One of Ours · Chapter
IV explained
Claude Wheeler, dreading a return to the denominational Temple College, asks his mother to let him transfer to the State University, but she resists, citing spiritual dangers and cost.
What happens
Claude Wheeler, dreading a return to the denominational Temple College, asks his mother to let him transfer to the State University, but she resists, citing spiritual dangers and cost. His father, Nat Wheeler, jokingly defers to Bayliss, who dismisses the idea. The chapter also recalls Claude's childhood sensitivity to his father's ridicule and a traumatic memory of his father cutting down a cherished cherry tree, as well as his boyhood penances and his brother Ralph's manipulative mischief.
Themes in this chapter
Family and Individuality
Claude struggles against his family's expectations and his father's domineering humor, seeking autonomy in his education.
Religion and Hypocrisy
Claude criticizes the Temple College's preachers as ineffective and questions his mother's faith in religious education.
Masculinity and War
Claude's father's 'rugged masculinity' and Claude's own self-imposed physical tests reflect a harsh ideal of manhood.
Characters to notice
- Claude Wheeler
Asks his mother to transfer from Temple College to the State University; recalls childhood trauma of his father cutting down a cherry tree; imposes physical tests on himself.
- Mrs. Wheeler
Claude's mother, who is old-fashioned and fears worldly influences; she opposes the transfer and is protective of Claude's spiritual development.
- Nat Wheeler
Claude's father, who is jocular and sometimes cruel; he cut down the cherry tree as a practical joke and later refers Claude's school decision to Bayliss.
- Ralph Wheeler
Claude's younger brother, docile but mischievous; he often persuades Claude to carry out risky plans.
- Bayliss Wheeler
Claude's older brother, who dismisses the idea of transferring to the State University, citing football and cost.
- Brother Weldon
Mentioned as a preacher who recruits students for Temple College and is criticized by Claude for being a poor teacher.
Key passages
“Claude might have enjoyed the large and somewhat gross cartoons with which Mr. Wheeler enlivened daily life, had they been of any other authorship. But he unreasonably wanted his father to be the most dignified, as he was certainly the handsomest and most intelligent, man in the community.”
Claude could have laughed at his father's crude jokes if someone else told them, but he expected his father to be the most dignified man around, even though he was already the best-looking and smartest.
Claude's sensitivity to his father's humor and his desire for paternal dignity.
“The beautiful, round-topped cherry tree, full of green leaves and red fruit—his father had sawed it through! It lay on the ground beside its bleeding stump.”
The lovely cherry tree, laden with leaves and cherries, had been cut down by his father and now lay on the ground next to the stump.
Claude's traumatic memory of his father destroying the cherry tree.
“According to her conception of education, one should learn, not think; and above all, one must not enquire.”
In his mother's view, education meant absorbing facts without questioning or thinking independently.
Claude's frustration with his mother's old-fashioned and restrictive view of learning.