony of night, not focalized by a definite personality, thus blast[ing] forever charge of 'autobiography' had been dogging him (To Maxwell 179-80; emphasis in orig.). Wolfe's projected book of night was, however, never published as he had intended. Rather, he allotted some parts to Webber and Joyner cycle he turned to instead, and others went into A Prologue to America, published in Vogue in February 1938. Combining not so much skits as distinct voices running into and echoing one another, Vogue piece exemplifies what Wolfe meant by symphonic style. A Prologue to America also serves as precursor to The Hound of Darkness, collection of sixteen dramatic pieces edited by John L. Idol Jr. and published by Thomas Wolfe Society in 1986. As Idol points out in his foreword, sketches Wolfe had been collecting in ledger combine to form tone-symphony of sorts (xviii). Keeping to symphonic conceit, I believe one of pieces make up The Hound of Darkness, Drug Store (81-88), sounds basic Wolfean theme, one swells in his characters' hearts at and is recognizable elsewhere in brilliant variations. Although it is not first sketch in collection, Drug Store carries basic message and reminds us of well-known lament. It is set in South Carolina town at end of hot day, location affords an opportunity to echo what Wolfe has elsewhere had to say about South. I will suggest it is no coincidence Wolfe chose this setting to strike first notes of theme of The Hound of Darkness: nighttime's special status in passage of time. Drug Store is slice of life showing establishment's proprietor, Charlie Evans, and his soda jerker, Dick, at work greeting and serving customers. Many elements in this humorous sketch take up Wolfe's pet peeves about South. He shows South Carolina is similar to one described in chapter 2 of The Web and Rock (14) (3): men in shirt-sleeves crying How are ye?... Hot enough fer ye?; laughing at reply, Damned if it ain't hotter'n whut Sherman said war was!; answering back, Damned if ye ain't right! (Hound 82). The stereotypical view of Southerners is presented recalls Eugene in chapter 13 of Look Homeward, Angel, contemplating [the] legend of charm of their manner, aristocratic culture of their lives, quaint sweetness of their drawl ... (155). When two young women drive up for sodas, Charlie Evans goes out to serve them and sweet-talks them mock-gallantly until they protest they are about to pe'ish faw somethin' cold to drink. …