The Cider House Rules

“What sort of climate would anyone expect for an orphanage? Could anyone imagine resort weather? Would an orphanage bloom in an innocent town?”

The Maine weather plays a strong role in this novel, whether it is the coldness of the winters or—in this case—the dampness and fogginess of the St. Cloud’s valley. The foggy weather suggests the town’s isolation, and the degree to which it is stuck in its past. This weather is the opposite of “innocent,” in that there is something murky and haunted about it.

“There was the human body, which was so clearly designed to want babies – and then there was the human mind, which was so confused about the matter.”

Dr. Larch is baffled by the self-deception and hypocrisy that makes people adopt babies and treat them badly, have babies that they do not want, or force other people to have babies that they do not want. He has seen all of these behaviors up close, as an abortionist and the director of an orphanage. The doctor in him sees the problem in a detached and clinical way, as the result of the warring priorities of the mind and the body.

“Of use, he felt, was all that an orphan was born to be.” 

As an orphan, Homer Wells sees himself as a kind of soldier. Rather than facing his own family and background, he is born facing the world and feels an obligation towards it. Over the course of the novel, he develops his own ideas of what being “of use” entails, as he learns when to be obedient and when to think for himself.

“He would use the set of dilators with the Douglas points – rounded, snub-nosed points, they had the advantage of an easy introduction into the uterus and eliminated the danger of pinching tissue in withdrawal.”

Dr. Larch contemplates how he would perform an abortion on Mrs. Eames’s daughter, the first woman ever to have asked him for one. He is ultimately too frightened to do so, but his calm and detailed thoughts on the procedure show that he is only afraid of getting caught, not of doing anything wrong. This is one of several passages in the novel that describes the procedure of abortion in clinical detail, making readers see it through the dispassionate eyes of a doctor.

“In the front room, the singers grew hysterical on the subject of God’s love and something that sounded like ‘blinding destiny’ – verblendenen Geschike.”

At the back street abortionist that Dr. Larch visits, there is a German choir singing in the front room. Their singing performs the double duty of distracting passers-by and instilling a sense of guilt in the waiting room patients. The scene has something farcical and exaggerated about it, even while the religious choir is evocative of present-day abortion protestors; this tone of mingled seriousness and farce is one that Irving often employs.

“[…] Wilbur Larch reflected on the last century of medical history – when abortion was legal, when many more complex procedures than a simple abortion were routinely taught medical students: such things as utero decapitation and fetal pulverization (these in lieu of the more dangerous Caesarean section).”

Because Wilbur Larch is a doctor, he has a long memory for medical history. He understands that abortion has not always been illegal and was once a necessary part of a medical student’s knowledge, just as a Caesarean section used to be “dangerous.” Abortions were seen as essential last resorts, to save the life of a mother in labor.

“Jane has a right to be anxious, he thought.”

Homer is thinking about the narrator and heroine of Jane Eyre, a book that he previously disliked. His recent sexual experience with Melony has given him more sympathy for the difficulties that girls and women face. This quote shows the role that other novels and stories play in this novel, serving as a means for the characters to understand their experiences and one another.

“Oh God, thought Wilbur Larch, what will happen to me when Homer has to go?”

Dr. Larch loves Homer like a son. Moreover, Homer is the first person whom Dr. Larch has ever really loved. The doctor therefore feels dependent on Homer, as if Homer were his parent. The quote suggests that Dr. Larch will have no purpose or identity once Homer has left the orphanage, even though he is a man of unusual purpose.

“Whatever there was that glimmered of wrong, that shone of mistake – of loss, of hope abandoned, of the grim choices that were possible – Melony had an eye expertly trained to see this, and more.”

Melony is rude and clumsy, but also intuitive and honest. Her marginal position in the world gives her an innate sympathy for the struggles of others like her. As the novel progresses, she grows more and more into herself and increasingly becomes a voice of reason and fairness.

“But that quick and not-quick stuff: it didn’t work for Homer Wells. You can call it a fetus, or an embryo, or the products of conception, thought Homer Wells, but whatever you call it, it’s alive.”

Having viewed abortion procedures at the orphanage, Homer has a particular view of abortion: one that is detailed and knowledgeable, but also myopic. He understands the procedure but does not yet understand why it is needed. He must go out in the world and have his own experiences to gain a broader understanding, which will eventually make him a more sympathetic doctor.

“Homer liked Candy’s father, perhaps because surgery is the mechanics of medicine and Homer’s early training had been surgical.”

Ray Kendall is a reassuring figure to Homer, providing a bridge between his old life at St. Cloud’s and his new life at Ocean’s View. The older man is oriented towards mechanical work, like Homer is, but also teaches him new skills. He has an understanding and appreciation of Homer, who needs to learn fast and be useful.

“‘Right,’ Homer said.”

This is one of Homer’s frequent utterances, and it has different meanings at different times. Sometimes it is a sign of his receptive and cooperative nature. Other times, he says it even when he is confused, or when he is trying to hide what he is really thinking.

“In an effort to calm himself, Homer tacked the extra questionnaire – which he did not fill out – to the wall of Wally’s room, right by the light switch, so that the questions regarding life at St. Cloud’s occupied a position of ignored authority quite similar to the page of rules that were yearly tacked up in the cider house.”

The St. Cloud’s questionnaire is both comforting and angering to Homer. He likes having it up on his wall and also likes leaving it blank. It reminds him of Dr. Larch, a paternal figure against whom he is also rebelling.

“We are an orphanage; we provide these services; we stay the same – if we’re allowed to stay the same, he thought.”

Dr. Larch tries to instill a sense of sameness and constancy at the orphanage, believing that routine is important for children. Yet this sameness can prepare children poorly for the turbulent outside world, especially in a time of war. Dr. Larch, himself a war veteran, understands that no shelter is permanent.

“He thought about rules.”

Over the course of the novel, Homer becomes acquainted with different sets of rules, some of them official and some of them unspoken. He is accustomed to routines and rules from his life at the orphanage; he is also accustomed to taking rules at face value. Homer must learn to question and interpret rules more, in the process of growing up and becoming independent.

“So was Angel Wells – eight pounds, seven ounces and neither an orphan nor an abortion.”

This is a negative way of saying that Angel Wells, Homer and Candy’s son, is a wanted child, even though he is the result of an accidental pregnancy. Homer’s own formative experience is with orphans and abortions. A conventional childhood seems less predictable to him and more full of unknowns.

“People from Maine don’t crowd you; they let you come to your senses in your own good time.”

Maine, where much of this novel is set, is a reserved but tolerant culture. People have guessed that Angel is Homer and Candy’s son, but no one confronts either parent directly about it. This silence makes both parents wary, and it gives them room to decide how and when to announce Angel’s parentage.

“Wilbur Larch could imagine Wally’s journey. It was an ether journey, of course. Elephants and oil fields, rice paddies and bombs falling, dressed up as a woman and paralyzed from the waist down – Larch had been there; he had been everywhere.”

Dr. Larch can understand Wally’s wartime adventures in part because he is a war veteran. He can also understand Wally’s adventures because of their surreality, which resembles an ether daydream. This passage is a way of transitioning from Wally’s point of view to Dr. Larch’s, but it also shows the imaginative identifications that even distantly acquainted characters make with one another.

“Are there things you can’t ease into? wondered Homer Wells. The scalpel, he remembered, has a certain heft; one does not need to press on it – it seems to cut on its own – but one does need to take charge of it in a certain way.”

Homer and Candy discuss how and when to tell Wally about their affair; Homer is dubious about Candy’s suggestion that they “ease into” doing so. The analogy of the scalpel recalls his surgical training and Mr. Rose’s skills with a knife. Homer is aware that Wally is going to be hurt—as with a scalpel—no matter what; all that he and Candy can do is wield the scalpel in “a certain way.”

“But who am I to advocate honesty in all relationships? he wondered. Me with my fictional histories, me with my fictional heart defects – me with my Fuzzy Stone.”

While Dr. Larch is a controlling character, he is also sometimes a considerate one. He has decided to remain silent about Homer and Candy’s affair. While he is self-effacing here about his reasons for remaining silent, his tendency to fictionalize has its good side, in that it makes him broadminded and tolerant.

“He had heard her say, so many times, that a society that approved of making abortion illegal was a society that approved of violence against women; that making abortion illegal was simply a sanctimonious, self-righteous form of violence against women – it was just a way of legalizing violence against women, Nurse Caroline would say.”

Nurse Caroline and Dr. Larch both believe in abortion rights, but they come at the issue from different angles. For Nurse Caroline, a socialist, the battle over abortion rights is indicative of a larger societal problem that needs to be managed by the state. For Dr. Larch, the right to have an abortion is an individual one, and the state should have no part in it.

“ ‘E-R-Y-T-H-R-O-M-Y-C-I-N,’ wrote Homer Wells – the apple doctor, as Mr. Rose had called him. He wrote that in the margin, too. ‘The apple doctor.’ And just before he got out of bed, he wrote, ‘A Bedouin Again.’”

Homer is on the verge of breaking up his family and is trying to calm himself down by reading medical journals and being a good student. This has always been his way of making sense of the world around him. At the same time, his disordered thoughts keep breaking through, even in his notetaking. He is trying to decide who he is, now that he is no longer a family man.

“How we love to love things for other people; how we love to have other people love things through our eyes.”

This quote refers to Angel’s desire to show Rose the ocean, which she has never seen. Yet it could refer to many other instances of instruction and explanation in the novel, such as Dr. Larch teaching his surgical skills to Homer, or Wally bringing Homer to a drive-in. The quote suggests both generosity and selfishness—a desire to be admired but also a desire to share.