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  • From: RHONDA MCDONNELL <rhonda_mcdonnell AT msn.com>
  • To: "Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion" <percy-l AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [percy-l] Love in the Ruins - Discussion questions for the first July 4 section
  • Date: Fri, 5 Jun 2026 23:20:16 +0000

Rhonda here, ready to take the wheel for our first section. But first, a note from our intrepid leader, Henry:
Welcome, everyone, as we continue our journey through Percy’s novels with Love in the Ruins, following our earlier readings of MG and LG. All are welcome to join the discussion, whether you’re keeping up with the reading,or simply drop in along the way. 
Since Love in the Ruins satirizes political themes, let’s remember  our group members hold a wide range of diverse view, but whatever our differences, we are all here this summer to enjoy and celebrate together Percy's many humorous questions and ideas in the novel.
I’m excited for us to now turn to follow Tom More through his many (mis)adventures and quixotic, comical schemes. As with earlier readings, we should all feel free to compare any of the novels with each other. The following questions cover the first July 4section of the novel, including the patient record, and ending with Tom on the interstate at 7 pm the evening of July 4th.
DISCUSSION TOPICS:

First, a little note: I considered many different gambits for opening this summer's discussion, but in the end, I thought, let's keep it simple. My questions are broad, and I'm hopeful that they might inspire some thoughts about the opening of the novel. However, I don't want to suggest that posts on this section have to restricted to answering these questions. After all, school is out. So, if you have other things on your mind, please share those thoughts.

  1. As a writer (albeit not a very good one) I noticed Percy's opening structure this time. He seems to start in media res (in the middle of the action), but that is a trick of sorts, as absolutely no action happens in this first section. Instead, he introduces us to this pre-apocalyptic near future using circles within circles: the Western world, the USA, his community, his neighborhood, himself. What seems to be the key elements of each circle that he wants to establish before getting to the action of the story? You don't need to feel compelled to cover the whole catalog. As Percy told Charles Bunting, "It was supposed to be a serio-comic review of the state of the world" (Conversations 46).

  2. This opening structure brings to mind the first lines of W.B. Yeats', "The Second Coming": "Turning and turning in the widening gyre, / the falcon cannot hear the falconer." Percy becomes more overt with the sentence, "The center did not hold," which follows Tom's descriptions of the politics of the time (page 16 of one of my editions and page 18 of the other), is a near echo of the poem's fifth line. This is but one of his allusions, which pepper the opening pages in a way that would make T.S. Eliot proud*. What do these add to the narrative and our understanding of Tom and his world view? I'm thinking responses can either consider the allusions as a whole or dive into any single allusion.

  3.  Percy sets this novel in 1983, roughly 12 years after its publication date (15 years after he did his last revisions, I conjecture, as he referenced 15 years in the future when talking to Bunting). It is a near future, but a tremendous decline seems to have occurred. Do Tom's descriptions of the decay seem "true" at this point, or is there reason to question his perspective? 

  4. Why are the stories of the four patients included? What is revealed about Tom? About society? 

  5. As a final thought, any thoughts about aspects of society that seem unchanged despite the radical changes in religion (Catholicism particularly) and politics?

  • Side note: the companion that explains all the allusions in Eliot's The Waste Land is massively longer than the poem itself. The poem is 434 lines, while Allyson Booth's line-by-line companion to it is 292 pages!

I hope everyone is enjoying Love in the Ruins!

Rhonda McDonnell
Member of the Institute for Studies in Pragmaticism
Texas Tech University

"You live in a deranged age, more deranged than usual, because in spite of great scientific and technological advances, man has not the faintest idea of who he is or what he is doing." ~Walker Percy~
  


  • [percy-l] Love in the Ruins - Discussion questions for the first July 4 section, RHONDA MCDONNELL, 06/05/2026

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