The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon

The book The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon written by Stephen King was evaluated this week by looking for determinism or free will components. This book is about a young nine year old girl named Trisha who goes hiking with her brother and mother. When doing so, she steps off the trail for a short moment, and then she quickly becomes lost in the woods. She only has a backpack containing a few items that allows her to survive. She also uses her knowledge about nature learned from either her mother or her school teachers to gather other food and water supplies. Trisha also has a few imaginary and real characters that accompany her throughout her journey through the woods of Maine and New Hampshire.

In the beginning, Trisha is on the hiking path, and this can be compared to determinism. The path was pre-set before Trisha even came to it; therefore, her initial journey through the woods was determined for her. Trisha then uses free will to step off the path and that decision changes her life. Once she steps off the path, her plan is changed and she now has a new path to follow, which is to either survive or not survive. This new path can be interpreted as having both free will and determinism in it. She uses her free will for small things, like deciding what to eat or how to walk through specific areas of the forest. The God of the Lost is another component in Trisha’s journey that has a more of a determining factor.

The God of the Lost comes in the form of a giant monster with a wasp filled face, but later this monster is revealed only being a bear. The ‘thing’ as Trisha originally called it was watching and following her all throughout her journey through the woods. This ‘thing’ could be interpreted as the one who is planning and controlling Trisha’s journey. It could have been the reason Trisha slept surrounded by trees. Trisha’s path through the woods could have also been driven by her not wanting to be followed or near the creature. So Trisha was going in an unknown direction through the woods, but to her it was known that she was going in a direction that was not the same as the creature. Although, Trisha did decide for herself that she needed to follow a waterway through the woods to insure she will have water, and because she believed it could lead her to people.

Another component of Trisha’s journey was Tom Gordon who is a real person, but Trisha imagined him throughout her journey to keep her company. Originally, I believed that Tom was only a part of Trisha’s journey just to keep her company, but that opinion changed when they reached the posts. In the end, when Trisha found the abandoned post and she was looking for more posts to follow their path. Tom pointed out the next post along her path, which gave her the confidence to follow that path. Tom also encourage Trisha when she was face to face with the God of the Lost because she used Tom’s pitching style. In this moment, Trisha chose to not let the bear kill her, and instead she tried to injure it by pretending to pitch like Tom Gordon.

Since this book has both components of free will and determinism, then it must overall be considered compatibilism. Compatibilism in this book is shown as Trisha having a set path, the original hiking trail, and then her choice of free will to get off the path changed her original plan into taking a new path. In the end, Trisha is on the new determined path, but she uses free work to survive when she’s face to face with the God of the Lost.