Emotions As a Connection with Memories

    Human memory, unlike stored data, often fades with time and is not as clear and detailed as what really happened. Yet, memories to a certain extent are more vivid for they not only contain facts but also emotion and certain connections with other memories, and all as a collective, make up an individual’s characteristic. Most importantly, an individual has the power to select memories that he or she wants to remember or forget, as well as the emotion and other characteristics associated with that memory. Katherine Anne Porter, who has experienced the influenza herself, has used the emotions of characters in “Pale Horse, Pale Rider” to better describe society’s memories of the influenza and World War I as a collective. Humans’ memory does not only contain historical facts but also emotions that are associated with that memory. 

“Pale Horse, Pale Rider” was told in a very blurry manner with Miranda drifting in and out of consciousness which is a better resemblance of human memory about certain events. The story begins with Miranda dreaming “in her bed” of her being in “a room that she had known somewhere” and “things have a will of their own in this place and hide where they like” (179) which sets the blurry tone for the story. Moreover, the story also contained inner thoughts and detailed descriptions of feelings associated with certain events. All of these characteristics reflect the way humans remember events, a combination of facts, emotions, and personal thoughts. In “The Forgotten Apocalypse: Katherine Anne Porter's "Pale Horse, Pale Rider” by David A. Davis, the writer stated that “works of literature serve a dual purpose of fictionalize and memorialize” (67) meaning that a fictional literature works about certain historical events serve both the purpose of illustrating historical facts but also emotions that individuals in that situation could have experience. By connecting memories with emotions in “Pale Horse, Pale Rider,” Katherine A. Porter “allows the reader to imagine the traumatic experience sympathetically” (Davis, 67). 

Besides the connection with emotion, and other characteristics, human memory is also connected with the fact that we could choose to forget or potentially fail to remember certain memories, thus making humanity not only a combination of what individuals remember but also what people choose to forget or fail to remember. It is reasonable to assume that memories make up an individual’s character; therefore, it is also reasonable to argue that what a person failed to remember or chose to forget is what differentiates him or her from another person even when they experience the same event. When Miranda was in her stage of illness she thought to herself: “When I am not here I cannot remember anything about this room where I have lived nearly a year” (Porter, 230) illustrating the human characteristics of memory for despite having lived in that space for a long time, Miranda still did not have any memory associated with the space. Thus, that space did not make up any part of her characteristic for she did not remember anything about the room in which she “ha[s] lived for nearly a year” (Porter, 230). To forget a memory, or failing to remember an event is also to shape up an individual’s unique perspective. To involve the possibility of forgetting or not being able to remember certain memories within “Pale Horse, Pale Rider,” Porter offered the readers her unique perspective of the Influenza and World War I, thus making the memories of these historical events more diverse and whole. 

Memories are not meant to be perfectly accurate but are supposed to reflect an individual's characteristics. Moreover, humanity is a collection of what we remember, and forget. Therefore, by connecting memories with emotion, Porter offered a more humanlike description of Influenza and the World War I period.---o0o---Davis, David A. “The Forgotten Apocalypse: Katherine Anne Porter's "Pale Horse, Pale Rider," Traumatic Memory, and the Influenza Pandemic of 1918”. The Southern Literary Journal, Vol. 43, No. 2, 2011, pp. 55-74.

Porter, Katherine Anne. “Pale Horse, Pale Rider.” The Modern Library. Random House, 1939, pp. 179-264.