The Last Green Valley

“She felt the same way when they left the village, heading west with the rising sun and cannon fire still rumbling behind them, past fields waiting for plowing, and trees budding, and birds whirling and whistling above the bluffs, and dreams destroyed, buried by the realities of famine and war.”

As the Martels leave Friedenstal with the refugee caravan, Adeline feels a sense of trepidation. The scene around her reinforces this sense of anxiety as signs of spring and rebirth are contrasted with the destruction of war. The devastation of war is not just confined to the battlefield but affects civilians as well.

“We’re going to a beautiful green valley surrounded by mountains and forests. And snow up high on the peaks. And below, there will be a winding river and fields of grain for bread, and gardens with vegetables to feed us, and Papa will build us a house where we’ll all live together forever and ever, and we’ll never be apart.”

In addition to her faith, Adeline relies on her dream of the green valley to sustain her during the most difficult parts of her family’s journey west. While their surroundings in Ukraine are mostly flat farmland, Adeline dreams of living in a green valley like the one she saw in Mrs. Kantor’s book. Her dream is simple, but it is informed by the suffering, such as starvation, that she experienced growing up under Stalin’s rule.

“Lydia had never stopped believing Karl would return. When they were finally thrown out of their ancestral home in 1930, she had insisted on writing a letter to her husband, telling him where they had gone and why.”

When Adeline was young, her father, Karl, was sent to a Siberian prison camp; her mother, Lydia, never gave up hope that Karl would return. Lydia’s situation represents the fate of many Volksdeutsche women who lost their husbands to Stalin’s regime or World War II. Furthermore, Lydia’s refusal to give up hope foreshadows Adeline’s struggles to maintain hope when Emil is taken by the Soviets.