The short literary fiction Hunter’s in the Snow, written by Tobias Wolff, is an interesting story depicting the life of three men who embark on a hunting journey that none shall forget. The story brings to mind a time not to long ago that seems simpler yet more complex then our urbanized state of living. Hunter’s in the Snow is not simply a story written for the pure sake of entertainment purposes, but instead it is a literary form of fiction. It’s written to show the reader something new and to teach us through fictional characters and scenes about the intricacies of life. More then that, the story delves into issues of morals and ethics, rights and wrongs- issues that are very real to us and provide dilemmas for the characters in the story. Hunter’s in the Snow is not only a fictional slice of life, but it is also a story written from and about the life of its author Tobias Wolff- including details from his past for us to examine.
The overall structure and plot of the story plays a part in how Wolff viewed his own life within the characters. It opens with a simple yet intriguing statement: “Tub had been waiting for an hour in the falling snow” (Wolff 1). Immediately, this hook does its job drawing the reader into the story and making him wonder what is going on. In the same paragraph we find that Tub is walking down the street, carrying a rifle and seemingly, shooting the breeze. But then a car comes from nowhere, nearly killing Tub and forcing him to leap off the roadside. Inside the truck, Tub’s friends, Kenny and Frank, wait laughing at the apparent “joke” that they had just played. Tub doesn’t seem quite as amused, stating, “You could’ve killed me!” (Wolff 5). Then, the three friends begin to make their way towards the woods to go hunting for deer, which seems to be a normal habit for these three men (Bernardo 1). On the trip into the woods and while they are walking around searching for tracks, Kenny and Frank don’t seem to like Tub very much. Not only that, they seems to exclude him from walking with them in the forest. They make fun of him about his eating habits and even try driving off without him: “When Tub crossed the last fence into the toad the truck started moving. Tub had to run for it and just managed to grab hold of the tailgate and hoist himself into the bed. He lay there, panting. Kenny looked out the rear window and grinned” (Wolff 47). The qualities that these characters possess and their specific attitudes make you think that’s there’s an even deeper level to the writing- possibly stemming from Wolff’s personal experiences.
The story continues with the plot moving forward rather quickly and more evidence is found that may tie into Wolff’s preferences for how the story should be written. The friends make their way to a farmhouse to ask the property owner if they could hunt for a deer on his land because they had seen tracks leading up to his property. The farmer agrees but tells them they probably won’t find anything. But the three men head back out anyways. Hunting is an activity which Wolff’s father used to take him and his brothers out to do (Biography 2). It’s interesting to see how Wolff uses hunting as the basis for the story. Not long later Kenny appears to start going crazy. He states that he hates certain objects- then he shoots them “dead.” He shoots a tree. He shoots a dog. Then he says to Tub: “I hate you” (Wolff 78). But before Kenny could pull the trigger, Tub shoots off his rifle, hitting Kenny right in the stomach, knocking him over backwards. Frank just stood there stunned while Kenny started apologizing immediately, saying he was never going to shoot Tub. Meanwhile, Tub just keeps saying he shot him out of defense. That it wasn’t his fault. Which could be a lie, but it isn’t said in the story. Wolff is known for his lies and he even states that saying: “I was a liar when I was a kid. I still am a liar” (Biographical Essay 1). So Frank and Tub drag Kenny to the truck and put him in the bed of the truck in the cold. They say that their going to take him to a hospital and fast. They ask the farmer for directions to the nearest hospital which is around 45 minutes away. They pile into the truck and take off. The characters seem to weave an incredulous similarity to Wolff’s own behaviors in an almost eerie kind of way. They lie, just as Wolff would have in the same situation and they are involved in the exact sport of hunting which Wolff used to do as a child.
Near the end of the story some crazy things start happening that relate to Wolff’s ability as a storyteller. The three men are headed off to the hospital with Frank and Tub riding up front and the injured Kenny lay out in the truck’s bed. Tub and Frank begin to talk, which may not seem so odd at first but its personal talk about families and personal happenings which seem a little out of place for two people that seem so different. Wolff is using an interesting tactic, not necessarily tied to his personal life, but tied to his history as a storyteller instead. He’s using the abilities he’s picked up from living with a family of storytellers to interlace some unusual happenings within the story. Kenny is still laid out in the back of the truck while Tub and Frank pull off to the side of the road three separate times, once for coffee, once to warm their hands from the frigid cold and a third time so Tub could hoard some pancakes because Frank felt pity for his seemingly unchangeable diet. These stops are increasingly random and seem completely inappropriate seeing that there is a man possibly dying in the back of the truck (Bernardo 3). But the story ends in a highly dramatic way with Tub and Frank changing paths away from the hospital and Kenny freezing in the truck bed thinking he’s on his way to safety. It’s an odd end to a story but with Wolff’s background as a great storyteller it makes complete sense. Wolff is not notably known for his writing as much as he is for his storytelling. So an ending as dramatic as this one is not only expected but consistent with whom Wolff is.
The characters are unique individuals and have quite different outlooks on life but at the same time enjoy similar pursuits and are strangely alike. Tub, who seems to be the central character in the story, is a fat- out of shape man who is very thin-skinned and very emotionally kept. He enjoys hunting, as he was doing on this day and he seems to enjoy the company of his friends although they don’t seem to enjoy him, at least at the beginning. He is “self conscious about his weight and in denial about his gluttony” (Bernardo 1). It seems as if Wolff is relating more of himself to Tub then any of the other characters. While Wolff never had an eating problem, he did love the game of hunting and he also felt out of place among his older brothers (Frank and Kenny), and was very self- conscious. Frank on the other hand seems much more mature and emotionally stable then Tub, seemingly the parent figure of the group. He “doesn’t care about his wife, and is in denial about his lust” (Bernardo 1). Kenny appears to be the joker of the bunch and is always in a kind of light-hearted mood joking around, even shooting the dog. He “doesn’t care about anyone or anything” (Bernardo 1). When these three characters were put together, and it seems as if they’ve been friends for most of their lives, they form a kind of odd group. At the beginning of the story Frank and Kenny seemed to hang out together and leave Tub behind most of the time laughing and joking about him behind his back as well as to his face. Very similar to how Wolff was treated as a youngster. Constantly getting left behind by his elder brothers, Wolff was the youngest and didn’t appreciate being left behind (Bibliography 1). Tub really didn’t enjoy this either but not once did he ask to go home or to be left alone. It seemed like he just wanted to be involved and to have a friend. But once Kenny is shot everything seems to take a different path. All of a sudden Tub and Frank become almost best buddies, laughing, this time at Kenny (Biographical Essay 2). They confide in each other secrets about their personal lives and enjoy each other’s company immensely. Frank seems to play the part of one of Wolff’s boyhood friend whom he met in his teenage years. Wolff, probably frustrated at being left back by his older brothers, met a friend Jack Burrell and they became best buddies (Bibliography 1). By the end of the story they’re not even taking Kenny to the hospital. It’s as if they’ve forgotten about him and they’ve taken a turn. Literary critic, Karen Bernardo, saw it this way: “The different turn they’ve taken is away from being human beings, and towards being no better then animals” (Bernardo 4).
The author of Hunter’s in the Snow, Tobias Wolff, had an interesting background that made an obvious impact on each of the stories that he wrote in his lifetime. For starters both of his parents, as well as his brothers, were great storytellers. They weaved enough stories and told enough tales to entice the boy to begin his own story telling and eventually help launch his career (Biographical Essay 1). Another impact that influenced his writing was his ability to lie. This may seem irrelevant but when reading Hunter’s in the Snow you are encountered with an endless supply of lies: Frank and Kenny lying about when they were going to pick Tub up at the beginning, Frank deceiving his wife about his lust for the young girl, Tub lying about his supposed gland problem, Tub and Frank lying to Kenny about taking him to the hospital, the farmer lying about turning the porch light on. The lies are laced throughout the story and they all come back to Wolff’s lying nature. Wolff says: “I was a liar when I was a kid. I’m still a liar, really and I don’t mean just in terms of telling stories and being a story writer. I wouldn’t ever want to be held to a literal version of the facts when I tell people a story. I don’t know that I’m really capable of it” (Biographical Essay 1). Wolff did just that during the story because it’s such an unpredictable story and we end the story not really knowing what events are true to life and which are made up in the author’s mind.
Every character that Tobias Wolff creates seems to have a quality, or several that are also main qualities of Wolff himself. The characters in Hunters in the Snow all have pieces of Wolff’s identity of how he saw himself. Wolff stated, “You could say that all my characters are reflections of myself…All of my stories are in one way or another autobiographical” (Biographical Essay 3). It is said that much of Wolff’s work is “embellished or edited versions of his personal history” (Biographical Essay 3). While he never says it Wolff does seem himself in Tub, Frank and Kenny all at the same time. Each character seems to have different qualities that define who they are but a part of them will always be Tobias Wolff.
This short story, Hunter’s in the Snow seems to bring to life several real life happenings and with enough intricacies that make it compatible to the complexities of life. The story line is interesting enough to keep the reader on the edge of his seat. The characters inside provide an insight on the story as well as an insight on author, Tobias Wolff. Hunter’s in the Snow was written in 1982 although it seems much earlier then that because of the simplicity of life and the surrounding nature- as compared to the busy lifestyle that we are accustomed to nowadays. Hunter’s in the Snow is a fictional but life- like scenario written in and of the perspective of Tobias Wolff regarding the plot and structure of his own life.
