Poverty and the American Dream Theme Analysis

Lily’s life cycles through times of extreme poverty and relative comfort. Though she believes her impoverished background has given her an invaluable work ethic, she also feels looked down upon by the rich. Nevertheless, Lily’s story is a testament to the power of hard work and a manifestation of the traditional American Dream.

Lily grows up so poor that her family lives in a dirt dugout for the first few years of her life, and cannot afford many of the things modern people take for granted. For example, Lily has to fight for her chance to attend school not only because she is a girl, but also because her parents cannot always afford the tuition. Lily has no time to wallow in misfortune, however, and appreciates others who similarly make the best of their lot in life. She admires Lupe because, despite being thrown out of her own home, she never feels sorry for herself. She respects Dorothy Clemens—the daughter of a tenant farmer hired by Dad, and who eventually marries Buster and runs the ranch—for similar reasons.

Going without for so long also teaches Lily a sense of resourcefulness, which becomes invaluable throughout her life. As an adult, she and Jim waste nothing—repurposing old clothes and lumber, sitting on crates for chairs, and fashioning wire into coffee mug handles. When she wants to save up money to buy the Hackberry ranch, she shows her children how to dig through trash to find recyclables. When she wants a gown to attend the Gone With the Wind premiere, she proudly fashions one out of her living room curtains. Lily’s background grants her optimism about her ability to overcome obstacles and an appreciation of what she has.

Unearned wealth, on the other hand, breeds an obnoxious sense of superiority. Lily often feels looked down upon by the rich and has little patience for those who act “hoity-toity.”At her Catholic school, Lily quickly establishes herself as more intelligent than her wealthier classmates and also less prone to moping and homesickness; life on the ranch makes life at the academy feel like “one long vacation.” She also appreciates that their gray uniforms “leveled out the differences between those who could afford fancy store-bought clothes and those of us, like me, who had only home-dyed beechnut brown dresses.” When Lily becomes a maid in Chicago, her first boss, Mim, seems “very impressed with herself” and treats Lily as if she doesn’t exist. Lily decides she will not spend her life under the thumb of people like Mim, insisting, “There was no shame in doing hard work, but polishing silver for rich dunderheads was not my Purpose.”

Lily similarly does not see the need for fancy things, and instead asserts that “you can get so used to certain luxuries that you start to think they’re necessities.” For example, though she enjoys having indoor plumbing and electricity at her and Jim’s home in Ash Fork, she is easily able to re-adapt to a simpler life on the ranch. Unlike Mom, who clings to her prized walnut headboard even as a flood destroys the family dugout, Lily rejects blindly worshipping or defining her worth via finery. When Rosemary later attends boarding school, Lily gives her a strand of fake pearls, insisting that if she holds her head high no one will know the difference.

By the end of the story Lily lives comfortably in the tiny town of Horse Mesa, happier in that “glorified camp” than she was in her large house in Phoenix. Lily is never content to sit idly even when she has the means to, however, and in addition to teaching fills her hours with political advocacy. For Lily, the American Dream is not simply about going from rags to riches, or from a life of endless toil to one of indulgent leisure. Without ever glamorizing the difficulties of poverty, her story ultimately suggests that frugality and hard work are themselves moral virtues. For Lily, the American dream is not freedom from work, but rather freedom to support herself through work she finds meaningful.