The Outcasts of Poker Flat

Drawing on the colorful and often brutal landscape of the American Western frontier, “The Outcasts of Poker Flat” depicts human moral complexities through themes of corruption, redemption, and self-sacrifice. In this vein, the story plays with the tension in the idea of the strengths and weaknesses in a person’s character, and it questions the role of luck or chance in shaping a person’s actions. The narrative’s thematic focus on luck or chance frequently involves gambling terminology, as Oakhurst, the gambler protagonist, often uses those ideas to make sense of his situations.

The setting of a California mining town during the height of the Gold Rush creates a realistic backdrop for the story, and it sets the stage for the theme of Purity and Corruption: The Moral Ambivalence of Humanity. These kinds of towns enabled gambling and sex work, and in the sociohistorical context of 1850s United States, such activities further propagate the image of unruliness associated with these locales. The story opens with Oakhurst observing “a change in [the town’s] moral atmosphere since the preceding night” (Paragraph 1). The description of the town as “unused to Sabbath influences” (Paragraph 1) indicates the lack of a Christian presence, which, at least in Harte’s contemporary ethos, signifies an immorality that seemingly corroborates the characters’ need for redemption. However, the story’s inciting incident—the conflict between the outcasts and the secret committee—carries a trenchant irony that sets the tone for the rest of the narrative. The Poker Flat committee is hypocritical to a satirical degree: They want to purge the town of corruption and violence, yet their “spasm of virtuous reaction” (Paragraph 3) entails its own brutality; they want to punish Oakhurst for his gambling, yet they themselves have gambled with him. Moreover, some committee members have lost money to Oakhurst and would like to hang him, while others have won money and feel more lenient. Such self-serving biases expose the committee’s lack of genuine ethical concern, and the perfunctory facade of their deliberation has an infernal comic element. Their decision to banish sex workers is arbitrary apart from its basis in moralistic stigma, as it is unclear how such women could be remotely responsible for the robbery and murder that have so perturbed these “virtuous” vigilantes.

Therefore, as the outcasts leave Poker Flat, their exile is pointedly ironic. The committee has spun a narrative in which this expulsion purifies the town, yet because the committee members themselves remain firmly ensconced there, Poker Flat will stay corrupt. The rest of the story takes place in a “wild and impressive” (Paragraph 9) area above the valley. As the setting switches to a more remote location, it permits the outcasts to begin their redemptive journeys. The committee’s condemnation of the outcasts is spurious, but there is further irony in how most of the outcasts subsequently hone their virtue as they focus on survival and taking care of each other: The exile does facilitate moral growth, but not in the way the committee intended.

As an example of Regionalism, the story realistically reflects the dangers and hypocrisies present in an atmosphere that usually overlooked unregulated behavior, and even after the setting shifts, the environment remains vivid and particular. Once escorted to “the outskirts of the settlement […] The exiles were forbidden to return at the peril of their lives” (Paragraph 6). The grim atmosphere intensifies with the imagery of the outcasts abandoned at the edge of an already isolated area, knowing the possibility of death is present whether they continue into the wilderness or come back to Poker Flat. The austere landscape, both physical and psychological, advances the authentic portrayal of a Western mining town, and literary elements of mood and foreshadowing often interweave throughout the story: Harte’s bleak descriptions of the landscape and weather both create a somber mood and foreshadow disastrous conflicts.

As the outcasts delay their travels at the insistence of the Duchess, Oakhurst observes the surrounding natural area: “He looked at the gloomy walls that rose a thousand feet sheer above the circling pines around him, at the sky, ominously clouded; at the valley below, already deepening into shadow” (Paragraph 10). The mood shifts to one of despair as the increasing snowfall physically entraps them: “Day by day closer around them drew the snowy circle, until at last they looked from their prison over drifted walls of dazzling white that towered twenty feet above their heads” (Paragraph 30). The imagery of the snow as a “prison” foreshadows death and enhances the forbidding mood. Despite this “dreary prospect” (Paragraph 30), the outcasts do not protest, signifying their deepening perseverance and stoicism. Such perseverance increasingly bears the fruit of self-sacrifice as the Duchess cares for Piney, Mother Shipton starves herself by saving her rations for the young woman, and Oakhurst continually urges Tom to save himself and his fiancée by leaving their group.

Part of Regionalism’s appeal is in its portrayal of regions with which the reader may be unfamiliar; the literary movement is sometimes called “Local Color” because it features things like dialect and other particularities of a given locale, and the way the characters speak in “The Outcasts of Poker Flat” exposes their unworldly milieu. Harte utilizes the reference to the Greek epic poem The Iliad and juxtaposes its loftiness with Tom’s unsophisticated language, as he relays “the fate of ‘Ash-heels,’ as the Innocent persisted in denominating the ‘swift-footed Achilles’” (Paragraph 29). Despite Tom’s blatant mispronunciation of one of the most famous Greek legends, the other outcasts presumably do not realize his error, as no one corrects him.

Harte’s style of narration offers a juxtaposition between the narrator and the characters. As an outside presence, the third-person narrator offers glimpses of Oakhurst’s internal thought process, “He started to his feet with the intention of awakening the sleepers” (Paragraph 17). The narrator’s diction exhibits a more formal and educated manner of speaking, “A careful inventory of the provisions, which, fortunately for the party, had been stored within the hut and so escaped the felonious fingers of Uncle Billy” (Paragraph 19). Harte also limits the amount of dialogue between the outcasts in the story. He employs the narrator to relate the major points of the plot, thereby focusing the attention on the characters’ actions: “[H]e insisted upon exchanging his own riding horse, ‘Five Spot,’ for the sorry mule which the Duchess rode” (Paragraph 7). Instead of having Oakhurst engage in dialogue to offer his horse, the narrator relays the information, to emphasize Oakhurst’s kind deed. Oakhurst usually responds with “curt” statements, and during some of the more dramatic scenes, the characters often reply with simple proclamations. When Oakhurst discovers Mother Shipton’s hidden rations and realizes she has starved herself, Mother Shipton replies, “That’s what they call it” (Paragraph 30). Only the two words, “No, dear” (Paragraph 35), are spoken between the Duchess and Piney before they comfort each other in death. It is the characters’ actions, not their words, that define their integrity and moral commitment.