1024 steinbeck, John
leaves them for his mother to find. He is responsible
for keeping the wood box full for the kitchen, gath-
ering eggs, and other small chores. In the opening
section, called “The Gift,” Carl brings a young pony
home and gives him to Jody. Jody is being tested to
see if he can shoulder more chores and take good
care of the pony, whom he names Gabilan. He is
guided by the sure hand of Billy Buck, who knows
all there is to know about horses. Carl is showing
affection and trust in his young son by present-
ing the colt, but there is no emotion exhibited in
the transaction. Billy promises Jody that if it rains
while the boy is at school, he will put the pony in
the barn. He does not, and this results in Gabilan
being left out in the rain for some time. The colt
becomes very ill, and Billy has his hands full trying
to keep him alive. Jody’s parents’ contributions to
the situation are platitudes about Billy’s skills with
horses and assurances that the colt will be all right.
When Gabilan dies after Billy’s heroic measures do
not cure him, Jody is heartbroken, an emotion Carl
cannot understand.
During Gabilan’s illness, the fear Jody has
for his pony is only acknowledged by Billy Buck,
although he realizes that his mother can see his
worry. Billy cares for the colt, exhibiting his own
fears as well as a need to regain Jody’s regard for his
skills. Carl goes out of his way, however, to entertain
Jody and get his mind off the sick colt by telling sto-
ries before the fire on evenings. He does not gauge
Jody’s fear well, and his own feelings are hurt when
Jody is merely polite about the stories, not totally
engrossed.
Gabilan wanders off to die, and Jody finds him
by following the circling buzzards. As one attacks
the colt’s carcass, Jody throttles it and beats its head
with a rock. He keeps at this until Billy pulls him off
the dead bird. Carl steps in to clean Jody’s bloody
face, and tells him that the the buzzard did not kill
the pony. He simply cannot comprehend Jody’s grief.
Billy jumps in to stop Carl from further wounding
his son. Billy has a better understanding of the boy
than Carl, and this scenario comes up again when
the horse Nellie dies.
Mrs. Tiflin’s father comes for a visit in the last
section, “The Leader of the People.” He is old and
repetitively tells the same stories about leading
a wagon train west in the 19th century. Grand-
father comes because he loves his daughter and
his grandson, but Carl makes it obvious that he
is unwelcome. Jody watches as his father belittles
and complains about Grandfather’s stories, acting
childish because he feels somewhat displaced. Mrs.
Tiflin asks for understanding and patience, but
eventually Carl cannot contain himself and snarls
loudly that the old man is “stupid” and tells repeti-
tive stories about a past that is dead and gone. The
old man hears him and is hurt. Whatever hope the
two men ever had of getting along is gone. It is
very sad for Jody, who sees that regardless of the
repetition, Grandfather’s stories are part of his own
history. He cannot behave as his father has done,
but he can be a friend to his grandfather, and that
is the road he takes.
The Red Pony shows a fairly modern American
family. The father is interested in taking care of
things and getting the best price for his goods; he
cannot or will not feel compassion for his son or for
others. The boy’s mother has limited opportunities
to be more than a helpmate to her husband and
has accepted Carl’s point of view about raising the
child. Billy loses his self-respect and Jody’s as well
for failing not once but twice to save a horse as he
has promised. He cares for the boy but also resents
him. The grandfather wants people to understand
what he went through and what the western emi-
grants did for the country. This family is disjointed
in places, dysfunctional at times, but still a family.
There is the shared job of raising the best Jody they
can as well as the shared responsibility for the parts
of the ranch they were assigned so that the family
might endure.
Elizabeth Malianature in The Red Pony
John Steinbeck wrote about the Salinas Valley sev-
eral times, based on his own intimate knowledge of
the area where he grew up in the early 20th century.
His knowledge is of the land and the lives that are
indelibly formed and colored by it. His realistic,
spare prose gives a very clear picture of a region
without palm trees or large bodies of water; no cities
are in view, people live at some distance from each
other, and they make a living off the land.