Multitudes, Multitudes

Multitudes, Multitudes is the title of Tom Keefer’s wartime novel, an unfinished manuscript that earned him a thousand-dollar advance from Chapman House. It enters the story both as a conspicuous inscription at a celebratory dinner and, later, as a work Willie Keith has read and assesses. Its biblical resonance, carrier setting, and recalled scenes from the beach give the title a place among the novel’s reflections on war, authorship, and the officers’ complicated camaraderie, without revealing the manuscript’s full plot.

The title at the celebration

At the dinner held to celebrate Keefer’s advance, the title is made into the evening’s centerpiece. A large cake, iced green and baked in the shape of a book, bears the words Multitudes, Multitudes, followed by A Novel By and Keefer’s name. The letters are formed in thick yellow sugar, and the cake stands among ferns and roses on a table crowded with flowers, candles, silver, and champagne. The physical presentation turns the title into a public announcement: Keefer is not merely talking about becoming a novelist; the officers are gathered around a celebration of a manuscript for which he has already received money.

The surrounding scene is noisier and less ceremonious than the book-shaped cake suggests. At seven o’clock the chair at the head of the table remains empty and no food has been served, while the officers are already boisterously drunk. Mr. and Mrs. Maryk smile uneasily at the jokes, and several new officers—who have never met Captain Queeg—listen with uncertainty as jokes about Old Yellowstain keep the table laughing. Keefer and Willie Keith sit side by side, helping sustain the running humor. Against this disorder, the carefully lettered title gives the celebration a formal object and a focal point, even as the party around it threatens to overwhelm any literary solemnity.

Keefer’s manuscript

The dinner marks a concrete step in Keefer’s writing career: he has sold an incomplete manuscript to Chapman House and received a thousand dollars in advance. The book’s title is therefore attached to a work already circulating beyond the ship, but the evidence does not establish that the novel is finished or that it has been published. The distinction matters: the party celebrates a promise and a sale, while the manuscript remains incomplete.

When Barney Greenwald later notices the cake, he identifies the title as biblical and connects it to the subject of a war book. Keefer answers with a grin that the Navy’s Public Relations office would not clear the manuscript. The exchange presents the book as potentially critical of the Navy, though it does not disclose what the novel actually says about the service. The title’s biblical allusion is thus named in conversation, while the prospect of institutional disapproval becomes part of the joke surrounding Keefer’s authorship.

Willie later reads chapters and gives a more detailed, mixed appraisal. He considers the novel smooth and thinks some of its scenes are brilliant, but judges its thought and style not especially original, describing them as a jumble of Dos Passos, Joyce, Hemingway, and Faulkner. Its action takes place on a carrier, with flashbacks to the beach. Willie expects the book to sell well, but his comments remain an assessment of chapters from an incomplete work, not a report on a published novel or its reception.

Greenwald’s toast and the novel’s place in the story

Greenwald’s remarks at the dinner make the title part of a tense social performance. He says he has been drinking with the judge advocate and has persuaded him to shake hands after a long evening. He then addresses Keefer’s book, asks whether the Navy receives a harsh portrayal, and calls attention to the title’s biblical character. The officers’ earlier joking gives way to an expectant quiet as Greenwald stands alone and prepares to speak. The manuscript, first displayed as a festive cake inscription, briefly organizes the attention of a room otherwise dominated by drink and recurring jokes.

The later account of Keefer’s novel comes through Willie’s letter to May, where the assessment appears amid his reflections on the court-martial and his wish to marry her. Willie reports that Keefer eventually broke down and showed him part of the manuscript; the disclosure moves the novel from public celebration into a more private exchange between shipmates. The letter gives no explanation for the dinner’s having become a horror, only noting that it did, and it supplies no further account of the book’s eventual fate. What it does establish is the contrast between the grand announcement on the cake and the limited, provisional knowledge of the work itself: an advance, a few chapters, a carrier setting, beach flashbacks, and a title Greenwald recognizes as biblical.