The Importance Of Home In Hazel Motes 'Wise Blood'

“Home is where the heart is” is the old famous quote that many people have said. But in some cases this is farthest from the truth. Tate’s statement suggests that “home” is a place, or even a state of mind. In the novel Wise Blood, the character Hazel Motes is far from home. A returning war veteran, Motes comes home to find his house in Tennessee abandoned and his family gone. Confused, Motes boards a train to Taulkinham and from there his journey begins, becoming farther and farther away from his “home”. Before the war, Motes’s home was full of religion and Christianity. The importance of home was apparent in Motes life, and was all he had left after returning from war. The feeling of being home could be related to the thought of God. At “home” Hazel has a sense of belonging and can be of importance. Importance of home affected Hazel. In the beginning of the novel, Motes meets various characters that mistake him for a minister. This is ironic, because after returning from the war, he is now against religion and antichurch. As Motes begins his twisted spiritual quest, he stoops further and further away from his “home” and his values. Hazel states “Where you come from is gone, where you thought you were going to never was there, and where you are is no good unless you can get away from it.” This means that his previous beliefs are slowly dwelling. As the novel continues, the reader …show more content…
Rage begins to burn in Hazel’s eyes, and this becomes the turning point in the novel. Everyone around Hazel begins to go insane. His friend Enoch kills a man in a gorilla costume in revenge, and then follows through by dressing up as the gorilla after he is murdered. This begins the ongoing violence in the novel. “He had the feeling that everything he saw was a broken-off piece of some giant blank thing that he had forgotten had happened to him.” This explains the chaos that is happening in the