Louise Erdrich's The Red Convertible

Life holds challenges for everyone. While some of life's greatest difficulties are universal, it is important to note that specific trials may be more likely to occur in certain communities. Louise Erdrich's "The Red Convertible" gives an example of life's most difficult challenge: Lyman must accept that his brother, Henry, has lost the will to live.

Erdrich begins the story with a red convertible that the brothers shared until Henry's "boots filled with water . . . and he bought out" Lyman's part of the car (Erdrich 382). The car represents youth, freedom and opportunity. Lyman insists the car is not just parked, but it sits "reposed, calm and gleaming" as the brothers decided to buy it (383). With the purchase, the boys found a summer of freedom.

Traveling across the northern United States, they drive without worrying about the details, and chose to live "everyday lives here to there" (383). The happy-go-lucky travels illustrate their carefree days of young adulthood. Henry and Lyman are old enough to enjoy life, yet young enough to be free from an adult's burdens. It is the perfect time for them to live in the moment and explore the open road.

As they return home from their journey, Henry is sent to Vietnam. He eventually returns home a "different" man (385). Lyman understands that his brother has been to war, and "you could hardly expect him to change for the better" (385). Lyman is concerned as he remembers the "times we'd sat still for the whole afternoon . . . [Henry] always had a joke, then, too, and now you couldn't get him to laugh" (385). In pain, Lyman watches his brother remain disassociated with his former self.

Watching a loved one suffer is heart wrenching, especially when nothing can be done to help the situation. Creating a very realistic situation, Erdrich's characters suffer much like the youth who live on Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. "Plains reservations are among the poorest places in the country, with all of poverty's consequences," but this does not explain the reasons for the rapidly rising suicide rate of "more than three times the national average for their age group