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Aunt Julia
Herman Volz is an older German man who works at Lincoln Indian Training School, teaching carpentry and acting as the assistant boys’ adviser. He is one of the only adults at Lincoln who genuinely cares about the children’s wellbeing, disobeying Mrs. Brickman’s cruel dictums and standing up to the bullying groundskeeper DiMarco. Volz’s rule-bending extends to the secret bootlegging business he operates with Albert and Mr. Brickman, and he helps Odie, Albert, Mose, and Emmy escape from Lincoln School at great personal risk.
Herman Volz Quotes in This Tender Land
The This Tender Land quotes below are all either spoken by Herman Volz or refer to Herman Volz. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 4
Quotes
“You’re saying she’s got some hillbilly in her?”
“Just like us.”
We’d been raised in a little town deep in a hollow of the Missouri Ozarks. When we first came to Lincoln School, we still spoke with a strong Ozark accent. That twang, along with a lot of who we were, had been lost over our years at the school.
“I don’t believe it,” I said.
“I’m just saying, Odie, that nobody’s born mean. Life warps you in terrible ways.”
Maybe so, but I still hated her little black heart.
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Chapter 11
Quotes
God be with you. That was the last thing Miss Stratton had said to me. But the God I knew now was not a God I wanted with me. In my experience, he was a God who didn’t give but only took, a God of unpredictable whim and terrible consequence. My anger at him surpassed even my hatred of the Brickmans, because the way they treated me was exactly what I expected. But God? I’d had my hopes once; now I had no idea what to expect.
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Herman Volz Quotes in This Tender Land
The This Tender Land quotes below are all either spoken by Herman Volz or refer to Herman Volz. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 4
Quotes
“You’re saying she’s got some hillbilly in her?”
“Just like us.”
We’d been raised in a little town deep in a hollow of the Missouri Ozarks. When we first came to Lincoln School, we still spoke with a strong Ozark accent. That twang, along with a lot of who we were, had been lost over our years at the school.
“I don’t believe it,” I said.
“I’m just saying, Odie, that nobody’s born mean. Life warps you in terrible ways.”
Maybe so, but I still hated her little black heart.
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11
Quotes
God be with you. That was the last thing Miss Stratton had said to me. But the God I knew now was not a God I wanted with me. In my experience, he was a God who didn’t give but only took, a God of unpredictable whim and terrible consequence. My anger at him surpassed even my hatred of the Brickmans, because the way they treated me was exactly what I expected. But God? I’d had my hopes once; now I had no idea what to expect.
Related Characters:
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Page Number and Citation:
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