The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Carson McCullers, 1940.
In The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers lulls the reader into long stretches of quiet prose before throwing in sporadic bursts of brilliant imagery and heroic altruism. Set in an unnamed, deeply segregated company town in Georgia, Hunter follows the lives of locals as they navigate loneliness and thwarted ambition.
Three main characters exercise control over the novel's consciousness: the deaf and mute John Singer, Dr. Benedict Copeland, a Black Communist, and Mick Kelly, a young girl who dreams of becoming a musician but lacks the means to do so.
Mr. Singer is a tenant of the Kelly family, who offer room and board to a transient crowd. Being deaf and mute, Mr. Singer communicates by reading lips and writing short notes. His exceptional listening skills attract many of the town’s lonely residents, who flock to his upstairs bedroom in an almost unbroken cycle.
Dr. Benedict Copeland serves as the general physician for the Black residents of the town. Inspired by Marxist teachings, his life’s work is dedicated to uplifting his race, even at the cost of estrangement from two of his sons.
Mick Kelly is a dreamer, equipped with a musical mind and an upward-looking view of the world. Her energy clashes with the stagnant energy of the town, and she longs desperately to rise above it.
"She wished there was some place where she could go to hum it out loud. Some kinds of music were too private to sing in a house crammed full of people. It was funny, too, how lonely a person could be in a crowded house."
The real genius of this novel is the character of Mr. Singer, who is by far the most influential figure despite never speaking a word. Singer serves as an ally to the other characters, counseling them—or rather allowing them to counsel themselves—through their smallest and greatest conflicts.
“In his face there came to be a brooding peace that is seen most often in the faces of the very sorrowful or the very wise. But still, he wandered through the streets of the town, always silent and alone.”
Early in the novel, Singer’s best friend, a man named Spiros Antonapoulos, with whom he had lived for ten years, is sent to an asylum in another town. Antonapoulos, a large man concerned only with food, had been cared for by Singer. When Antonapoulos is sent away, a void opens in Singer’s life, soon to be filled by the town’s needy residents.
Carson McCullers burst onto the literary scene with The Heart is a Lonely Hunter at only 23 years old, later going on to write four more novels.