Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance (1985) By Richard Powers

“Life is three dimensional,” four words, or in the case of Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance by Richard Powers, a 352-page novel. The book was a slow read because I had to stop at the end of every sentence to ponder the author’s purpose. It was a challenge, but that’s not a complaint.  

Throughout Three Farmers I found myself concentrating not on the story, but on the structure of the novel. It is actually two books merged into one: past and present, with a side-bar toward the future. Foremost, Three Farmers is a philosophy treatise, a collection of essays. They appear as digressions from the second book, a novel. 

The novel is interesting in its own right. While traveling to Boston, Peter (one of several main characters) must deal with a lengthy layover in Detroit, waiting for a connecting train. To kill time he visits the famed Detroit Institute of the Arts. At the museum he comes across a black and white photo titled Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance, one of whom bears a striking resemblance to Peter. (While still in Chapter 1, we’ve already come across two major digressions: one a commentary on Detroit, the other on Diego Rivera’s industrial murals that engulf the main entrance to the museum – both are worthwhile essays). The book is about Peter’s quest to determine the identity of the three individuals in the photograph, there is no defining information at the Museum. 

Diego Rivera

Chapter 2 will take us back to 1914, rural Germany, just three months before the outbreak of The Great War – The War to End All Wars – World War I, also known as the prelude to World War II. The chapter introduces us to three young men, dressed in their Sunday best, on their way to the village’s Spring Festival.  One of the boys is a German, the other two are his Belgian stepbrothers.  A photographer stops to take their picture.

The remainder of the novel connects the first two chapters, uncovering the story of this picture from two angles: as the young men advance forward in their lives, and as Peter traces their lives backwards from when he saw the photograph in the museum some 70 years later. The book gets confusing at times as the narrator-location-year change frequently, but stick with it.

The digressions and plot limbs are limitless: the life of Sarah Bernhardt, Henry Ford’s Peace Ship, young love, farming, a tobacco shop, war reporting, the Parisian underground, and a closing future reference to Yalta – all pawns of history.  The photography references are timeless, including this from the photographer of the photo:  “A car is for getting from start to finish as quickly as possible.  But I earn a living by pointing out what happens between.”

Recommendation:  Do read, and don’t rush it.