Alex Hollingsworth
Helen Driver
Literature 221
November 20, 2014
Magnus Derrick: The Governor As the leader of the farmers’ defense league, Magnus Derrick has many troubles and hatred from many others within his league. His dialect is short of a redneck that we see today because of his short worded phrases and cut down words that only the people in his community can understand him. The governor has the features of an athlete even at his age, and his sons’ are two of the different kinds that he likes to describe them in many ways short of very descriptive. He tends to fit just right in to the community, the valley of farmers, with his sense of argument means to get what he wants no matter the consequences and in turn makes enemies like a leader of a gang or rebel group. Magnus is just like many other American’s during his time and beyond, the follow the rule of law. Almost sixty years old, Magnus Derrick, an all-American politician and leader that always commands his presence like a military officer, gambles his principles and way of living to his own ruin through the use of the enemy’s bad means for his good cause in the form of rebellion. One way that Magnus portrays as an all-American, is not just the fact he is a farmer but he knows how to talk and negotiate like an American. He tends to smile a lot and talks easily to strangers and shares personal stories like any other American would. Another attribute of The Governor is his ability to be polite to anyone by shaking their hand, looking them in the eye, and smile for whomever he meets. Magnus, like another character in the novel Arthur, is hoping to stall the unnecessary war by all means. Ever since the beginning of revolutions, war has always tried to be prevented, but with the help of United States, many wars have been dismissed just by the fact of our negotiation skills and ways to get around other wants and needs with those skills. Magnus tells his men on the way to the irrigation ditch for a battle, “I believe, gentlemen . . . that we can go through this day without blood-shed. I believe not one shot need be fired. The Railroad will not force the issue; will not bring about actual fighting” (Stampone). Almost a southern gentleman, he speaks in a more direct approach and cares less for ones feelings like the former president Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt is a prime example of an American, not only because he was a President, but because of the background he had. Americans are much of a powerful persona that can be noticed in a crowd of other nationalities because of our stance. Mr. Derrick is a man of who seeks fortune in his position and is a bit greedy when it comes to be the most successful man in the valley. This can be seen in many other aspects in many different centuries. Not everyone is grown up a greedy individual, but becomes greedy because of the nation we live in and the society helps in this characteristic. He comes up to a manufacturer named Cedarquist in the novel in his travels that identifies himself with the struggle against the railroad and their rates with the wheat farmers like himself (Lye). With a lack of alertness and a man easily lured in business deals like a CEO of a fortune five-hundred company we hear about today, he falls into his own imagination and proposes too much for him to handle and ends up with him in ruins like the scandal of Enron that had collapsed (Pizer). With Magnus being the type of man he is, not much can influence him unless it comes to business proposals and an opportunity of growth. Like Magnus, Americans are extremely independent, individualistic, and like to be different from each other. One of his own sons’, Lyman, is a terrible social influence that ends up betraying him because of his opposition on the reduction of the San Joaquin Valley rates since he was a member of the Railroad Commission. Just like many Americans within the past century has a problem of gambling in many forms, thus being a terrible economic influence (Lye). The author describes Derrick as “always ready to take chances, to hazard everything on the hopes of colossal returns…there was no more redoubtable poker player in the country…The old-time spirit of ’49, hap-hazard, unscientific, persisted in his mind. Everything was a gamble-who took the greatest chances was most apt to be the greatest winner” (Collins). Even though the Governor lives in a valley on a farm in California, he still holds true to the characteristics of the” Divided we Stand” phrase. He is a relaxed, agreeable, and very open to tell everyone how he feels no matter the consequences. An all-American gambler at heart that ends up fantasizing of being economically rescued by others, i.e. China markets, collapses; from word of another court decision that leads him financially and mentally destroyed leaving his future in ruins (Howells). Franklin Roosevelt once said "Speak softly and carry a big stick”, and this quote sticks well with Magnus Derrick due to his position in the novel as the leader of the valley. In the end, Magnus Derrick sees that his greed and perception had got to the best of him and no longer has what he had wanted for his whole life. Just like any other American, he believes in his freedom of choice.

Works Cited
Collins, Peter E. "Nature, The Individual, And The Market In Norris And Dreiser." Twentieth Century Literature 58.4 (2012): 556-581. Academic Search Premier. Web. 20 Nov. 2014.
Howells, W.D. “Frank Norris”. The North American Review, Vol. 175, No. 553 (Dec., 1902), pp. 769-778. JSTOR. Web. 20 Nov. 2014.
Lye, Colleen. “American Naturalism and Asiatic Racial Form: Frank Norris's The Octopus and Moran of the “Lady Letty. Representations, Vol. 84, No. 1 (November 2003), pp. 73-99. JSTOR. Web. 20 Nov. 2014.
Norris, Frank. The Octopus: A Story of California. Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1901. Print.
Pizer, Donald. “Another Look at “The Octopus”. Nineteenth-Century Fiction, Vol. 10, No. 3 (Dec., 1955), pp. 217-224. JSTOR. Web. 20 Nov. 2014.
Stampone, Christopher. "You Can't Buck Against The Railroad." Studies In American Naturalism 9.1 (2014): 26-51. Academic Search Premier. Web. 20 Nov. 2014.