Power, Property, and Identity Theme Analysis

Ulrich and Georg both believe that a patch of forest on the edge of Ulrich’s property rightfully belongs to their own, different, families. This family feud has intensified over the past two generations, even though the land is not that large or productive. The fact that Ulrich and Georg, men decades away from being able to determine certain ownership of the forest, take the land dispute even more personally than their grandfathers did suggests that the feud itself, and the ambition to win it, outweighs attachment to the actual forest.

Rather than hunt for wild animals, at the story’s opening the men hunt for each other. The fact that they share the objective of murder shows that they value the forest because it provides the opportunity to beat, or hunt, the other man. After Ulrich and Georg become trapped beneath a fallen tree, they first see it as a chance to finally kill the other. They both hope their men will be the first to arrive to the scene, so that their party can roll the trunk over the other.

However, Ulrich and Georg ultimately come to see being stuck under the tree as a chance to be gracious toward, and free, the other. Put another way, each man’s desire to get the better of the other man is not lost, just the expression of that desire has changed. Ulrich and Georg still want their party to be the first to arrive, but now they hope that their men will come so that they can act as the other’s savior. Even when reconciled, the men seek validation from an action performed on the other. The forest matters to Ulrich and Georg because of how their ownership of it, and actions within it, will be known and understood by others.