5th
The Last American Man
In her story, The Last American Man, Elizabeth Gilbert describes the life of Eustace Conaway. Eustace Conaway was a man who grew up with an unimaginable childhood. Although his family looked like a normal functional family from the exterior, Eustace and his father had an unusual relationship. As the eldest, his father had great expectations for his son. His father drilled him in math and other subjects in front of guests and deprived him of food when he did not complete a certain set of problems correctly. The strain in Eustace and his father’s relationship pushed Eustace to escape into nature and learn as much as he could about it. When he turned seventeen, he moved out of his home and went onto becoming what Elizabeth Gilbert calls “The Last American Man”. Eustace started his discovery by journeying across the Appalachian Trail, eating only what he can scavenge and sleeping in a tepee that he made with his own hands. Through his journey, he met a variety of people and made new acquaintances. His journey led him to teaching the skill that he acquired to students by giving lectures and showing them that they had the ability to live in the woods if they chose to do so, and giving them a new perspective on how thing work in the world. His journey eventually led him to buying his own land and building his home in the woods. He kept his home open to others who were interested in learning about nature.
Gilbert portrays Eustace as an individual who is beyond the media and its antics. Eustace, in a way, made his own “boy code”, as Pollack would put it. His code did not restrict showing emotion, or having to show masculinity. Eustace lived only by his own rules and was not particularly concerned with others opinions about him. When on the Appalachian Trail, him and his friend, Frank, openly talked to each other about their feelings and their past. It was completely normal to them both, because the only other thing that surrounded them was nature. In hi interview, Eustace explained that everyone has the opportunity to shake off the media and do what they want to do with no obligations to what they have chosen.
Gilbert claims that Eustace became the “Last American Man”, by leaving society and becoming a man in true society, nature. It almost seems that Eustace wants to recreate a society of his own that excludes the media and all of the things that come with it, but in reality he utilizes them and then tells others not to be influenced by it. He starts his journey with nothing other than his knife and his tepee, and through his journey adapts more and more pieces of society. This almost contradicts his belief completely, other than the claim that he uses it to show others his way of living.
One of the main reasons that Eustace ran became so intrigued with nature was his relationship with his father. All of Eustace’s memories seem to be negative ones of his father. Although he wanted to escape from the assertiveness of his father, he himself became the person who inherited this trait. His father was very particular on how thing were done, similarly, Eustace had the same characteristic. The period of time when Donna Henry was living in Eustace’s tepee with him, Donna explained that she felt that “she was screwing something up and that her best efforts would never be enough to please this man” (Gilbert 78). He always came down on her for something that she did not do a certain way, just as her father had done to him.
Altogether I think that Elizabeth Gilbert did a good job on putting the life of Eustace Conaway together. However, in my opinion I think that Eustace was an individual who had goals in which he set out to accomplish, and someone who was so focused on his own goals that he only saw his accomplishments in the long run. His many companions throughout his journey serve as mere acquaintances. Who he recalls as good patrons who did a good job in keeping up with him.
