In the words of Richard Feynman, “you can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird,” and that the only way to change this is to “look at the bird and see what it’s doing — that’s what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.” Feynman’s description of knowledge is shared with that represented in Charles Frazier’s novel Cold Mountain. Throughout the course of this book, Frazier reveals the dichotomy of two worlds which exists within the concept of human knowledge. One type of knowledge is that which humans create for themselves; the other is one that humans can gain from the outside in, from the earth, which each individual can learn on their own.
The first type of knowledge is an inter-human knowledge that comes from within the human species, and is meant to stay there and be used for their own enrichment. This is the knowledge that must be passed down from generation to generation of Homo sapiens in order to be preserved and prevent from being extinguished.
The second form of human knowledge is a natural form, which is gained through life experiences. This is the kind of knowledge that a person can learn even when living in a rural area without formal schooling or books. It is a knowledge about the Earth, and all of the living and nonliving things that are on it. It includes detailed knowledge about one’s surrounding environment, and the ability to survive in it.
This first type of knowledge is the kind of knowledge possessed and held dear by Ada in ColdMountain. Ada is a very intelligent young lady who has gained a very rare amount of education for a woman, and has relied on her only parent, her father Monroe. Yet, a woman who is so enlightened with expertise in many fields is left utterly helpless and unable to care for herself when her father dies and is left alone on her father’s farm. “She had discovered herself to be frighteningly ill-prepared in the craft of subsistence,” (Frazier 23). The only thing separating her from starvation or a forced return to her native Charleston is a lone stranger named Ruby who comes to help Ada reestablish her farmstead.
Ruby is a stark contrast to Ada. She has red hair, plain clothes, and has had no formal education as a child. Ruby, like Ada, was raised by a single father, yet Ruby’s father was almost never around, and took little time to care for her. Ruby grew up in a small house, and largely had to take care of herself from almost the age she could walk. Ruby’s most important contrast from Ada, however, was her reliance on the second form of “natural” human knowledge. Ruby is the one who has to educate Ada about the way of the world, and how to create a successful farm for the future in exchange for equality, or in her words, “everybody empties their own night jar,” (52). Throughout the entirety of the book, Ruby teaches Ada the many miniscule aspects of running a farm that must be done in order to ensure productivity. During this time Ruby also teaches Ada all the things to make them eventually self sufficient, and to barter what few expendable items they did have in order to further that goal.
Over the course of the book, Ada gradually embraces Ruby’s type of knowledge in order to further her goals, (and lengthen her life). This is seen when Ruby forces Ada to choose between her precious piano and one of her father’s possessions, the cabriolet, in order to trade for a neighbor’s farm animals. Ada makes the painful, yet right decision to trade away her piano, and the reader begins to see that Ruby’s lessons are influencing her, as Frazier describes that afterward “there was not a lot of regret in Ada’s mood,” (75). This is when Ada begins to show a genuine understanding for the value of the other type of knowledge which Ruby possesses, and gives up a symbol of her former world and realm of mind when she trades it away in order to allow Ruby’s future plans to flourish into fruition.
Likewise, Ada shares with Ruby a few things from her world of knowledge. Every night after Ada and Ruby finish their daily chores in order to create a better farm according to Ruby’s recommendations, Ada spends the rest of the daylight reading to Ruby from various books which she holds dear. These books stand as symbols of the world of which Ada was born and raised, and she tries to extend them to Ruby in an effort to allow her to feel their potential value as well. Although Ruby admittedly does not understand many of the traditional concepts and themes which Ada knows well, she tries her best to try to bridge the gulf that exists between them. When Ruby listens to these books she brings to them her own point of view, and comes out of the stories with an other worldly perspective that can only be given by someone who is on the outside looking in, and is obviously not of the environment in which these novels were created. This is seen in the book when after listening to The Odyssey, by Homer, Ruby compares Odysseus to her father, Stobrod, and assesses that “not much had altered in the way of things despite the passage of a great volume of time,” (108). Ada does her best to try to explain her (and society’s) views on the books, and after some frustration, learns to analyze these novels in a whole new way.
The concept of this knowledge from within is further shown in the book by the character of the Goat Lady. The Goat Lady is a woman who lives alone, and has intentionally isolated herself from society for a very large portion of her life. Yet this woman, who is obviously not privy to many of the modern facts and secrets of the urban, civilized society, is able to create an amazingly stable life for herself. She holds within her various secrets of the plants and animals around her, and their potential value to humans. All of this knowledge, part of which she bestows on Inman during his travels, comes from her own discovery, and is done by personal interaction with nature, as opposed to pages. As she says, “there’s a world of food growing volunteer if you know where to look,” (215). The secrets of potions and healing medicines, which she gives to help heal Inman’s wounds, prove just how much a person can learn within a lifetime if they take the time to work closely with nature. Much of this knowledge could not be gained from books, as Inman admittedly points out when he reflects on the fact that one of the healing solutions that he had received looked like “black axle grease but smelled of bitter herbs and roots” (219). Surely such a miracle medicine would be of wide renowned if it were to have been discovered by scientists or others within society. This reveals a true triumph which the Goat Lady achieves, a victory of the knowledge within over the collective conventional knowledge of man.
Clearly, over the course of the novel, Frazier shows that the two realms of human knowledge are separate, yet can coexist. Ada and Ruby both learn not only the value of their respective forms of knowledge, but also discover a brand new type, which allows them to view the world in a whole new way. Ada learns that all the important things in the world cannot just be learned from books or in a big hub of civilization such as Charleston. Ada finds that there truly is a difference between merely knowing the name of something and actually knowing something, which is a lesson that Ruby teaches her. Similarly, Ruby learns of a whole new world of knowledge that she never before had the opportunity to experience, and that although she did not get an education as a child, she still can benefit from its existence.
Frazier shows that conventional human knowledge does have its limits. By normal account, such a well read woman like Ada who knows so much about language and history and books should be one of the wisest people in the world. Yet, as is stated by the boy that Inman meets after the battle of Fredericksburg, “we can never know God’s name for things,” and that “it’s a lesson that sometimes we’re meant to settle for ignorance,” (117). This truly wise statement reveals that in fact, while humans have indeed amassed an impressive amount of history and inventive advances, there are certain things that humans can never know, and are secrets of nature. People like Ada, who adhere to the first mode of human knowledge are prone to believing that humans are capable of knowing everything, and in fact can, after much labor know the inner workings of all aspects of nature. Yet, it is shown in the novel that the truly wise person, such as Ruby, who believes in the second type of human knowledge, accepts the fact that there are certain things that humans cannot know, and merely search to find the things that are necessary, and actually applicable and have a practical purpose for survival. Ruby values not only knowing the name of something, but why certain things in nature behave the way they do, such as when she describes to Ada why dogwood and sumac trees turn red so early in the year. She explains that it is in order to “say eat to hungry stranger birds” (Frazier 107) which fly overhead during this time. Ruby understands that nature is more interconnected than one might think. That each species is not exclusionary of others, such as man, but that other species do not only work with each other, but with entirely different organisms in order to get what they want, such as the dogwood and sumac working with the passing birds. The birds get sustenance, and the trees get to ensure that their seeds will be transported to a new location where they can grow. In conclusion, Ruby realizes that nature does not delineate between these two forms of knowledge, but realizes that knowledge is useless without purpose.
This, perhaps, is Frazier’s true message in his novel ColdMountain. Frazier is trying to reveal to his readers that the human assumptions that conventional knowledge is better than or exclusionary of natural knowledge are wrong. That mankind must understand that this is an arbitrary distinction which is yet another man-made construction that is not only unnatural but truly uneducated. And finally, that no matter how much a person might know, it will all be for naught if it is without purpose. A man can spend his entire life accumulating all the knowledge in the world, but if he does nothing with it, then it is all a waste. So, Frazier shows that in this case of human knowledge, it is not a case of “When Two Worlds Collide,” but that instead these worlds are not mutually exclusive and that a truly knowledgeable person knows about, and can utilize both.
Works Cited
Frazier, Charles. ColdMountain. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1997.
“The Quotations Page: Thomas Feynman.” www.quotationspage.com. 1 January 2005. 13 January 2005. < http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/26933.html>.
