Maine

Maine is the coastal state where the Barbour family maintains a summer house, a setting that becomes the site of the drowning deaths of Andy Barbour and his father Chance, and a place that embodies the family's complex relationship with the sea, privilege, and tragedy.

The Barbour Family's Maine Retreat

The Barbour family's summer house in Maine is a place of both privilege and tension. Andy Barbour, who despises sailing, is forced to spend summers there, enduring long, stressful days on the boat with his bullying brother Platt. He describes the prospect of going to Maine as being "sold into slavery on that boat," a fate he dreads. Mr. Barbour, Chance, is obsessed with the sea and sailing, viewing it as a birthright and a source of freedom, a passion none of his children share. Mrs. Barbour, Samantha, does not care for sailing either. The house itself is associated with the family's wealth and social standing, a place where they retreat from the city.

The Fatal Sailing Accident

The most significant event associated with Maine is the drowning of Andy and his father. Chance Barbour, who had a history of bipolar disorder and was in a manic state, was staying at the family's Maine house, cared for by a caretaker. Platt and Andy went up to be with him. Against better judgment, they took him sailing on a short hop to get him food and calm him down. The boat capsized in a sudden squall. Chance, who had become dangerously thin and was in a manic state, died of hypothermia after an hour and a half in the fifty-three-degree water. Andy's jacket was found trailing behind the boat, still attached to the life-line, but he had not been properly buckled in and drowned. Platt, who survived, describes the accident as a result of his father's manic state and Andy's clumsiness, a characterization that reveals the family's long-standing dynamic.

Aftermath and Significance

The deaths in Maine shatter the Barbour family. Mrs. Barbour retreats into a state of near-seclusion, rarely leaving her room. Kitsey, who had asked Andy to go in her place, is consumed by guilt. The tragedy also brings Theo Decker back into the family's orbit, as he reconnects with Platt and later becomes engaged to Kitsey. Maine, for Theo, represents a lost Eden, a place of summer and sailing that he associates with the Barbours' former life, now irrevocably changed by the accident. The state's coastal waters, which Mr. Barbour revered as a source of life and freedom, ultimately become the instrument of his and his son's death, underscoring the novel's themes of fate, loss, and the destructive power of nature.