Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

 

Characters
Inman	Ada
Swimmer – childhood friend, Cherokee Indian   Balis – hospital   Blind man   Solomon Veasy – preacher Laura Foster   Three men outside store, attached Inman outside of town   Girl in canoe on Cape Fear River   Gypsies   Big Tildy – whore   Odell – peddler   Junior, Chastity, Lila, 2 sisters, 2 boys – Inman helped remove bull blocking stream, turned Inman in to Home Guard for $5   Yellow slave – drew map   Goatwoman – kindness, medicine   Potts – Red String Band, sympathized with Federals   Sara, baby – husband John killed in war   Men from north - looting	Monroe – father, preacher Claire Dechutes – mother, deceased   Esco and Sally Swanger – neighbors   Ruby   Stobrod – Ruby’s father   Reid – initially with Teague, stayed behind and never left, married Ruby Three sons   Ada’s daughter with Inman – 9 years old at end of novel
Teague and the Guard- Bounty hunters
Prisoner telling story from jail cell – captured outlier, was a volunteer, so he “just unvolunteered”   Caught Stobrod and Prangle – shot both, Stobrod survived   Caught Inman and Stobrod – Inman helped Stobrod escape, shot Teague and then was shot himself

 

 

For Discussion:

NOTE: Page numbers are from the 1997 hardback edition.

1.       Monroe and Ada were ridiculed for not adapting to the area where he decided to build his church.  They “stayed too long green in the country they had taken up, and they soon became a source of great comedy to many households” (page 59).  How could/should they have better adapted to their surroundings?  Was it wise or fair for Monroe to take his daughter out of the surroundings where she had been raised?

2.       After she was left alone, Ada “wondered how a human being could be raised more impractically for the demands of an exposed life” (page 22).  Would Ada have been able to survive without Ruby?  What did you like best about Ruby’s rules when she moved in?

3.       Mrs.  McKennet, one of Ada’s neighbors, “found the fighting glorious and tragic and heroic.  Noble beyond her powers of expression” (page 140).   Would anyone else in the novel agree with her?  Do you think this view was typical of people in the south who had not experienced the war?

4.       When he was still in the hospital, Inman met a blind man who asked him “cite me one instance where you wished you were blind” (page 6).  This question led Inman to reflect on the battle at Fredericksburg.   Did his following description give you any new insights?

5.       The blind man also told Inman that he had been born blind and that he was glad he had never had vision because, “It might have been worse had I ever been given a glimpse of the world and then lost it” (page 5).  Did you understand his reasoning?

6.       When Inman was crossing the Cape Fear River, he reflected, “he would like to love the world as it was, and he felt a great deal of accomplishment for the occasions when he did, since the other was so easy.  Hate took no effort other than to look about” (page 69).  How did this help explain the Civil War?

7.       Discuss Stobrod and his music.  Ada reflected on him, “it seemed akin to miracle that Stobrod, of all people, should offer himself up as proof positive that no matter what a waste one has made of one’s life, it is ever possible to find some path to redemption, however partial” (page 234).

8.       What did all of the individual stories add to the main story of Ada and Inman?  How did they further your understanding of the Civil War?

9.       What did the character of Teague and the Home Guard add to the story?  Were they important?

10.   What did you think of the ending?

11.   The novel has been compared to classics of the Civil War, such as The Killer Angels.  Do you think it deserves that distinction?