Angels in the Outfield: The Abcarian Story of Wing

In class of Friday, we had an intellectually stimulating discussion regarding the brilliant symbols that Sherwood Anderson uses throughout the novel Winesburg, Ohio. Although the stories seem unrelated, the appearance of similar messages and pictures throughout every short story dispel the thought. Among the symbols discussed were rain, passion, windows, artistry, restlessness, and the presence of darkness and shadows. Also in class, a researcher who had done extensive studies on the writings of Anderson was discussed. This literary researcher was called Richard Abcarian. In his studies, Abcarian found a pattern in most of Anderson's stories in Winesburg, Ohio once again showing that the stories are interconnected in portraying some meaning. The four part of this pattern were 1)The central character in the story is already grotesque in his present state, 2) In the story, there will be a flashback to a time when the character was not grotesque to show how the character gained his grotesqueness, 3) The betrayals that cause the grotesqueness occur the moment the character is filled with youthful hope for the future as well as purity, love, and dignity for the self, and 4) The character in his present state has an afterglow or some residue of this previous self before grotesqueness struck. Although not all of the stories have all of the elements listed in the pattern, I found it quite interesting that the pattern did apply to many stories, especially the story called "Hands."
"Hands" is a story about an old man named Wing Biddlebaum who has large, uncontrollable hands. He very rarely talks, but opens up greatly to one man, a man named George Willard who appears throughout the novel. Wing is characterized by his hands, hence the name of the chapter being "Hands", and when he talks or gets excited, his hands take on a life of their own and sometimes he is forced to punch a wall in order to stop them from doing things he doesn't want them to do. Here, as Abcarian indicates, Anderson establishes the character as being grotesque. Next, the flashback occurs, as Wing thinks back to the days he was called Adolph Meyer and was a school teacher in Pennsylvania. He exuded a natural calming presence for children and seemed to be a natural teacher. Even then, he gestured greatly with his hands and even placed his hands on the shoulders of children in order to help them feel comfort. Then disaster struck at the moment Adolph was feeling at home and at peace with himself as a teacher of children as he was filled with hope for the future. One of the children in the school, who like Meyer, told his dad about how Meyer touched him and eventually word spread like wildfire and he was kicked out of Pennsylvania after being accused of being a pedophile. After being kicked out of the town at a point when he was filled with a youthful hope for the future, as Abcarian states, Wing eventually settled in Winesburg, Ohio. At the time of the narration of the story, Wing has told the story to George Willard and his telling of the story indicates that Wing still has an afterglow of he days he called himself Adolph Meyer, the final step in the pattern Abcarian states is present in Anderson's novels.