Lonely hunting

The title of the classic 1940 novel by Carson McCullers, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, tips us off. Her characters are lonely people in search of something, even if they are not always certain what that something is.

In case you miss the significance of the title, McCullers makes it clearer in nearly every early chapter with lines like these:

"It was funny, too, how lonesome a person could be in a crowded house."

"The town seemed more lonesome than any place he had ever known."

"It was a queer thing to talk with a draft-mute. But he was lonesome."

"He was lonesome and he was an old man."

Loneliness seems to be universal in the novel, for McCullers has several central characters, and loneliness is a trait shared by most of them. These include a deaf-mute named Singer, whom other characters love to talk to even though he cannot hear them; Mick, a young girl who dreams of composing music until adult responsibilities come too soon; Doctor Copeland, a well-read black physician disappointed that his grown children have just ordinary intelligence; and Jack, a carnival worker who preaches socialism, drinks heavily and is always ready for a fight.

As lonely and seemingly independent as these and other characters are, they are nevertheless dependent on each other. When one of these dominoes falls, the others topple, or at least wobble, as well. Not even the lonely really stand alone.