Bobbie Ann Mason's Shiloh

In Bobbie Ann Mason's Shiloh, the two main characters are a married couple with silenced troubles. Norma Jean and Leroy Moffitt are perceived as two teenagers discovering themselves and the world for the first time, even though they are both in their mid-thirties. The reason? Norma Jean and Leroy are frozen in time. The couple lost their two-month-old son Randy while watching a drive-in movie sixteen years ago, and the oppressive force of silence both on the incident and on their feelings has accompanied them more than they have accompanied each other. It kept the relationship in a doom for the next sixteen years.

Sometimes while we read we can almost feel like we are reading about a twenty-year-old couple instead of two people that have been married for almost twenty years. Norma Jean and Leroy put their lives on hold after the incident by refusing to talk about it and drifting away from each other. After an accident on the road forces Leroy to stay home, he starts noticing how Norma Jean takes control over her life. His wife “is going to night school. She has graduated from her six-week body-building course and now she is taking an adult-education course in composition at Paducah Community College” (Mason 72). Norma Jean has started to live her life after sixteen years and Leroy is realizing he doesn’t really know her. On the other hand, Leroy notices the changes in his town and develops his own habits, like sewing and crafting. He also has an unrealistic dream of building a log house, which is in reality just a symbol of how insisting he can be on lost causes. As Norma Jean becomes more certain of who she wants to be, Leroy seems more unsure of who he is. He even admits he feels “awkward; like a boy on a date with an older girl” (75). At this point, we can clearly see how the gender roles are reversed for a couple of its time, and this reversion reinforces the confusion for Leroy of who he is as a man and as a husband. It raises questions for him, "Am I still king around here?", "Would you tell me if you were [cheating on me]?" (74). Norma Jean discovering who she is and Leroy feeling more out of place than ever expands the already existing gap between the couple.

The lack of discussion about their son’s passing has made it impossible for Norma Jean and Leroy to properly recover from the tragedy, and consequently, they anchored their lives. Many aspects throughout the story prove that Randy is at the forefront of the character’s minds, yet Leroy states the lack of conversation on the subject: “They never speak about their memories of Randy, which have almost faded” (68). However, Leroy is reminded of his son when interacting with Stevie Hamilton, a teenage boy around the age Randy would be, had he lived. Norma Jean is certain that her mother’s claims that a neglecting mother was to blame on a story about a dog killing a baby and feels guilty herself. Leroy recalls how he told the tragic story to hitchhikers over and over again until it sounded pitiful even to him. For Norma Jean, it is most likely the feeling of guilt that has kept her from discussing what happened, especially because her mother makes her feel like she neglected her child. On Leroy’s side, it is shame that prevails him from speaking. He doesn’t see himself as a paternal figure, and talking about what happened would only put more pressure on him. Leroy did what he thought was right at the moment and married the girl he got pregnant, but when the child died he wasn’t really sure of what the right thing was anymore. After Randy’s death, the wedge that silence drove between them made healing impossible and alongside Leroy’s sixteen years on the road, the interruption on their relationship and their lives was inevitable.

As dividing as the silence on Randy’s death was, there was an overall shortage of communication between our characters that contributed to the unavoidable failure of the relationship. For the most part , Leroy is glad he gets to stay home and be with his wife, but he starts feeling Norma Jean isn’t as happy to have him there. He can corroborate that when she tells him that “In some ways, a woman prefers a man who wanders" (75). As he goes on realizing everything that has changed, he becomes afraid of what his wife has to say. “I have this crazy feeling I missed something." says Norma Jean; to what Leroy responds, "You didn't miss a thing", ending the conversation (69). Norma Jean here opens the door for an honest conversation on what was going on in both character’s lives and Leroy shuts it down because he is scared of where the discussion would take them. All Leroy wants to talk about is the log cabin and going to Shiloh, while Norma Jean insists on discussing him needing a job and how she felt.