59 pages • 1 hour read
Dreamland
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Themes
Love and Pain as Two Sides of the Same Coin
Content Warning: This section includes discussion of domestic violence and mental illness.
The novel explores the interconnection of love and in each of Colby’s relationships—with Morgan, with his family, and with his music. At two important points in the novel, Colby recalls his sister telling him that “love and pain [are] two sides of the same coin” (216). The novel does not attempt to resolve the interdependence of love and pain but acknowledges it as an inevitability to which Colby must reconcile himself to live a fulfilling and meaningful life.
Much of Colby’s character arc involves coming to terms with the fact that in protecting himself from pain, he is also denying himself the full experience of love. At the beginning of the novel, Colby claims that he does not “think about whether [he is] missing out on something bigger or better or whatever” but “take[s] things as they come and [tries] not to expect or regret too much” (6). He admits that he dreamt of being "discovered" as a musician, but the demands of his family—Paige’s illness and his uncle’s unexpected death—took priority over his professional aspirations. Even before his uncle’s death, the farm was struggling. After his death, his aunt needed Colby’s help to lift the farm out of its economic struggles. Paige also needed help getting back on her feet after the deaths of her husband and son, which triggered her first psychotic episode. By keeping his expectations for his personal life low, Colby protects himself from the pain of not living the life he dreamed of, which also prevents him from experiencing the exhilaration of love in either a romantic or a professional and creative sense, leaving his life feeling one dimensional, stagnant, and stuck.
Falling in love with Morgan leaves Colby vulnerable to the pain and loss that he’s become practiced at avoiding. Colby first mentions his sister’s saying about love and pain’s interconnection in Chapter 34 after he and Morgan are caught in a storm and spend the night together. At that point, Colby knows that he has fallen in love with her but is unsure about her feelings for him. He does not know whether they can have a future together, but he knows that loving her has transformed him. Though he anticipates the pain of Morgan not reciprocating his feelings, and of eventually being left behind, he also feels the thrill of loving someone and of making music with her. He can no longer pretend that he is living a fulfilling life without these things. The night of music and love has inspired him to confront the dreams and desires he has long ignored, and he resolves that whatever happens with Morgan, he will find a way to live not only for his aunt and sister but also for himself.
Colby’s love for his family vies with his desire to embrace a life with Morgan in pursuit of music, forming the central conflict of Colby’s arc. Colby references the interconnection of love and pain for the second time at the end of Chapter 68, having broken up with Morgan pre-emptively because he believes that she will leave him behind. As he watches her walk away from him through the electronic airport doors, he finds he does not want to lose his music dreams or Morgan, but his guilt that his family has suffered in his absence and his own fears of being hurt and disappointed compel him to let her go. Sparks implies that Colby has not yet learned the lesson of balance: His love for and commitment to his aunt and sister, can co-exist with his love for Morgan and for music if he will let them. Without embracing this balance, the novel posits, the love he feels for his family has “become [his] prison” (350).
Sparks’s novel emphasizes the inevitability of both love and pain as defining characteristics of the human experience. Once love is experienced, one way or another, pain will follow. Being left behind by Morgan would be painful for Colby, but breaking up with her would also bring him pain. Failing at his dreams would be painful, but so is ignoring them. Through Morgan’s support and stubborn refusal to accept the limitations Colby places on himself, he ultimately reconciles himself to the inevitability of pain as a natural part of a full life lived with love.
The Transformative Power of Creativity
Dreamland explores the dynamics of the creative process and the opportunities it provides for people to connect with each other and with their deeper selves—exemplified by Colby’s description of running a farm, his relationship with Morgan, and Paige’s artistic work. In each instance, creativity requires care and a degree of love.
Colby’s experiences running his family’s farm provide him (and by extension, the reader) with a framework for understanding the creative process. Colby’s trip to Florida is part vacation, part opportunity to explore his music. Once an aspiring musician who played in a band, he abandoned the thought of pursuing it professionally to devote himself to making his family’s farm profitable again. The farm is depicted as a creative endeavor in several ways. On the most obvious level, it requires nurturing the land so that it can provide a hospitable environment for growth and nurturing the animals—in the case of Colby’s farm, chickens—so that they can produce eggs. As a farmer, Colby pays particular attention to the farm’s environmental dynamics—for example, how natural events like a storm or an unexpected frost might affect the plants or animals he nurtures. Running a successful farm also requires creativity and effective engagement with the larger community that consumes its final products. Colby decides to raise cage-free chickens and grow heirloom tomatoes because he knows these are in demand. As a result, he succeeds in restoring the farm’s profitability. Similarly, creativity requires nurture and care to produce art. Making a living as an artist requires engagement with the audience that consumes it.
Colby, Paige, and Morgan each represent a different stage of an artist’s career. At the start of the novel, Paige is the most successful working artist of the three. Colby has given up his dream of being a musician, and Morgan is about to launch her career, but Paige is already an established artist. Colby tells Morgan how Paige’s Tiffany-inspired lamps are highly valued and live in the homes of prominent people. She has achieved success because of her natural talent, hard work, careful study of what would sell, and knowledge of how to leverage all the above to make a profit. Her artistic success was integral to the success of the family farm, since it was her money that kept the farm afloat while Angie and Colby instituted changes.
Creative production is what brings Morgan and Colby together. Morgan seeks him out because she sees him perform, loves his voice and wants to get to know him. Not only does their bond grow as they write and sing together, sharing stories about their childhoods and discovering their commonalities, but their talents also develop and evolve in the glow of each other’s admiration and respect. Morgan is nervous to sing in public but, empowered by Colby’s support, she discovers she can electrify an audience. Colby initially struggles with a song he’s writing but, inspired by his feelings for Morgan, the song goes from a draft to a completed product. In addition to finding love with Morgan, Colby comes to terms with how important music is to him. Though he is not, at the end of the novel, prepared to abandon his family and farm to follow her to Nashville, he recognizes that music has an important place in his life, and he strives to honor that.
The Bonds of Family
Balancing the responsibilities family members have to take care of each other with each individual’s personal dreams is a recurring concern in Dreamland. The dynamic is explored in both Colby and Beverly/Paige’s narratives. The theme also echoes in Morgan’s life story as she struggles to assert her independence with her overprotective parents.
The trauma experienced by Colby’s family makes him hyper-vigilant to protect them from further pain. As a teenager, Colby briefly rebelled against his family. He stopped helping at the farm and joined a band, the youngest in the group. When the band fell apart, he returned to working at the farm and was there to see his aunt go through the loss of her partner. His uncle’s death was not only a personal loss for Angie but also a professional one, as the couple ran the farm together. Though running the farm preoccupied them during Colby’s childhood, he cannot forget that his aunt and her husband opened their home to Paige and Colby when they had no one else, and they treated them well. If it were only a matter of running the farm, Colby could conceivably find someone to supplement his role, leaving him with options to explore music, but Colby also has a responsibility to Paige, who he identifies as the person who raised him and who he considers his most trusted advocate. According to Colby, Paige saved his life, and he cannot leave her behind to pursue his own interests knowing that she needs his support. The traumatic loss of Colby’s mother to suicide and his uncle to a heart attack has left him desperate to keep his sister and aunt safe, but in doing so, he’s denied himself the life he truly wants.
In her narrative, Beverly/Paige repeatedly expresses despair over having failed her son, Tommie. The narrative does not specify whether this is because her son was killed, because of her troubled relationship with his father, because Tommie had to see his mother suffer in the way she saw her own mother suffer, or a combination of all of these feelings. The novel suggests that the balance Paige needs to achieve is committing to her own healing and choosing life even though she has suffered the loss of her husband and child.
To a less extreme extent, Morgan also faces potential limitations imposed on her by family bonds. In Morgan’s case, her mother does not want her to leave Chicago for Nashville to pursue music—a career her mother believes has little chance of success. Instead, she wants to keep her daughter safe and close, repeatedly suggesting that Morgan take a teaching job close to home rather than uproot herself. Morgan’s strong will to achieve her dreams enables her to push through the temptation to stay emotionally safe by avoiding the possibility for pain and disappointment. She’s reconciled to the possibility of failure, as long as she can say that she did everything she could to achieve her dreams.
For Morgan, Colby, and Paige, living meaningful and productive lives depends on seeing themselves as deserving of a meaningful and happy life. Colby uses his love for his family as an escape, allowing him to put off confronting what he really wants for his life and seeking fulfilment in it, even if it requires compromise. Opening himself up to love allows him to begin to believe he is a person worth loving, a person worthy of pursuing their own dreams. Paige’s feelings of failure as a mother, the trauma of losing her son and the stigmatization she experiences as a result of her mental health landscape trigger feelings of shame and unworthiness that become overwhelming in the midst of her psychosis. Conversely, Morgan—who comes from a place of emotional privilege—provides a foil to both Colby and Paige with her unfailing belief in her abilities and drive to succeed. Had she been less driven, Morgan could have sacrificed her dream to play it safe, as her mother wanted.
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