While reading
Song of Solomon, many weird thoughts kept coming back to me, which is appropriate; it's a weird book. One thing that stood out was a connection between the film
Citizen Kane and the book, with Macon Dead II as the Kane-esque figure to the novel. I will begin by saying that this is a massive
SPOILER ALERT for those who haven't seen Citizen Kane. It's worth it to see the movie, and if you plan on watching it, you shouldn't read this entry. Anyway. We begin the book seeing Macon Dead II as a slumlord. We see only this side to him, at the start—an unsympathetic, cruel man, who is abusive to his wife, and cold to his whole family. In
Citizen Kane, we begin the movie seeing the extraordinarily wealthy newspaper publisher, Charles Foster Kane, die, uttering one word: "Rosebud." No one is too upset at his death. Like Macon Dead II, he was a wealthy man who was feared, and had some power, but wasn't loved. A reporter sets out to discover what "Rosebud" meant, as the death of such a prominent figure is big news, and from there we meet people who were associated with him, and hear stories of his life this way.
Another key similarity between Macon Dead in Song of Solomon and Citizen Kane is that, though they are cruel now, we see they weren't always this way. We see Kane when he's younger, impoverished, but innocent and more or less happy. One day, the world's third largest gold mine is discovered on his parents' property, and they sell it for a huge sum of money. Kane is sent off to school, and we see him take control of his share of the money as an idealist young man. However, from this point on, he slowly becomes more and more power hungry, and less happy and idealist. Similarly, we see Macon Dead in the novel, described as taking care of Pilate when he was young. And while he didn't have entirely romantic intentions marrying Ruth, he certainly seemed more optimistic about their future together. Macon is confident that his property is the reason for his success when asking Doctor Foster for Ruth's hand in marriage. He, too, feels some sort of need (not a want so much as a necessity) to have power and money, and begins a similar spiral into becoming exactly the person he feared. In both cases, we see a similar implied motive for their remarkably similar actions: they both were raised in poverty, and their property—their home—was taken from them in childhood.
Before going further, I want to point out a sort of stylistic parallel to the two stories. Both Song of Solomon and Citizen Kane feature a similar plot device. We hear part of the story, and keep uncovering more and more of the story bit-by-bit as hints are dropped here and there, but it's not ever until later on that we know the whole story. In Citizen Kane we hear stories from one person close to Kane's perspective (or as close as anyone could, or wanted to get to him), but we never know the entirety of what happens until the end. A similar thing goes on in Song of Solomon—we are teased with sentences like the one in Chapter 4, which describes Hagar searching for Milkman Dead, but it's just a teaser, a one-off reference to a story we'll see unfold later. The same is going on with the conflict between Pilate and Macon: we know they were close, and aren't now, but we don't know how they got there.
Another sad but important theme in both stories is the alienation of spouses in a once-sort-of-happy marriage. We all know about Macon falling out of love with Ruth, and the bitterness, lovelessness, and verbal and physical abuse that their marriage, though not perfect, once lacked. Kane has a first marriage, which seems happy, but falls apart as he continues to gain power. He ends up having an affair, which breaks up his first marriage. This second marriage too seems almost happy, but after his talentless wife's failed career as an opera star encouraged by Kane, he becomes complacent, and used to her. He just begins buying her whatever she wants (he can afford it), but not doing anything with her, and she becomes bored, and leaves him.
At this point, both Macon and Kane have amassed lots of beautiful things that just sit there. Macon has his "hearse," a beautiful Packard that he drives, but doesn't enjoy driving, and never has fun with. Kane has Xanadu, his massive mansion with priceless art and other possessions that just collect dust, since he never enjoys the wealth. I think of Ferris Bueller's Day Off (sneak peak to my next blog post), in which Ferris describes Cameron's house as being "like a museum. It's very beautiful and very cold, and you're not allowed to touch anything." Also, Cameron says about his dad, who owns a Ferrari: "he never drives it! He just rubs it with a diaper!" While funny, these quotes do seem appropriate descriptions of both Macon Dead's and Charles Foster Kane's view of their possessions.
I guess for any of you who ignored my spoiler warning up above, I still won't ruin the very end of the movie. It is fitting though, with the overlapping themes in the book and movie. I'm not sure if seeing Macon Dead II in a similar light to Charles Foster Kane makes him more sympathetic, but it does make him more complicated, and it shows he's not necessarily evil for evil's sake.
P.S. I just wanted to point out the connection between Charles Foster Kane and Doctor Foster, who is Ruth's mother and Macon's father in law, making Ruth "Ruth Foster Dead." Judging by all the similarities between the two stories, and the fact that Citizen Kane came out ~50 years prior and was recognized as a classic before the release of Song of Solomon, I wonder if this is a sort of wink and a nod to Citizen Kane, especially in a novel with such unique, significant, and descriptive names.
