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“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” (1890)

“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” (1890). Ambrose Bierce . Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914). Journalist, essayist, fiction writer known for his biting wit and mysterious death Born in Ohio, 10 th of 13 children, all with names beginning with “A”; raised on farm in Indiana

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“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” (1890)

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  1. “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” (1890) Ambrose Bierce

  2. Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) • Journalist, essayist, fiction writer known for his biting wit and mysterious death • Born in Ohio, 10th of 13 children, all with names beginning with “A”; raised on farm in Indiana • Worked as printer’s apprentice on anti-slavery newspaper • Union soldier in Civil War, rose to rank of lieutenant; at Kenesaw Mountain, bullet in skull behind ear

  3. Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) • 1870s-80s: journalist and writer in San Francisco (later with Hearst publications) • 1872-75: magazine writer in London • Wrote stories about the War and about California: unsentimental & disillusioned; he read Stoic philosophy • Married wealthy miner’s daughter in 1871; divorced in 1905 • The Devil’s Dictionary (1911) is his often-quoted book of cynical definitions: Happiness: “an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another.”

  4. Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) • 1900-1913: mainly in Washington as political lobbyist for Hearst and journalist • Sept. 10, 1913, age 71: "I am going away to South America, and have not the faintest notion when I shall return.” • He posted a letter from Mexico, then vanished; possibly killed in Mexican Civil War

  5. “Occurrence” setting: northern Alabama

  6. Civil War (1861-65): Union (North) vs. Confederacy (South)

  7. Film Version • French, directed by Robert Enrico, 1962, 28 min. Starring Roger Jacquet • Best short subject at Academy Awards, 1963 • Broadcast as an episode of the TV series The Twilight Zone, in 1964 • Images from the film are featured in this presentation

  8. Vision vs. Reality • “Occurrence” plays games with vision and reality, on two levels • The apparent Confederate soldier is in fact a “Federal [Union] scout” • Farquhar’s apparent escape is only imaginary • The confusion is not only Farquhar’s but the reader’s as well • Ultimately vision & reality are clearly defined; no supernatural dimension as in “Rip Van Winkle”

  9. Structure • Section I: Present; Realism: Military Ritual of Hanging; hint of subjectivity/fantasy • Section II: Flashback; Realism/Satire: Framing of Peyton Farquhar by Union spy • Section III: PresentFuture; Fantasy; ends realistically in present

  10. Realism: Military Ritual • Section 1; ¶1-2: Bierce establishes texture of reality through close description of execution scene: bodily positions, military rank, physical equipment, etc. • ¶2, end: the formality of the scene associated with Death • ¶3: description of protagonist appeals to historical reality and reader’s sympathy: “kindly expression”

  11. Realism/Satire: Framing of Peyton Farquhar • Section II; ¶8-17: Southern gentry portrayed through Bierce’s Northern satiric perspective: • “Being a slave owner and like other slave owners a politician, he was naturally an original secessionist and ardently devoted to the Southern cause” (¶8) • “the frankly villainous dictum that all is fair in love and war” (¶8) • “Mrs. Farquhar was only too happy to serve him with her own white hands” (¶9) • Ultimate irony: Soldier was a Union spy

  12. Subjectivity/Fantasy (1) • Section 1; ¶4, end: subjectivity enters narrative: • Narrator’s detached intellect: • “simple and effective” • “‘unsteadfast footing’”: quote from Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part I • Time appears to slow down: • “stream racing madly” “sluggish stream” • Slowing of his watch, increase in volume

  13. Subjectivity/Fantasy (2) • Section I; ¶6: “Flash” of thought expressed as words: “If I could free my hands. . . .” • Section III; ¶18: loss of consciousness; reawakening “ages later, it seemed”; pain of hanging, “unaccompanied by thought” • Thought restored: impression that rope has broken and he is in stream • ¶19: Detached from himself: “watched” his hands free themselves and remove noose; he surfaces

  14. Subjectivity/Fantasy (3) • ¶20: Senses “preternaturally keen and alert”; observes natural world • Ripples of stream • Leaves of trees, insects • Dewdrops on blades of grass • Gnats, dragon flies, water spiders, fish

  15. Subjectivity/Fantasy (4) • ¶21: Sees his executioners: “their forms gigantic” • ¶22: One of sentinels fires rifle; Farquhar sees his “gray eye” looking into the rifle sights: an impossible perception • Note: Farquhar’s own eye is gray (¶3) • ¶25: Bullets fired; one lodges in his neck and “he snatched it out” (unrealistic detail) • ¶30: cannon fired

  16. Subjectivity/Fantasy (5) • ¶31: whirling: “Objects were represented by their colors only; circular horizontal streaks of color”; similar to painterly expressionism, e.g., The Scream (1893; same decade as Bierce’s story) by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch (1863-1944); see next slide

  17. Subjectivity/Fantasy (6) • Details suggest artificial, dreamlike setting: • ¶31: Sand like “diamonds, rubies, emeralds; trees “giant garden plants; he noted a definite order to their arrangement” • ¶33: “forest seemed interminable”; “He had not known that he lived in so wild a region”: uncanny • ¶34: Nightfall: road “wide and straight as a city street, yet it seemed untraveled. No fields bordered it, no dwellings anywhere.”

  18. Subjectivity/Fantasy (7) • Some details hint at menace, threat: • ¶34: “black bodies of trees formed a straight wall on both sides” • “strange constellations”: “secret and malign significance” • “whispers in an unknown tongue”

  19. Re-emergence of Reality • ¶35: Hints that Farquhar is still in the noose: • Neck pain • Eyes congested, unable to close • Tongue swollen, thrust out • Feet suspended above ground

  20. Final Fantasy, Then Reality • ¶36: Morning: approaches home • Wife standing to meet him: “fresh and cool and sweet,” “smile of ineffable joy” • Farquhar “springs forwards with extended arms”; “stunning blow to back of neck”; “blinding white light”; “darkness and silence” • ¶37: “Peyton Farquhar was dead; his body, with a broken neck, swung gently from side to side beneath the timbers of the Owl Creek bridge.”

  21. Conclusion • “Occurrence” is a psychological study of consciousness and its struggle against death • Like the other stories in this section, it portrays a man lost in a journey beyond the home, trying to regain his place • Like “Rip Van Winkle,” there is a political dimension: here the Civil War • Southern Plantation life portrayed as fantasy

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