The White Oxen

This novella, published in 1924, tells the story of Matthew Carr, an adolescent orphan in the care of an uncle and aunt. Matthew has little experience of meaningful relationships of any kind. The first profound interaction for him is with a herd of white oxen that he decides to feed with grass through a fence. The author describes subsequent friends in Matthew’s life as the equivalents of these white oxen: a connection of strangers which will never be close but which will have value. One case is described in terms of the loyalty of a pet:
“The fact was that Gabriel had begun to be irritated by Matthew. He sensed the dog-like fidelity behind his friend and it irritated him.”
When in his mid twenties, Matthew is said to have no meaningful social connections:
“People had no more meaning to him than the pavements he walked on.”

The author, Kenneth Burke (born 5 May 1897), was a student at Columbia University from 1916 to January 1918. He withdrew from his degree course in January 1918 as he was fearful that his studies were stifling his intellectual growth. Unlike his schoolmate and literary friend, Malcolm Cowley, who served with the American Field Service on the Western Front, Burke had no involvement in the war (his draft registration was done in June 1918).

Burke tells of a series of bereavements that shape the life of Matthew Carr:
his mother “getting up from her Grieg one evening, turning a white, frightened face towards her dozing husband and sinking dead to the floor”;
his father “slipping from a rock and breaking his neck, probably the only vigorous action of his career”;
his sister dying within two years of her father’s death.
There were undoubtedly many Americans who experienced the loss of all members of their family during this period and this novella imagines the social impact that this forced detachment of emotional ties could have on an individual life.