Pale Rider Foreshadowing

Katherine Anne Porter uses foreshadowing and allusions to portray a theme of death in her 1939 short novel, Pale Horse, Pale Rider. The title itself is a reference to death from Revelation 6:8. The lead female, Miranda, has ominous feelings the day preceding her illness, but refuses to acknowledge death as a possible fate. The theme of death is reinforced in the setting of World War I and the influenza pandemic, a time with an enormous death toll. Porter intertwines a playful love story between Miranda and a soldier, Adam, preparing for his official orders of deployment. This relationship gives both Miranda and Adam a false sense of hope for a happy ending because neither concedes the possibility of his death overseas. The denial of death is befitting of Southern writing as it alludes to Southerners denying the Old South is may be dead. Porter’s language is so vivid and descriptive that she forces readers to put themselves in Miranda’s place and reflect on the situation.

Pale Horse, Pale Rider,

opens with Miranda’s influenza born hallucination of escaping Death, the pale rider of the title, on another horse while shouting, “I’m not going with you this time – ride on!” (181). Porter uses the allusion to death and the four (4) horseman from the Book of Revelation to introduce a theme of overcoming death. For Miranda, this scene demonstrates her will to live because she has something worth fighting for, love. In her semiconscious state, Miranda looks back on the day preceding her fall to influenza to remind herself why she must continue to fight for her life. Porter uses Miranda in this scene to convince her audience to consider death as a reality, whether it be oneself or a loved one. She is telling her audience that the pale rider will affect them one way or another and there is no escape.
One of the first memories Miranda nonchalantly accounts is just after she greets Adam when they cross a funeral procession at “the first corner” (196) they approach. The diction gives a feeling as though this is a regular occurrence and an inconvenience rather than something to be mourned. This experience reiterates the prevalence of death in this time period. During their breakfast conversation, Miranda and Adam discuss “this funny new disease” which Miranda refers to as a plague, and Adam responds, “Well, let’s be strong minded and not have any of it. I’ve got four days more…” as if they can will influenza and death away (200). This relationship is delicate because the two are falling head-over-heals for each other; however, neither will mention the likely prospect that Adam will die overseas. Every time they dance around the topic, the word “death” is never spoken. The only instance of them pondering the idea is in Adam’s lighthearted joke about how horrible smoking is, but it does not matter if he is going to war (199). Here Porter attempts to exhibit how frivolously the couple acts towards death in order to reiterate how ignorantly they are acting. Unfortunately, neither of the two identify Miranda’s lack of appetite during breakfast as a warning sign of an impending illness. Miranda is slightly more aware of how sick she is about to get because she recognizes she feels rotten, but that it cannot be the weather or the thought of war because the feeling is different (202). Yet she does not verbalize all of these feelings because she wants her memories with Adam to remain jovial and warm; therefore, she continues to discuss plans for the future.
While apart from her love, Miranda is more pessimistic and aware of her forthcoming fate.

She goes so far as to tell Chuck, a colleague from the newspaper, he can have her drama beat for the day and write a review of the show. Chuck is of course excited about this, but Miranda can feel the influenza starting to set in and tells him to enjoy the write up since she is going to leave soon anyway. Not understanding what is going on with Miranda, Chuck believes this means she is about to leave the paper. Miranda, however, is thinking she will leave the review column to him in her last Will and Testament that she believes shall be read soon. This is one of the strongest examples of foreshadowing in the novel because Miranda has an internal feeling, “Something terrible is going to happen to me. I shan’t need bread and butter where I’m going” (215-216). The rest of her day involves her attempting to get her affairs in order before she even knows what is

happening.
Moving forward, the novel depicts the scene where Miranda falls ill and Adam, her knight in shining armor, comes to her rescue to tends to her every need until he is able to force the overcrowded hospital to take her in. Once Miranda is taken to the hospital Adam is deployed and is not mentioned again until the end of the novel when a friend and fellow soldier writes to Miranda about Adam’s death. This is by far the most moving and heart-wrenching part because Porter eloquently allows her readers to form such a strong emotional connection with the characters that they feel like a part of the novel. She does this to show how powerful Death is and the sensations and regrets that come with it. The scene when Miranda wakes up and professes her love for the man that can only be seen by heart and soul’s projection of Adam reminds the audience to leave nothing on the table because death comes without warning.
The constant allusions and use of foreshadowing that Porter uses in this novel reveal how death is surrounding the characters, and its effects cannot be escaped. While Miranda makes it out alive, even after her ominous thoughts, she is affected by the loss of Adam. It is this loss that allows her to finally pronounce her love for the man that ensured she received the proper care so she could survive. There is great irony in the fact that Miranda’s motivation to survive the influenza comes from the idea of meeting Adam again, and he dies of the same disease while fighting the war. His death is the true fulfilment of Miranda’s ominous thoughts because a part of her soul leaves and reunites with Adam when she discovers he has died while an empty shell of her body remains with “time for everything” (264). Porter exploits the emotional upheaval of her captive audience to articulate how naïve it is to deny death; her goal is to communicate to readers that they should always be ready for the pale horse, pale rider.