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Chapter 49
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Lonesome Dove, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
American Mythology
Family
Luck, Fate, and Chance
The Good Life
The Meaning of Masculinity
Feminine Strength
Summary
Analysis
According to their plan, July and Joe stop in Fort Worth to see if anyone has news of Jake Spoon and so that July can send a letter home to Elmira. He can’t stop worrying about her. But when they go to the post office, the clerk recognizes July’s name. Peach recently sent a letter general delivery for him, which he hands over to the sheriff. The contents of the letter—Ellie’s departure on the whiskey boat, Roscoe’s search, Peach’s opinion that July should forget Ellie and focus on Jake—dismay July.
Peach clearly doesn’t trust Roscoe to successfully track down July, so she hedges her bets with a letter. On the other hand, it’s an interesting choice to tell July about Elmira, as this risks distracting him from what Peach thinks should be his real mission. July now stands at a crossroads and must start making choices. He can’t just let life carry him along anymore because the two paths in front of him—to Jake and to Elmira—lead in opposite directions.
Themes
Much to July’s surprise, Joe guesses about Elmira’s disappearance. His mother, he says, doesn’t like to stay in one place for too long. He also says she probably went looking for Dee Boot. This catches July off-guard because Ellie told him that Dee Boot was dead. July finds himself in a terrible position. His wife—if she is his and not Dee Boot’s—left for “parts unknown.” And that’s where Roscoe and Jake Spoon are, too: parts unknown. He doesn’t know who to chase down first. Finally, he decides to look for Roscoe, even convincing himself that the deputy knows more about Elmira’s disappearance than he told Peach. As he falls asleep under the stars that night, he dreams that he’s back home in Arkansas, sitting in the loft with Ellie. He wakes up in tears.
July’s life has spiraled well and truly out of his control. He’s bound for parts unknown regardless—the only thing he knows he can’t do is slink back to Fort Smith with neither his wife nor his deputy nor his quarry in tow—that would show once and for all that he’s as ineffectual as Peach (and to a lesser extent, Elmira) consider him. In a way he’d like to think of it as bad luck. But Joe’s story suggests that it’s also the consequences of his own unfortunate decision to trust Elmira’s story—and to marry a woman he barely knew and clearly didn’t understand.
Themes
