Steinbeck

The Moon is Down by John Steinbeck (1942)

The people don’t like to be conquered, sir, and so they will not be. Free men cannot start a war, but once it is started, they can fight on in defeat. Herd men, followers of a leader, cannot do that, and so it is always the herd men who win battles and the free men who win wars.[1]

A small town is invaded by a foreign army. Taken completely by surprise, the local militia is unprepared and outmatched, and the battle is over quickly. The occupying army soon, high on victory, discovers that people do not like to be conquered. Small incidents, here and there, cause the occupiers to respond. The back and forth of ever-escalating events eventually breaks into open rebellion.

A short book, The Moon is Down is set in an unspecified place in northern Europe. Although neither country of the occupier and occupied are named, Steinbeck leaves no doubt that the invader is a stand-in for Nazi Germany. In chapter two, for example, the leaders of the invading army are described. The younger lieutenants are caricatures of the stereotypical National Socialist who unquestioningly follow “the Leader”. Steinbeck includes references to Nazi-like tenets, the disgust for the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I, “degenerate art”, et cetera. The higher-ranking officers are more mature and individual. Finally, the colonel, their commander, is an experienced soldier and the only combat veteran in the whole story. He saw action in World War I and is annoyed by his underlings and his superiors who misunderstand war. They see it as a pathway to glory while he understands its horrors. “I’m tired of people who have not been at war who know all about it,” he says at one point.[2]

On the other side, the townspeople are led by the mayor. When he and the colonel first meet to discuss surrender and the occupation, the subject turns to how the people will react. The colonel asks if the town will resist or not. The mayor never answers the question directly and makes it sound like he’s a mere figurehead, that the people would do what they want and he has no real influence. Later, we find out that that’s not true.

I liked how Steinbeck contrasted the soldiers and the villagers, looking specifically at the effects of conquest on both. In the beginning, the invaders are benevolent: “Just do what we say, and everything will be fine.” They are full of pride while the civilians are in disarray. As the story unfolds, the pressures of the occupation dissolve the discipline and order of the trained military. The confident soldiers of chapter one are disillusioned by the fifth. The villagers are the opposite. That they have never known war is repeated throughout the book, implying that the people will accept the occupation. As the plot develops, the reader discovers that even peaceful people can accept only so much. The quote at the beginning of this essay is spoken by the mayor to the colonel at their final meeting. As the soldiers lose confidence, the civilians gain it, becoming a pseudo-military force. War flipped the roles.

I like how Steinbeck kept the army and the village nameless. This allows the story to grow beyond the pages. The Moon is Down is about the lie of peaceful conquest, treachery, and the myths of war verses its reality. By being ambiguous, the book’s themes become timeless and universal.

The story is structured like a play and easy to read and follow. Each chapter is a scene that takes place in one of three locations, with people coming in or leaving the room. The dialog is clear with some interesting monologues and conversations. The cast of main characters is small, about eight, and a few secondary characters. At no point did I lose track of the plot. As short as it is, The Moon is Down is deep, and I think it is evidence of Steinbeck’s talent to be able to pack so much into it.

The Moon is Down was written during World War II as anti-Nazi propaganda. At the time, Steinbeck was working with American intelligence and interviewed refugees from countries invaded by Germany, such as Norway, Denmark, and France. He “wrote [his] account basing its fiction on facts extracted from towns already under the Nazi heel.”[3] When it was published in early 1942, the War was at its height and Axis powers seemed unstoppable. I think that’s why Steinbeck ended the story without a resolution. To the people of that era, the situation felt very real.

The title comes from Shakespeare’s play Macbeth and describes a black, moonless night. The line is uttered by guards just before Macbeth murders King Duncan and foreshadows the descent of evil on the kingdom. “Steinbeck’s allusion suggests that the Nazis had brought a similar spiritual darkness to Europe.”[4] As mentioned above, The Moon is Down ends just as the resistance begins. To me, this suggests that not only is the darkness referring to the occupiers and their methods of control, but also maybe to the corruption of the villagers, too. These were peaceful people who became violent. While Steinbeck might have intended the metaphor to be limited to war, the consequences will ripple. When the war ends, that knowledge will still be there. The fruit has been eaten; the villagers cannot reenter Eden.

[1] John Steinbeck, The Moon is Down (New York: Penguin Books, 1995) 111.

[2] Ibid 35.

[3] John Steinbeck, “Reflections on a Lunar Eclipse,” quoted in Donald V. Coers, introduction to ibid, ix.

[4] Donald V. Coers, introduction to Steinbeck ix.