Sin, Redemption, and Children Theme Analysis

“The Luck of Roaring Camp” is a satirical rehashing of the biblical birth and death of Christ. In the story, a prostitute dies while giving birth in a small settlement in the American West (where she was the only woman), leaving the all-male community in charge of a newborn. But the baby, whom the men name “the Luck,” quickly changes Roaring Camp for the better, spurring the men to clean up their foul language and even their appearances. In Christianity, it’s believed that Christ’s life and death absolved his followers of their sins, thus giving them access to eternal life in Heaven. The story’s point about redemption, though, isn’t religious in nature—after all, baby Luck’s christening is the first time the word “God” is uttered seriously at the camp. Instead, Luck’s birth and his impact on the community show that even the most seemingly hardened and criminal people are still capable of positive transformation, or “redemption,” and that children are uniquely equipped to bring about this kind of radical, positive change.

Roaring Camp is full of immoral, unpleasant, or even outright criminal characters—from a biblical perspective, they can be read as sinners in need of redemption. Roaring Camp is described as a “city of refuge,” a biblical allusion to ancient settlements where outcasts could find safety and community. This allusion suggests that the men of Roaring Camp are immoral enough to have been cast out from other towns, but it also implies that there’s hope for them. Many Bible verses suggest that God himself created those cities of refuge—that God seeks to love and protect even the outcast and immoral by giving them a sanctuary or safe space to live. And indeed, the men are all “reckless”—some are criminals, and others are fugitives. But this reference to a “city of refuge” seems to suggest that the characters in “The Luck of Roaring Camp” are redeemable, too. Furthermore, the one woman in the settlement, Sal, is a prostitute, and she is “Dissolute, abandoned, and irreclaimable.” When she dies, she’s described as leaving behind the “sin and shame” of Roaring Camp, again underscoring that the camp is riddled with sin—and desperately in need of redemption.

Baby Luck’s birth mirrors Christ’s in several ways, suggesting that the Luck will bring about this redemption or positive change in Roaring Camp—just as Jesus is believed to redeem believers of their sins. The Christian story of Christ’s birth recounts that he was born in a manger—a feeding trough for farm animals—in a modest stable, and that the Magi (wisemen) visited him here and brought him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. The Luck’s birth is similarly unglamorous, as he’s born in a crude cabin in the middle of the wilderness. The men of the camp, like Magi of the frontier, bring the baby precious gifts (like a gold boot spur, a diamond pin, a silver teaspoon, and an embroidered handkerchief), further likening him to Christ.

The Luck’s presence spurs the men of Roaring Camp to better themselves and their town in various ways. This emphasizes Luck’s status as a Christ figure but also children’s power more generally to effect positive change. After Sal dies, someone raises the idea of recruiting a woman from another town to nurse Luck. But the men decide against this, declaring “that ‘they didn’t want any more of the other kind.’ This unkindly allusion to the defunct mother […] was the first spasm of propriety,—the first symptom of the camp’s regeneration.” While the men are making some “unkindly” generalizations about women here, their underlying intention is to protect the camp from further sin now that they have a baby to raise. Soon after the Luck’s birth, positive outward change sweeps over the camp, beginning with the cabin where the Luck stays with an esteemed citizen named Stumpy. The Luck’s presence catalyzes this outward regeneration—for instance, his new cradle is so nice that it makes the rest of the furniture look bad, so Stumpy goes to work trying to spruce up the rest of the cabin to make it fit for the baby. This regeneration spreads all over Roaring Camp and “produce[s] stricter habits of personal cleanliness.” Even Kentuck, who “had begun to regard all garments as a second cuticle, which, like a snake’s, only sloughed off through decay” begins wearing clean shirts and washing his face so that he’ll be clean whenever he holds the baby. The image of Kentuck sloughing off his dirty clothes like a snake sheds its skin also speaks to the more general renewal and rebirth happening in Roaring Camp.

Indeed, the Luck begins to positively change the men on a deeper, more personal level. The men’s usual rambunctious yelling, which is what gave Roaring Camp its name, is tempered when they’re in close proximity to the Luck, and they even cut out profanity. Again, that the men go from cursing and roaring—and being known for this behavior—to respectfully tiptoeing and whispering, which indicates that caring deeply for the Luck is influencing them to change their ways. Even though the Luck is just an infant, he’s redeeming and renewing the men inside and out, which speaks to his status as a redeeming Christ figure in the story. But this also underscores the story’s more general point that children are uniquely capable of bringing about this kind of dramatic positive transformation in the world.

Luck’s death at the end of the story is tragic and seemingly meaningless—he wasn’t a religious martyr who died for his people but was instead the victim of a random act of nature, a massive winter flood. But the story implies that the men have been so thoroughly changed and redeemed by Luck’s presence that Luck’s death was, in its own way, redemptive like Christ’s. In Christian thought, Christ’s death isn’t the end of his influence on Earth or his connection with his followers; likewise, Luck may have died, but the story suggests that he has so radically changed and renewed the community of sinners that his influence will perhaps live on in the town.