The quintessential modern man is suddenly mesmerized by history…
“I personally take no pride in the Confederacy. Avoid wars you can’t win, and never raise your flag for an asinine cause like slavery.”
— Francis Underwood
For every Southern boy fourteen years old, not once but whenever he wants it, there is the instant when it’s still not yet two o’clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods and the furled flags are already loosened to break out and Pickett himself with his long oiled ringlets and his hat in one hand probably and his sword in the other looking up the hill waiting for Longstreet to give the word and it’s all in the balance, it hasn’t happened yet, it hasn’t even begun yet, it not only hasn’t begun yet but there is still time for it not to begin against that position and those circumstances…
— William Faulkner
Between the two, Faulkner knew better what he was talking about.
To call slavery merely “asinine” is to fail to give evil its due. It was something far more than “foolish, unintelligent or silly.” It was this country’s original sin, and before the national blood offering that killed hundreds of thousands of our ancestors, it dragged down both white and black.
In his quote, Underwood — protagonist of “House of Cards” — wasn’t teaching a moral; he was showing his contempt first for losers, and secondly for the things that occupy the small minds of ordinary humans. Frank thinks he’s so far above them, above us. In his contempt, he is contemptible. You didn’t have to be an apologist for slavery or march behind a Confederate flag to feel the profound loss when Levon Helm sang “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.” You just had to be human. (You can even be a guy like me who has struggled for years to get that flag off our State House lawn — in fact, I may feel it more intensely for that. The SCV guys don’t understand where I’m coming from. I think I get them, but they don’t get me.)
But by the end of season two, episode five, the regional obsessions of the only defeated part of this country have grabbed Francis — a South Carolinian, remember — by the throat. On the battlefield where his great-great-great grandfather fell and was buried in a common, unmarked grave, Francis has a mystical experience that brings him closer to being Faulkner’s 14-year-old boy.
I’ve been dismissive of this show, and it has many weaknesses. But the moment when Frank was confronted by his “ancestor” was Shakespearean. It was the Southron version of Hamlet being haunted by his father’s ghost.
Only without a hint of the supernatural. The explanation is quite pedestrian. Underwood is touring a Civil War battlefield, asking polite questions but exquisitely bored, when the park ranger springs a surprise on him — the kind of surprise that your average tourist such as you or me would not experience, but something completely within the realm of believability for a vice president: An unassuming, deadpan young man in homespun butternut strides casually but purposefully out of the woods toward the veep. He is introduced as Augustus Elijah Underwood, Frank’s great-great-great grandfather.
Frank, in no mood for hokum, immediately protests that his grandfather had never told him of any Underwood who wore the Confederate uniform. The ranger assures him that the research is sound; this “is” his ancestor. The re-enactor delivers a brief spiel, the ranger cuts him off, and they start away. But history has its hook in Francis now. He turns back, and questions “Augustus” further. The young man obliges, telling in simple, matter-of-fact language about how he died, how it looked, felt and smelled. No hesitation, as real and organic and naturalistic as Stephen Crane. It was more detail than anyone could know, of course, but Francis doesn’t want to break the spell by saying so; he drinks it in, his eyes wide.
The next day, he interrupts a groundbreaking ceremony for a new visitors’ center by having “Augustus” — who never breaks character — turn the first spadeful. Then, while everyone else is distracted, Francis gets down on his knees, takes off his “Sentinel” (Citadel) ring, and buries it in the brown earth.
I don’t know what that gesture meant. Was he embracing his heritage, trying to become one with it, or trying to bury it? In any case, you know now that he doesn’t feel he can just sneer at it with impunity. It’s in him, part of him. (In a measure of how impressed he was, he soon gives up violent video games for building a Civil War battle diorama in his home.)
It was a very impressive set of scenes. And for me, this is an increasingly impressive series.
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You lost me at the battle diorama. I don’t watch the series, but it sounds like Underwood is going full McConnell and falling for the siren of romanticism.
I drove through Petersburg yesterday morning and thought of those defenders existing in the muddy squalor of trench warfare; hungry, tired, sleep deprived and cold. Fighting against the inevitable defeat and dying by mortar blast, sniper, or in the heave of the earth when the Union miners blew the tunnel under the trenches. It’s easier to imbue Gettysburg with Faulkner’s kind of gauzy romanticism. Does anyone really think that in those early days of July 1963 the feelings of the soldiers did not actually hue more to realism? I can’t imagine the troops being other than grimly determined, fearful and fatalistic – after all hundreds of thousands had died and been wounded already in the preceding 2 years.
One can be critical of and a part of something at the same time. There is no diametrical opposition in that. Maybe Underwood has a deeper and richer connection to his place, one that will temper his disdain. That would be for the best. But to give up “violent video games for building a Civil War battle diorama”, that raises a red flag for me.
I’m reminded of an anecdote from (as far as I remember) Shelby Foote: A Confederate soldier during the pre-assault bombardment sees a hare dashing toward better cover. He said, “Run as fast as you can – I’d run too if I didn’t have a reputation to maintain.”
YES! And that’s why soldiers stand and fight — they can’t bear to let their buddies down. That’s what combat is all about.
And God bless and keep Shelby Foote…
“I’ve been dismissive of this show”
I think that’s the best thing you wrote above- and the smartest thing.
Oh, there’s still much I don’t like. The first season revolved around Underwood’s relationship with that silly little girl. The second revolves around his relationship with a billionaire who likes to wield political power. The first was irritating; the second is boring.
My great-great grandfather died at Petersburg. Of disease, not wounds. Nothing romantic about it; it was a horrible place to be.
Nor is there anything romantic about the way Augustus died. His head was bashed in by a rock during a desperate unarmed grappling in the dark.
When you say “romantic,” you raise the wrong objection.
Maybe it was the idea of the “only defeated part of this country”. That is a way of perceiving the world that I do tend to react strongly against. We have all suffered defeats. That’s a part of life. But we go on. We redefine ourselves – as what we become after we move beyond the defeat.
I think I understand what you are saying about the Southern character. Being from the West I guess I relate to another sort of mythical construct – the Pioneer. The West swelled with homesteaders after 1865. We call it seizing opportunity; but is was probably more about how some dealt with the aftermath of a war that destroyed and scarred so much to the East. Some leave, some remain. But no one is ever untouched by events.
Empathy is, I think, the one emotion that requires the experience of life to fully understand and to be able to express. Underwood seems to have gained that appreciation of others’ struggles; or so you seem to imply, Brad. But then I am left with the idea of this transformed, humbled and more aware – and connected – character building a set piece battle diorama (is there anything more romanticizing that men do than build dioramas – or construct “championship” golf courses?); and I am left questioning whether the character really got right with reality or whether he simply flipped from one extreme, condescension, to another, romantization? To have gained a real appreciation of his fellow Southerners would have, to me, had Underwood finding a way to move the past forward, remembered but also freed to grow anew.
Note – he gave up the video games (Call of Duty type) for technology reasons – (spoiler alert) – as the new Vice President, the Secret Service had to eliminate Frank’s network capability that allowed him to play Call of Duty online. The choice to build the diorama was certainly driven by his visit to the battlefield.
I think both symbolize Frank’s love of the battlefield – especially the political one. He loves the strategy and tactics and, more importantly, winning.
The first question South Carolinians secretly ask themselves is whom its voters sent to D.C. that most resembles Francis ‘Frank’ Underwood.
When SALON asked “House of Cards” head writer why Francis Underwood was cast as a Democrat, it received the circuitous, politically correct reply it wanted (Balderdash warning):
“That’s because by casting him as a Democrat, “House of Cards” is avoiding the standard cartoonish portrayal of Washington as a place of Evil-And-Powerful Conservatives and Idealistic-But-Powerless Liberals. Instead, it is more honestly admitting that in many cases, both parties’ leaders are equally vicious, powerful and corrupt.”
The truth (Spoiler Warning): Representative/Sen. Frank Underwood, (D) , of South Carolina graduated from Harvard Law School. Like most of the U.S. Congress’s leadership Frank is an elected lawyer.
The Frank Underwood character is married (open marriage) and his sexual preferences are “all of the above”. Gee, that does not match any U.S. senator from SC. Defamation suit obviously avoided by Netflix, etc.
You are welcomw!
First of all, great post. I’m going to shamelessly link it over in my little corner of the internet.
As an aside, I don’t think I would describe Faulkner’s position on the South as “romantic”. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The romantic point of view is Gone With the Wind, which is the “moonlight and magnolias” version of the South.
Faulkner is inappropriately labeled as a romantic because many of his characters are classic southern romantics. However, the themes of his novels continually show the dark side of the South. For instance, if you take that Faulkner quote above (which I absolutely love) and continue reading, you’ll see that Faulkner isn’t only giving us the romantic side. He goes on to make the point (ever so eloquently) that Pickett’s charge must happen in a desperate and tragic way, as the South has passed the point of turning back. It’s akin to how the end of “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” is both inevitable and tragic. They’re past the point of just walking out with their hands up. They have to run out of that bank guns blazing. There isn’t really any choice at this point.
Heck, Absalom, Absalom! ends with Quentin screaming that he doesn’t hate the South, in opposition to the conclusion of the entire story. At the end we (and Quentin) feel the same “profound sense of loss” that Brad references feeling when he listens to “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”, except Faulkner shows how it’s all a self-inflicted wound that was inevitably mortal.
But I digress…
As for Underwood, I don’t believe that he’s taken in by the South’s romanticism all that much. If there’s one thing that Underwood isn’t, he’s not romantic or sentimental. He’s an utterly calculating, Machiavellian character. I think that Underwood momentarily taken in by his ancestor, but the spell is broken in the morning. In burying the ring, I think Underwood is reaching out to connect with his past, but in a way that allows him to leave a part of himself there. It’s not a constant reaching out. It’s more of a nod to the past which then allows Underwood to move on to his own battles.
Also, remember when Underwood talks about why he does hit little “double tap” of his ring on the desk to conclude conversations? He says, “Something my father taught me. It’s meant to harden your knuckles so you don’t break them if you get into a fight. It also has the added benefit of knocking on wood. My father believed that success is a mixture of preparation and luck. Tapping the table kills both birds with one stone.”
Although he says it’s to harden his knuckles, Underwood has always just been tapping his ring, not actually his knuckles. After he buries the ring, he begins actually is hitting things with his knuckles, so maybe it’s a “the gloves are coming off” moment, as Underwood is beginning to gear up for his battle with Tusk. (Does he say at one point “The gloves are off.”? I think so.) In removing his ring, he’s leaving his bare skin exposed, to harden his knuckles and prepare for what he knows will be a hard fight ahead.
With his ancestor dying in hand-to-hand combat (head smashed with a rock, right?), maybe Underwood’s lesson from the South is to be tougher and more brutal than your opponent. That would make sense in how Underwood would view the South. They’re losers. Not like him — he’s going to be a winner. Burying his ring and hardening his knuckles is perhaps how Underwood chooses to symbolize his hardened resolve to defeat Tusk.
Very interesting interpretation. I had forgotten about the tapping thing.
The diorama might be, for Frank, a way of imposing control over what he encountered at Spottsylvania. He encountered emotions, levels of being, that he was unprepared for there. Now he’s rebuilding the battlefield as a perfectly orderly display, instead of the dark, frightening, smelly melee in which his ancestor died.
Was anyone impressed by the actor who played Augustus? He has just the right spooky expression and manner of speaking that would grab Frank’s attention and get under his skin. It’s matter-of-fact, yet unwordly at the same time. (Look at his eyes in the screengrab I put at the top of this post.)
I like when Frank says to the warden, in an indirect admission of how the young man disturbed him, that “Augustus” seems to take it all rather seriously. The ranger says yes, they tend to do that — meaning, on the surface, re-enactors. But on a deeper level, you could say Augustus and all those who fought alongside him took it all very seriously — and they don’t need or deserve Frank’s contempt.
You can’t take anything more seriously than you do a desperate, unarmed, writhing struggle in the night, when you’re trying to strangle a stranger and he’s bashing your head with a rock. The causes of war don’t mean much at a time like that. Of course, most authorities on combat psychology will tell you that causes — democracy, slavery, the Reich, survival of your country, the girl next door back home — have little to do with motivating soldiers in combat. It’s just them and the guys next to them, and the immediate struggle with the elements, the circumstances, the enemy, and themselves.
Excellent analysis, Bryan…. you need to become an adjunct professor of contemporary cultural analysis somewhere. I’d take your class (hoping for a gentleman’s C).
Interesting discussion and analysis by everyone. However, reading Faulkner and other writers describing the feelings and emotions of young men in the Civil War is one thing but knowing about the actual emotions and reactions of a direct descendent is another and after listening to my grandfather describe his father’s reaction to his participation in the Civil War, reading or watching a fictional account is not my cup of tea.
In the beginning, my great grandfather was simply a Confederate foot soldier in the Civil War and his duty toward the end was to be a sniper at a small, natural spring where Union soldiers passing through were known to use on occasion. One day as he waited in his perch in a tree, a young Union soldier approached the spring with caution and after surveying the situation, decided it was safe to drink from the spring. As he kneeled down to fill his canteen, my great grandfather took aim and in one brief instant, he ended the life of another young American. A young American he did not know or have any clue about who he was, his family, his friends, what he liked to do and all of the other aspects of his life that were suddenly and violently ended with one carefully aimed shot to the head.
As my great grandfather described it to my grandfather and my father during his last year on earth, he expressed his deepest emotions to them and they passed it on to me in a way that had an impact on how I viewed war and the consequences for the individual(s) who must be the instrument(s) to carry out the orders of a higher authority.
My great grandfather sat silent for a long time after firing the shot and as he described his emotions, the reality of his action in that brief instant overwhelmed him and he cried in silence for what he described as an eternity when he imagined what the dead soldier’s life was like before the madness that divided the nation that ended in a war that pitted brother against brother, father against son, family against family, neighbor against neighbor, and friend against friend. A war that was waged between fellow Americans who under different circumstances would have been friends, visiting with their families, spending time hunting and fishing, and other things normal people would do.
My great grandfather climbed down and slowly walked to the dead body and as he described it to my grandfather and father, looked at the face of the enemy and realized that he was looking at his own reflection and under different circumstances, he could be the one lying dead on the ground and all because he was thirsty, wanted a simple drink of water, and was wearing a Confederate army uniform. The young Union soldier died in his own country, not in some foreign land where he was sent to defend America. He died because ignorant politicians and merchants were in a dispute over state’s rights and the issue of slavery. The North had become very wealthy as slave merchants and the Southern plantation owners were prospering because they were able to own humans to do the hard work. My great grandfather realized that he was not a politician, he was not a slave owner, and in the end, all he was, was a simple farmer who answered the call of the Confederacy. He realized he did not understand why it was important for him to kill his fellow Americans and most likely, neither did the Americans who served in the Union army.
As he described action in a battle, fighting along with fellow soldiers, there was no distinguishing the face of the enemy, it was the uniform he was trying to hit, not the individual wearing it. The bodies falling to the ground were faceless and no sense of loss assigned to their death at the time. Walking away from a victory was cause to celebrate but never stopping to talk about the dead except for your own.
Afterwards, my great grandfather went back to headquarters and asked his commanding officer for another assignment. He was fortunate enough that he never had to fire another shot during the war and when it ended, he went home a changed man. Afterward, he was a very peace loving man and spent his remaining years with his family and friends close by. He told my grandfather and father that not one day passed that he did not remember vividly that fateful day and understand how fortunate he was to survive. It was interesting that he never believed the South was defeated because in the end, he believed both sides lost too much to ever claim victory. He believed the scars left would take a long time to heal and as history has proven, he was right. Unfortunately, as he told my grandfather, the ones who start wars are never the ones who must fight the battles and sacrifice their lives.
The story is true and I have relayed it the same way it was told to me by my grandfather and father.
I am proud of my Southern heritage and always will be. There is a charm and quality about certain aspects of Southern life that belies the perception that we are ignorant, backwards, intolerant, and all of the other popular beliefs for those who do not have deep roots here. Yet, I believe the flag should be removed from the grounds in Columbia and placed in a museum where it belongs. At the same time, history should be accurate and reflect the human side of the Civil War from both the South and North. It still amazes and disturbs me the degree of brutality and inhuman treatment demonstrated by both sides during battle and in prison camps during that time. Footnote: one of my distant relatives on my mother’s side died in a Union prison camp under conditions similar to the infamous Andersonville prison camp.
Muy bueno, Bart. I cried. Really — and they weren’t alligator tears. Bonus!?!
If nothing else, Brad has encouraged and educated your writing. He is a great writer. I only hope he can extricate himself from politics ONE FINE DAY.
Thank you for the kind words Mab. Bonus? Absolutely!!
You work in sales, right — not accounting. Lol. Mazel Tov, anyway.
Rather perceptive Mab. I was in sales for a few years, became a regional manager for an international company. Now, I have a small consulting company with a few select clients. Don’t need as much as we once did, empty nest for years now. Just my wife and 4 legged ruler of the roost, JoJo the Chihuahua.
Thanks so much for sharing, Bart.
I probably should share the story of my ancestor who died at Petersburg, but I need to brush up on the particulars.
Here’s what I think I know.
He was a poor man, a farmer from Marion County. When his unit began the march north, he went AWOL. He rejoined his unit without trouble later. Nine months later, my great-grandmother was born. I remember her, slightly. She died when I was four years old. He never saw her.
That’s how close the war is to me.
He buries the ring to bury his past. Spoiler alert: he regrets it soon after and Claire buys him a new one. Symbolism?
Does he show explicit regret for burying it later? I’ve watched to the end of season 2, and I don’t recall that. Maybe I missed it.
That would fit with his character, though. I could see him looking back at a sentimental moment he had with contempt for himself.
He fidgeted with his now bare hand. Claire notices this and buys him a replacement, which he gratefully receives.
But was it a sentimental moment? Was he embracing his past and the past of his ancestors by burying it, or trying to thrust it away from him?
The sentimental thing is wearing a class ring. If he was disgusted with himself for sentimentality, he wouldn’t want a new one.
Unless — you separate HIS past from his ancestors’. Going to the “Sentinel” was something HE did, part of HIM… So replacing the ring is a way of asserting selfhood. Except that wearing any kind of class ring is an expression of solidarity with other people…
I don’t know. It’s confusing…
I was thinking that Underwood might look back on the burying of the ring as a foolish thing he did — giving up a part of himself in a nod to the past, and think something along the lines of : Well that was a stupid thing I did, getting all sentimental about my ancestor.
In fact, the idea that a Citadel graduate would voluntarily part with his class ring struck me as far-fetched. The Citadel grads I know (the ones who actually wear their rings) are fairly attached to their rings.
Yeah, that was the first thought for me — shock at the idea of burying a Citadel ring, even a fictionalized one. Then I started to wonder WHY…
But would the writers of the show even know what it means to bury one’s Citadel ring?…
I stumbled across this site by accident but I had to comment. I have been wearing a Citadel ring for 20 years. Either the writers have no idea what they are talking about… or they really, really know what they are talking about and therefore the act of F.U. burying his ring was beyond significant and profound. I’m not wise enough to present a case either way. ha ha.
I think he was burying his past….very FU
Just watched the one about the scandal over the photo of Claire, and the ruination of Freddy. Of course, I cared 1,000 times more about Freddy.
Frankly, I don’t see why the veep couldn’t stand up publicly for Freddy. I think their assessment of the political risk was all wrong. I think it would have done him more good than harm, standing by a man who’s struggled to turn his life around.
Also… I see no reason why they had to blindside the photographer like that. That was completely unnecessary bad will that they created intentionally in a man they badly needed to be on their side. I’m speaking pragmatically, not morally. Morally, they shouldn’t have been in the situation, and then shouldn’t have lied about it. But given that these are not moral people, I see no reason for them to have hung him out to dry like that.
But at least maybe we don’t have to be subjected to that insipid plot line any more. I mean, the photographer one. The one good thing I can say about him was that he was slightly, oh so slightly, less irritating than Zoe…
Slavery was horrific, but far from our country’s “Original Sin.” Study up some on what we did/do to the native peoples of the Americas first.