The Summer of the Beautiful White Horse

Throughout “The Summer of the Beautiful White Horse,” Saroyan paints a picture of the Armenian immigrant experience. Although the narrator, an older version of Aram, tells the story through the eyes of his nine-year-old self, the narrator nevertheless portrays the other characters’ emotional and moral complexities. Through their complexities, Saroyan explores the theme of Duality and the Immigrant Experience. Small joys feel powerful to the characters in Saroyan’s story, and the heavy burdens that come with life in America for these characters, such as poverty and language barriers, don’t detract from that.

The story sheds light on the hardships that permeate the lives of the characters. It hints at the isolation that immigrants may feel upon settling in the US, as evidenced by the character John Byro, who, as Aram reports, was “an Assyrian who, out of loneliness, had learned to speak Armenian” (8). Other characters suggest that his uncle Khosrove’s irritable temperament is due to the tragedy of forced displacement and the corresponding loss of home and culture. About Aram’s uncle, Aram’s mother says, “It is simply that he is homesick and such a large man” (7). As a further hardship, Aram also describes his family’s poverty. He also hints at the prejudice they face at the hands of their non-immigrant neighbors. As they rode out into the morning, Aram observes: “For all anybody knew we were still in the old country where, at least according to some of our neighbors, we belonged” (5).

Yet, in spite of these difficulties, freedom and joy abound in this story, and the beautiful white horse emerges as a poignant symbol of freedom and opportunity. Aram’s older cousin Mourad, in particular, experiences joy. Aram describes how his “cousin Mourad enjoyed being alive more than anybody else who had ever fallen into the world by mistake” (2), as evidenced by Mourad singing loudly as they ride through the countryside. The boys experience joy in nature, the feel of “the air [which] was new and lovely to breathe” (4). They experience joy in the freedom of the morning rides with “the feel of the horse running” (4). They experience joy in “the beautiful white horse” itself, whom Mourad names My Heart in Armenian. Aram and Mourad’s joy and feelings of freedom contrast with the circumstances of their everyday lives—yet another example of the Duality and the Immigrant Experience.

The tension between being trapped by circumstances and experiencing joy is evidenced in Aram’s confusion about Mourad’s “theft.” Aram can’t believe his senses when Mourad shows up with the horse at his window in the early morning, partly because he knows that Mourad has no money to buy the horse, and partly because his family’s reputation for honesty precludes Mourad from stealing. Aram’s brain tells him one thing, and his senses tell him another. He is horrified that his cousin must have stolen the horse, and he simultaneously tries to justify it. Mourad and the horse “delighted” and “frightened” him at the same time. When he joins Mourad on his early morning rides he attempts to reconcile these conflicting realities, but he never lands firmly on one side or another.

Aram’s confusion is partly due to his age—he is a nine-year-old boy and doesn’t understand the nuance at work in the events from that summer. The story is told in a matter-of-fact way, in the manner of a child recounting events. However, Saroyan subtly uses point of view to make observations regarding the Garoghlanian family’s circumstances. The narrator, Aram’s older self at an indefinite point in the future, reflects on the summer of the beautiful white horse. The story opens with the narrator saying, “One day back there in the good old days when I was nine and the world was full of every imaginable kind of magnificence, and life was still a delightful and mysterious dream” (1). This contrasts the point of view of nine-year-old Aram, who still maintains the wonder and innocence of childhood, with the point of view of the older Aram, who clearly has a more mature and perhaps more realistic view of the world. Although the story isn’t a traditional coming-of-age tale, it nevertheless speaks to the loss of innocence. The young Aram still experiences life as a “magnificent dream,” and the older Aram has awoken to life’s difficulties. It is because of the contrast between Aram at two different ages that Saroyan is able to tell a seemingly simple tale that offers between-the-lines commentary on complex subjects. This split point of view is another example of Duality and the Immigrant Experience at work in this piece of fiction.

Although the story is written and narrated in English, Saroyan uses Armenian when Mourad speaks to or about the horse. He encourages it to run in Armenian, shouting “Vazire” (5). More telling is that he’s named the horse “My Heart” in Armenian, as if his love for the horse is better expressed in the language of his home country than in English. Also, he is effectively severed from his “heart” when he returns the horse to John Byro, which echoes the loss entailed in being forced to emigrate from one’s home country. Khosrove experiences a similar severing of ties. His anger and grief are products of the loss of his homeland. His nihilistic pronouncements also are indicative of this loss. Mourad and Khosrove each live in one world, but their hearts exist in another.

Hope and resilience abound in the story as well. Emblematic of this hope is the scene in which Mourad fixes the robin’s broken wing. Aram sets out looking for Mourad and finds him “sitting under a peach tree, repairing the hurt wing of a young robin which could not fly. He was talking to the bird. […] He threw the bird into the air. The bird tried hard, almost fell twice, but at last flew away, high and straight” (9-10). The robin is a symbol of overcoming hardship. Life isn’t easy for the immigrant family. Yet the robin is healed. The boys have beautiful morning rides. The horse is tamed. John Byro is happy in the end. Most importantly, Aram is given a chance to reframe his life circumstances.

In the end, the question of whether or not Mourad has truly committed theft is unresolved because Mourad has done good in the world in working with the horse. The question of Truth and Honesty versus deception is not as black and white as Aram once believed.