A PSYCHOANALYTIC ANALYSIS
"Hands"
by Sherwood Anderson
Summary:
While pacing on the decaying porch of his small house near a ravine on the outskirts of Winesburg, Ohio, a fat man watches young adults passing in a wagon on a highway beyond an expanse of weeds. They are boisterous berry pickers returning from the fields. One fellow jumps out and tries to pull a girl after him. She screams in mock protest. Then, seeing the man on the porch across the weed field, calls out to him, “Oh, you Wing Biddlebaum, comb your hair, it's falling into your eyes.” The man is bald.
Wing Biddlebaum, who is full of self-doubts, has
only one real friend in town, George Willard. George, a reporter for the
Winesburg Eagle, is the son of Tom Willard, operator of the New Willard
House. Sometimes Tom could be seen on the highway walking to
Biddlebaum's house. Biddlebaum wishes that Willard would visit him on
this evening. Wing walks across the field of weeds and looks toward town
for a moment and then, afraid, hurries back to the porch and resumes
pacing.
Whenever he is with Willard, Biddlebaum's shyness eases,
and he talks animatedly on his porch with his friend or sometimes goes
into town with him. Biddlebaum talks with his hands. In fact, says the
narrator, “The story of Wing Biddlebaum is a story of hands.” His hands
move like the wings of a captive bird—hence, his nickname, Wing. Not
that he wants to gesticulate. He would rather hide his hands, and he
looks with envy upon those who have them under control.
Sometimes, when talking with George, Wing beats his fists on a wall or
table—or even on a stump or a fence if they are outdoors. Doing so makes
him feel more at ease. And they are fast hands. He can pick as many as
one hundred forty quarts of strawberries in one day. The townsfolk are
proud of his hands. They are legendary in Winesburg, where Wing has
lived for the last twenty years.
George had often wanted
to question him about his hands—about their movements and his tendency
to hide the hands. One summer afternoon he is on the verge of doing so
when Wing is telling him he tries to be too much like other people in
the town. “You are destroying yourself," he cried. "You have the
inclination to be alone and to dream and you are afraid of dreams.” To
help him make his point, Wing beats on a grass bank.
Wing then dreams of a scene in which young men gather around a wise old
man under tree. Laying his hands on George's shoulders, Wing tells him
what the old man said: “You must try to forget all you have learned. You
must begin to dream. From this time on you must shut your ears to the
roaring of the voices.”
Suddenly Wing puts his hands in
his pockets. Tears well in his eyes, and he says he must go home. He
hurries away. George, unsettled by the terror in Wing's eyes, vows not
to ask him about his hands. There's something strange about them. He
thinks his hands are responsible for his timidity, his fear of everyone.
George is right, and the narrator tells the story of Wing's hands.
When he was young, Wing—his actual name is Adolph Myers—taught school
in a Pennsylvania. There the boys liked him, for he was gentle to them.
He often walked with the boys after school or sat talking with them
outside the school on the steps. His hands would touch their shoulders
or tousle their hair. His voice was soft. His voice and hands were
instruments of kindness.
“And then the tragedy,” the
narrator says. “A half-witted boy of the school became enamored of the
young master. In his bed at night he imagined unspeakable things and in
the morning went forth to tell his dreams as facts.”
He made accusations. People believed him. Then, under questioning from
parents, students of Myers said he would run his fingers through their
hair or put his arms around them. One day, a saloon keeper named Henry
Bradford, whose son was one of the boys Myers touched, went to the
school, beat him with his fists, and kicked him around the schoolyard.
That night, a group of men drove Myers out of town.
He
changed his name to Biddlebaum and settled in Winesburg, where he has
lived for twenty years. During the whole of his first year in town, he
was ill in reaction to his bad experience in Pennsylvania. Early on, he
lived with an elderly aunt, who raised chickens. After she died, he was
on his own. Upon his recovery from his illness, he became a field
laborer and developed the habit of hiding his hands.
Wing is only forty, but he looks sixty-five. After pacing on his porch
until dusk, he goes inside and makes himself a snack: slices of bread
spread with honey. A train rumbles by carrying the day's harvest of
berries. Afterward, Wing goes back out on the porch and resumes pacing.
In the gathering darkness, he cannot see his hands. As a result, they
behave themselves.
He goes back inside, washes dishes, and opens a
folding cot and puts it next to the screen door that opens onto the
porch. Spying on the floor a few crumbs of bread from his snack, he
brings a lamp near and picks up the crumbs and eats them. As he kneels
there, he resembles a priest carrying out a ritual. In the dim light, he
also looks like a petitioner hurrying his fingers through the beads of a
rosary.
ANALYSIS:
Id- This aspect involves the instant gratification of needs and wants of an individual. Pleasure satisfaction of the unconscious mind is at hand.
“You must try to forget all you have learned. You must begin to dream. From this time on you must shut your ears to the roaring of the voices.”
His hands would touch their shoulders or tousle their hair. His voice was soft. His voice and hands were instruments of kindness.
One summer afternoon he is on the verge of doing so when Wing is telling him he tries to be too much like other people in the town. “You are destroying yourself," he cried. "You have the inclination to be alone and to dream and you are afraid of dreams.”
