PEACE: Smart's relatives

Adam Stephanides · 20 Oct 2002, 13:48 · from urth-v0210.mbox · original

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From: Adam Stephanides <adamsteph at earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: (urth) PEACE: Smart's relatives
Date: Sun, 20 Oct 2002 08:48:40 -0500
Message-ID: <urth-v0210-1884 at digest.urth.net>
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on 10/19/02 2:17 AM, Roy C. Lackey at rclackey at stic.net wrote:

> To me that's a red flag; too many people died too conveniently
> to Smart's advantage--his parents, Tilly, Olivia, and possibly Peacock.

For his parents, see below.  As for Tilly, Smart couldn't have known that
Tilly's relatives would keep him on at the store; he'd have had greater
reason to think Tilly's death would leave him jobless again.

> Smart grew
> up in the area. We know this because he said he didn't want to buy Tilly's
> drugstore because he "wanted to get back closer to the farm" (148).

"Get back closer to the farm" is an ambiguous phrase; it could simply mean
that he wanted to live in a more rural area.  If he were specifically
talking about his parents' farm, he'd be more likely to say something like
"wanted to go home," imo.

> Assuming
> Smart had no siblings, his parent's death left him owning a chunk of real
> estate that was worth a tidy sum of money to him in the go-go 1920s.

Even if Smart's parents did own a farm, there's no reason to think Smart
would have gotten rich by inheriting it; the 1920s were not "go-go" years
for agriculture.

> So those relatives were not "distant", geographically.

Even if his parents did live in the area, his surviving relatives at the
time of his death need not have.

A couple of minor points in response to mantis:

> Ah, but he must have had siblings, no?  He mentions "in-laws," after all,
> among those relatives trying to help him get started.

Or could that refer to his parents' brothers- and sisters-in-law?

> Because Tilly's death is the circumstance that brings Smart, out of a job,
> all the way from Florida to Ohio.  Smart has just arrived in town; he is

Um, no; as mentioned above, Smart took over the pharmacy after Tilly died;
and has seemingly been doing so for some time (158-9, Harper & Row hc).

--Adam

--=20

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