Two Roads

In addition to gently introducing readers to aspects of trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder, Chapter 1 also injects elements of magical realism and spiritual connection into the structure of the novel, and these trends are more powerfully developed as the story progresses. The spiritual connection between father and son is vividly illustrated when Pop recalls the unspeakable horrors he endured as a soldier in the “Great War,” as World War I was called in the years preceding the onset of World War II. In Chapter 1, Cal hopes that his father will not start “remembering,” a term that refers to Pop’s flashbacks of his experiences in battle. While the grim reality of such flashbacks is realistic enough, the “magical realism” element occurs when Cal himself experiences Pop’s memories in vision form as well. In the first such vision that the novel describes, Cal actually takes on the role of Pop’s comrade-in-arms, the man who owns the pocket watch with the engraved initials “S.K.E.” and to whose house Pop and Cal go later that day. This literary device allows the author to relate intense moments from World War I as expository passages that provide key context for Pop and Cal’s doings in the narrative present. Without this particular flashback, for example, it would be impossible for readers to fully appreciate the significance of Pop’s decision to visit Edith’s house and provide her with assistance in the matter of the larcenous Jack.

These daydreams or visions therefore serve to connect Cal to key events in the past. At this point, he has not known anyone else who has these visions, nor has he told anyone that he experiences them. This secret isolates him from others as he believes himself to be the only person who possesses this ability. Nevertheless, the visions also serve to connect him to others because he is able to more intimately understand their experiences, just as he comes to understand private aspects of Pop’s experiences in the war. The author makes it abundantly clear that such a gift is often a burden and comes at a heavy price, for Cal often prefers not to hear about a person’s experience in order to avoid experiencing those life events “firsthand” in a vision. Thus, the presence of trauma once again comes to the forefront, for Cal wishes to avoid becoming traumatized like his father was. In this way, his daydreams are a source of connection as well as disconnection as he learns how to integrate them into his view of himself and the world. Ultimately, this spiritual ability is one that Cal must learn to accept as he works on Evaluating and Assimilating New Identities into a more nuanced understanding of himself as a well-rounded, multi-faceted person.

Cal and his father have an intensely close relationship, and this marks the first and most intimate version of the ongoing theme of The Influence of Friendship on Identity. At the beginning of the novel, much of Cal’s sense of identity is based upon this father-son relationship alone. The two have lost their home and Cal’s mother, and all they have is each other, so in addition to the more conventional parent-child relationship, these difficult circumstances also create a tight bond of mutual friendship and respect. Pop expects Cal to protect him just as he acts to protect his son, and because Pop expects Cal to honor and live up to these adult-caliber responsibilities, Cal always feels like he is respected by his father. Cal loves their current life together, but as the adult, Pop can perceive many realities that Cal does not yet have the maturity to acknowledge. He knows that his son needs an education and a life of greater stability, and these concerns prompt him to introduce Cal to the idea of attending an “Indian School” at the end of Chapter 4.

Throughout the novel, the author describes many instances of both culture-based and Government-Sanctioned Abuse of Marginalized Populations, particularly of Black people and Indigenous people during this time frame. The way in which racism affects people’s perceptions of others is displayed by Pop and Cal’s experience with the man on the horse who confronts them in Chapter 1. The man behaves with hostility until Pop, perceiving the reason for the man’s attitude, wordlessly assures him that he and Cal are not Black people by displaying the color of his untanned skin. After this point, the man’s demeanor becomes significantly friendlier, and thus the author uses this scene to demonstrate just how fraught the interactions between members of different races can be due to underlying prejudices; as Cal explains in the narrative, such behavior is unfortunately common in this part of the South. While Two Roads is primarily a story about embracing one’s heritage and navigating the process of coming of age, it also addresses many aspects of racism and bigotry head-on. In fact, even the novel’s kinder and more helpful characters demonstrate signs of bigotry and racism; in this particular scene, for example, the man believes he can trust Pop solely based on the color of his skin. Thus, even his helpful directions are steeped in racism.

It is important to note that although the term “hobo” is now considered to be derogatory, the character of Cal takes great pride in identifying as a “hobo” and adhering to the code of honor that such people live by. His views are designed to reflect the values of actual unhoused people during the Great Depression who adopted a travel-based lifestyle and shared secret “signs” to indirectly help each other in their travels from place to place. As is established when Pop talks to the man on the horse, Cal and Pop perceive a sharp difference between honorable “hobos” and more unethical travelers whom they deride as being “tramps.” In their eyes, claiming the identity of a “hobo” requires one to live up to an exacting code of honor. They work for what they receive, and they act with respect toward other people and toward the natural world. Cal frequently mentions various points of this honor code, and the two do their best to live up to it. In fact, they never abandon this code at any point in the novel. One example of their adherence to this code occurs when they clean up the remains of Jack’s abandoned camp even though it is not their mess. Thus, they maintain their self-respect by honoring this code in all situations. In Cal’s eyes, “hobos” reside at the top of the hierarchy of various unhoused and unemployed people due to the stringency of their value system.

When Cal and Pop visit Edith’s house and reflect that her chicken coop is nicer than many “Hoovervilles,” the author uses the scene to introduce the historically accurate concept of “Hoovervilles,” which denoted the many shantytowns that cropped up across the United States as the devastating effects of the Great Depression spread. Such makeshift towns took on this epithet because President Hoover himself was blamed for the massive economic downturn and for the government’s failure to provide American citizens with any relief from their intolerable circumstances. By favorably comparing a chicken coop to such inadequate human dwellings, Cal’s thought serves to emphasize just how poorly many in America were living at the time. Ultimately, President Hoover’s policies caused him to be defeated by Franklen D. Roosevelt, who authored the “New Deal” that provided essential job opportunities and eventually helped pull the United States out of the Great Depression.

In connection with the theme of Evaluating and Assimilating New Identities, it is significant that Cal’s only two books are Bulfinch's Mythology and The Call of the Wild, for they hold connections to the past and to the act of honoring one’s origins, respectively. Mythologies tell of the beliefs and values that people held centuries ago; thus, they represent the heritage of people living in the modern day, and some of the values expressed in such mythologies still hold sway in modern culture. As Cal comes to learn about his own origins as an Indigenous person, he must learn to embrace the stories and mythologies of his own culture and incorporate them into a more nuanced understanding of himself. Similarly, The Call of the Wild is a book that, although it features animal protagonists, also focuses upon the concept of ancestral memory. At this point in Two Roads, Cal does not yet have any information about his own ancestors and remains unaware of his Creek origins, but this lack of knowledge will be alleviated as the novel progresses.

One last event of significance to the novel’s overall premise occurs in Chapter 4 but is not fully explained by the narrative. In a further development of the theme of Government-Sanctioned Abuses of Marginalized Populations, Pop reads about a man named Angelo who is fighting to allow veterans to take out loans on their compensation certificates. These certificates are an important plot point in the novel, but they are never clearly explained. These certificates came about because of the World War Adjusted Compensation Act, which was also called the Bonus Act. According to this act, soldiers were paid according to their service, but only a portion of the money was immediately available. When the Great Depression hit, this stipulation left many veterans suffering financially as they were unable to collect the funds owed to them by the government for their service in World War I. Thus, many veterans were against these restrictions and organized protests to obtain the money they were due. In Chapter 4, Angelo is already advocating on behalf of veterans to bring about the social change that will allow such veterans to receive the money that is rightfully theirs, and Pop is interested in joining the cause. A significant moment of foreshadowing occurs when Cal does not see himself in his vision of Pop in Washington. The author therefore uses the device of Cal’s visions to introduce the idea that Cal and his father will need to go their separate ways, but because such a separation is not entirely explained, the scene also injects an element of narrative tension.