Following the New World

“America, America, blasphemous dream. Giving so much, why could it not give everything?” Lucia Santa pondered in Mario Puzo’s novel The Fortunate Pilgrim. Lucia Santa Angeluzzi-Corbo was an immigrant to the United States from Italy. She escaped her village and married an Italian man living in America. She ran from Italy in order to live a better life, one that could not have possibly been offered a poor woman in Italy. But she, like many other immigrants that we have and will read about, wished to achieve the dream while still living like she was in Italy. America offered so much, and by sticking with the old ways Lucia Santa was unable to grasp those American dreams. She asks: “Why could it [America] not give everything?”  But the answer lies simply in the fact that she refused to change as her life and circumstances changed around her. This attitude is not limited just to the Fortunate Pilgrim, but it can also be seen in both of the other books we have read this semester; Bread Givers and War Trash.

In Bread Givers, by Anzia Yezierska, the story is centered on the Smolinksy family who emigrated from Russia to New York. The father, Reb Smolinsky, was a student of the Torah in Russia and for that he was well respected. His family was able to get good jobs to help support him in his studies so he never had to work. Then they moved to America because Reb had lost all their belongings as a salesman and decided to move where he thought things cost nothing at all (Pg. 34). But all that awaited him in America was more poverty. He moved with the belief that he could continue in his studies while his family worked to support him, just as he had done in Russia. And although his daughters may not agree with his way of doing things, they know nothing else and must respect him.

Bessie, the eldest daughter, is the “burden bearer” of the family and she always does what is expected of her; including giving all her earned wages to her father so he can continue to sit and do nothing. Fania and Mashah also must live according to what their father bids them to do. When they all eventually start having love interests the father drives out every single one who loves them, only to replace those good men with men who are crooks and liars all because of his pride and desire to stick with the old world way of doing things. The three elder daughters are unhappy in the lives their father picked for them but they can say nothing. Sara, the youngest daughter, observes all that happens in her home and decides that she does not want to suffer at the hands of her father the way her sisters did. So she sets out to make herself “a person among people” and she changes to the American lifestyle and crawls her way out of the dirt she grew up in, to become a teacher. She was the only one in her family to rise above the poverty because she realized that in order to fulfill the dream, one must work to fulfill it.

In War Trash, by Ha Jin, the main character, Yu Yuan, is a POW in South Korean prison camps. Although his story is not one of an immigrant to the United States, he also goes through certain trials in which he must decide whether or not he wishes to stay in the old world, or change to fit in with the new. The old world in this story would be the Nationalists, and the new world would be the Communists. Yu Yuan did not necessarily like the Communists way of doing things but he thought it was China’s best chance at survival. In each camp there were two separate groups of Chinese men, the Nationalists and the Commies (Communists). Yu Yuan was constantly being bombarded by both sides, he must join the Commies but he also must be a Pro-Nationalist. He knew that the Commies were ruthless, but the Pro-Nationalists could be ruthless as well. So which side did he want to choose? He wanted, above everything else, to get back to his mother and fiancée. So no matter what the cost, he would choose to side with the Communists, even if he hated them for not caring about individual lives, and instead thought of them all as indispensable: “To be honest, I didn’t fear this crowd [the Pro-Nationalists] all that much, because these were simpler, weaker men than the Communists. They cared more about personal relationships, especially brotherhood and group loyalty.” Even though he knew the Pro-Nationalists would treat him right, he chose to go with the Communists back to China. He chose the new world over the old in order to try and make it somewhere in life because he didn’t know what would become of him in Free China (Taiwan). Once back in China, though, he was stripped of all honor and sent to work in a school, which was better than most returning soldiers had gotten, because he was not an official Party member. As a result he did get somewhere in life by choosing to side with the new world, even if it wasn't exactly what he had expected.

One of my most prevalent thoughts while reading these novels was: “if you risk so much for your dream of becoming a better person and get out of poverty, enough to travel across the globe to the new world, then isn’t it work it to continue to work for and follow that dream once you’re in the new world?” In The Fortunate Pilgrim, the only person who wanted to change to follow the new world’s way of doing things was Octavia, especially after she returned from the hospital. In Bread Givers, Sara Smolinsky was the only person to desire to get out of the dirt of poverty and she achieved it by following the ways of the new world. In War Trash, Yu Yuan followed the new world and he did not find himself in poverty once returning from the war. The American dream, or the dream of having enough, is not a “blasphemous dream” as Lucia Santa thought, it’s just one that must be followed all the way through and not just followed to America and then quitting. And only a few people realize this and can actually fulfill that dream.