Dark They Were, and Golden Eyed

Cora Bittering is Harry’s wife, and her actions and speech show that she is resolute and practical. When the family first sees the strange Martian landscape and Harry immediately wants to turn back for Earth, Cora tells him to “chin up,” reminding him that “one day the atom bomb will fix Earth. Then we’ll be safe here” (631-32). She turns out to be right, as a nuclear bomb later hits New York; if they had gone back, the detonation would likely have affected their home in Boston. Cora’s practicality continues to keep Harry alive on Mars; when he grows thin as the stock of Earth-grown food runs out, Cora eventually insists on his eating food from Mars. By convincing Harry to live on Mars, Cora also ensures the survival of the entire family.

However, if Cora helps her family survive, she does so by allowing and encouraging their assimilation into life on Mars. Cora is unable or unwilling to acknowledge the changes that Harry sees in the plants and people on Mars, insisting they “Look all right to [her],” and chastising, “Oh, your imagination!” when her husband suggests that the cottage has changed too (635-36). She remains oblivious even as she herself transforms: When the family is on the afternoon swim in the canal, she tells her husband that she thinks her eyes have always been yellow, though he remembers differently. Like Sam and the other men in the village, Cora does not reflect on the changes happening to the Earth settlers as Harry does, instead seeming to accept them almost subconsciously.

The three Bittering children are not given explicit characterizing descriptions, but together they adapt more quickly to the Martian environment than their parents. When the Bitterings first land on Mars, Harry sees them as “small seeds” that “might at any instant be sown to all the Martian climes” (631). Comparing them to seeds to be planted by the alien wind suggests that because they are young and still growing, these children will easily “take root” in their changed surroundings. Indeed, the children seem excited by their new home, described as hollering “at the deep dome of Martian sky” while their parents remain tentative (631). Later, Harry imagines the children as sleeping “metallic in their beds” (638), suggestive of the Martian winds molding them into new shapes like hot metal.

It is implied that David, the youngest, soon begins exploring the Martian ruins; he doesn’t meet his father’s eye when asked if he has been there. Dave’s curiosity about the Martians, and his feeling that they may still be there in some way, suggests a sensitivity to the environment and its history that informs the children’s more rapid changes in eye and skin color and their learning of the Martian language. He adopts the Martian name “Werr” by the end of the story.

Dan, the eldest, is the first to begin speaking the Martian language, calling his father “Utha” and asking to be called “Linnl” instead of “Dan” because he no longer feels like his Earth name applies to him. The episode is key to the story’s exploration of The Meaning of Names. Dan’s elation at adopting the new name paves the way for his siblings’ new names and his parents’ later adoption of Martian speech.

Laura is the first to learn that a nuclear bomb hit New York, stranding them on Mars, and is at first upset, crying, “We’re stranded on Mars, forever and ever!” (633). However, by the move to the villas, she has adopted the Martian name “Ttil” and without hesitation insists that she does not need her “New York dresses” anymore (643), demonstrating that she too has fully left behind her Earth identity.