In spite of the rather detached and clinical description of this conflict between Paul and his world, the author’s distaste for the materialistic and rather coarse society she describes becomes evident. While Paul is clearly presented as emotionally disturbed and as almost pathologically lonely and isolated, he is also, in part, the victim of a society that is somewhat deadened in its imagination and finer sensibilities. Paul is like an aesthete for whom there is no place to belong, no home, and who finds no kindred spirit anywhere. Had he been able to find a group like Oscar Wilde’s “art for art’s sake” movement or the Bloomsbury group, both artistic cults that flourished during Cather’s lifetime, he might have found a friendly haven in a bohemian subculture, part of an aesthetic minority group. As it is, he is simply a doomed misfit.