Christy

Christy taps into the Christian subgenre of missionary literature, which was experiencing a resurgence at the time of its publication. It depicts a protagonist from a mainstream American background going as a missionary teacher to an isolated location where differing cultural and class dynamics characterize the interactions. Her first interaction with that location makes it sound like she has stepped into another world: “It was as if, in crossing the mountains with Mr. Pentland, I had crossed into another time, another century, back to the days of the American frontier” (51). While the location to which Christy travels is not an international locale but is, in fact, relatively near her own home, it is nonetheless an entrance into a strangely foreign culture. The process of navigating those cultural differences shapes many of her relationships in Cutter Gap. While Christy can effect positive change through her work at the mission, the novel focuses just as much attention (if not more) on the changes in Christy herself, as she comes to understand the local culture on a deeper level and appreciates the differences she could not understand upon entry in Cutter Gap.

Three different models of cross-cultural efforts are portrayed in the secondary characters who also, like Christy, are engaged in charitable work to help the residents of the Cove: Doctor MacNeill, David, and Miss Alice. Each one has a different level of self-identification with the local culture, but all are alike in seeking to better the conditions for those living in Cutter Gap.

Doctor MacNeill is an insider to the culture, having grown up there and with an ancestry that goes back to the roots of the population’s settlement in the area. Understanding the way the culture operates—heavily influenced by poverty and local values—he chooses to do the good he can within the constraints of that culture and is quick to dismiss ideas and methods that he knows won’t work. He is not seeking a transformation of the culture itself, because his understanding of the deeply rooted nature of local values tells him that such transformation would be agonizingly slow, if even possible. Instead, he aims simply to do the good that he can within the constraints of the context.

David is an outsider to the culture, having taken the pastorate at the mission church as an assignment after seminary. Unlike Doctor MacNeill, he does not know the local culture from the inside and is quicker to recognize its flaws than its positive values. He hopes for the transformation of the culture in a way that will ameliorate some of the social problems but struggles to make connections with the locals beyond what their shared love of music will allow. Thus, he preaches to the people and challenges their assumptions about certain aspects of their way of living, like feuding and seeking rest instead of profitable labor: “[Christ] declared unrelenting, unending warfare against the sin and evil in our world. And believe me that includes the evil in Cutter Gap” (265). David tends to view Cutter Gap and its people as a problem to be fixed, though he does not always know the answers to how to fix it.

Miss Alice is both an outsider and an insider to the culture—she comes from the outside and represents a different cultural community (the Quakers), but she is also connected to the locals by marriage, through her daughter’s union with Doctor MacNeill. She has also served for a longer time than David in the area and has a deeper knowledge of the local culture as a result. She holds a mediating position between the two men. Unlike Doctor MacNeill, she does want to help transform the culture, and unlike David, she sees not only the problems but also much of the value of local practices and beliefs. She hopes that she can effect change in the area by loving people and introducing them to God’s love: embracing their culture, extolling its virtues, and allowing the slow, patient work of faith to rework the culture’s problems from the inside out. Throughout the novel, although Christy interacts with both David’s and Doctor MacNeill’s positions on cross-cultural issues, Miss Alice is her mentor in a way that neither of the others are, and it is Miss Alice’s model that most influences Christy’s perspective.

This theme touches both the main characters and the entirety of mountain society in the Cove. It begins with a narrow focus on Christy herself, but it builds throughout the novel as Christy’s awareness grows of the social values around her, eventually coming to define her perception of the whole community of Cutter Gap.

One of the main marks of Christy’s character, especially early in the novel, is to prove herself as being tough and resilient. She has an optimistic, empowered attitude upon setting out on her adventure, but is keenly aware of the fact that some people (like her father) think that it might be beyond the powers of a 19-year-old woman. “I’m not afraid of plain living,” she declares (35). Her insistence on going to work as a volunteer in the backwoods regions of the Smoky Mountains exemplifies her desire to show herself strong, and it pushes her to undertake actions that many of her fellow characters are surprised by, such as hiking the seven miles into Cutter Gap on foot in the middle of a snowstorm.

Many outsiders typically react to the local culture of the Cove by noticing its flaws: the constant feuding between families, the perceived laziness of its men, and its poverty and squalor. Such assessments—which even Christy is tempted to make early in the novel—tend to blind those outsiders to the virtues and values of mountain society such as their characteristic resilience in the face of adversity. As Christy’s understanding of local culture and familiarity with the class position of those in Cutter Gap deepens, the theme of toughness and resilience gradually migrates from her desire to be perceived in a certain way by others to her perception of the others around her. She notices the strength and perseverance that undergirds the mountain people’s way of life, and her respect for them only deepens as she sees more and more of the social and economic challenges they face. Through understanding these material challenges, Christy is ultimately able to empathize with the structural adversities they face.