The Beans of Egypt, Maine, written by Carolyn Chute, is a novel based on the lives of an oversized, impoverished family living in the rural area of Egypt, Maine. The Beans are a carefree low working class family that struggles to make ends meet everyday. Some people may use the harsh stereo-type of “poor white trash”.
The narrator, Earlene, begins as a middle-class child living across the street from a lesser fortunate family, the Beans. We see the way the Beans live mainly through the first person perspective of Earlene. Earlene comes from a family with more class and higher expectations than the Beans. Earlene’s father Lee Pomerleau looks down upon the Beans and tries to teach Earlene to do the same. Earlene usually does listen to her father but she finds it interesting how the Beans live. Earlene is described as always staring out her “picture” window, which was aimed directly at one of the Bean’s mobile homes.
Even though Earlene’s father does not like the Beans, Earlene finds herself slowly getting to know the Beans. Her curiosity leads her to the youngest male neighbor, Beal Bean. The two engage in sexual relations; some readers may portray this act as a rape, but the author denies. Despite the circumstance, Earlene ends up pregnant. Earlene and Beal end up marrying only to live a life of poverty and desperation. Eventually Earlene and the baby, Bonny Loo, move out and go to live in poverty with Beal and his sister-in-law.
Beal and Earlene seem to have some tension on there relationship because of the family background differences. Earlene is a mediator between her previous middle-class and the lower class that the Beans are classified as. Earlene is subjected to the realization that her husband has slept with a majority of the women in his family and has fathered most of their children. Throughout Beal and Earlene’s marriage Beal Bean not only degrades Earlene, but disrespects her constantly. As this horrible life continues for Earlene she becomes tired of the way Beal Bean treats her. Out of desperation Earlene attempts to reason with Beal by trying to persuade him to find a way the two could afford to live after Beal is laid off from work. Eventually the socio-economic pressures of poverty get to Beal and his inability to provide for his family and he goes into a drunken rage. He becomes determined to kill anything or anyone that sets him off or stands in his way. One evening as he was shooting out the windows of the neighbor’s house the police are called on Beal. The author doesn't go into very much detail, but the chapter ends and Beal is deceased after the incident.
Throughout this book Chute often gave little explanation about events. This could be because she did not want her readers to get caught up in the less significant events; instead, she wanted them to comprehend the entire picture. Chute is known to leave things unsaid about her below poverty level family in the mythical town of Egypt, Maine. For example, some of the characters are portrayed as having mental disabilities.
Chute never actually comes out and tells the reader about these illnesses or disabilities, but she often hints at it. Although it is not clear whether the Beans being poor had anything to do with their various mental illnesses, it could be possible to make the connection. There has been ongoing research that links poverty to different types of mental illness. Research proved that poverty can make a person depressed or could cause bipolar disorder. Some of the characters in the Bean family portrayed more of a cognitive illness, but it does not specify in the book the disorders or illnesses the Beans might have.
Carolyn Chute can often be perceived as speaking for her characters since her life is considered similar to the lives of the Beans in her book (Ward 2). Chute seems to relate to her characters because she sympathizes with the Beans as she told an interviewer “‘to me they look regular, like average people’” (Ward 13). Born in Portland, Maine in June 1947, Chute lived a simple life. Chute has a limited education since she dropped out of high school at the age of 16. She got married and had her daughter soon after. Chute got divorced in the mid-1970’s and worked in a chicken factory while she did some writing work on the side (Lannin 3). She later married a man, Michael, who was a high school graduate that worked in a junkyard, sold firewood and did snowplowing work for a living (Lannin 3). The two lived in poverty, but not in depression. Chute had been writing for almost her entire life, but in 1985 something unimaginable happened. Her novel became a best-seller and she began collecting more money than she had ever seen. As the excitement of the first release began to fade, she realized the novel was not completely finished and began revising it.
Ten years after the first version Chute revised and published another version. She felt it was not complete and that readers and reviewers did not understand the meaning in some parts of the first version. She was happy with her first version, but she just felt people were interpreting the book differently than she wanted them to. Chute claims reviewers have always misunderstood her motives (Lannin 4). Chute wanted it to be clearer what she meant. For example, she did not mean for anyone to think of incest when reading about the father and daughter sleeping in the same bed. To Chute, incest was something she did not think of because she was use to that way of life.
Chute grew up poor, but after she wrote The Beans of Egypt, Maine she was able to move into a roomy two story house with some acres of land. Chute and her husband live a simple lifestyle. For example, up until recently when she purchased her first computer, she had been working on a typewriter her entire life. Unfortunately as the book's success dwindled, so did the money she had in her family. Chute feared her life was slowly moving back towards the life she was used to without the luxury of having money (Lannin 4). As of now, she is continuing her writing through her magazine the "Fringe". And who knows, maybe she's brewing up another remarkable novel up there in Maine as we speak!
