Riders of the Purple Sage Literary Elements

Western, Adventure

Southwestern Utah, early spring and late summer of 1871

An anonymous narrator who tells the story in a third-person point of view, and allows the reader to delve into the mind of each character, exploring the subtleties that the reader cannot find at face-value. Point of view is neutral, as the narrator often upholds both sides when the reader would have put them down.

The tone and mood of the story usually represented the thoughts and feelings of the main character. At first the tone and mood could be described as hesitant and indecisive. As the story goes on it morphs into bitterness, violence, and then ends with a reminiscent tone.

The protagonist is Jane Withersteen who is kind and compassionate to all despite their faith, while the antagonist is Elder Tull, a malicious Mormon elder who oppresses anyone who opposes him.

Jane has to decide between staying blindly faithful to the church and the Mormon elders or whether to change and accept people despite a difference in faith. When she goes against the church, it leads to continued harassment and eventually violence between Jane's side and the church's side.

Jane realizes she can no longer live a life in the place she had called home since the day she was born. Fleeing with Lassiter, first on horseback then on foot, they escape into Surprise Valley and block the only entrance to the valley with a massive boulder, thus sealing her from the rest of the world and the Mormon church, effectively ending the conflict.

In chapter 1, Jane had befriended a poor Gentile, a non-Mormon named Bern Venters, who was in desperate need of help and showed him love and affection. However, this act went against the the ideas of the Mormon elders as well as their religion. Elder Tull ordered his group of men to forcibly drag Bern Venters from where he was stay and whip him to "within an inch of his life." This singular event foreshadowed the violence and oppression the Mormon elders would use as tools against any who opposed them.

Jane finds out her own workers and servants are spying on her for the Mormon elders, leaving her bewildered and bitter. Slowly, day by day, her servants start leaving her ranch and never returning, not even asking for their wages. This not only showed Jane's separation from the rest of her community, but understated the severe tactics of deception and trickery the Mormon elders used to achieve their goals.

After thorough analysis and debate, many historians as well as critics of the book agree that Zane Grey, the author of the novel, used a significant amount of allusions to the Mormon religion and made it a focal point of the book. The author went extremely in depth on this topic when alluding to it and even mentioned the persecution this specific group of Mormons had faced in Ohio, because of their beliefs in polygamy. This led to a migration of Mormons from the region to Utah from about 1845 to 1857. Grey's allusions and references to the Mormon religion, and often its flaws, help provide context for the story and allow new conflicts to emerge and push the plot along. While he did include many references to the Mormon religion, many have argued that it could simply be a guise to criticize all organized religions, without offending the majority of his readers at the time by using the less-prevalent religion of the Mormons. Examples of this allusion to organized religion can be seen throughout the entirety of the novel. The blind faith towards the church and the elders no matter what they do or say leads to conflicts. Oppressing and attacking other people simply because they have a different religion leads to conflict. Giving too much power to a single authority, such as the church and Elder Tull, to represent the entire religion leads to conflict.

The setting of the book takes place in the wilderness wasteland of southwestern Utah and the book repeatedly depicts scenes of the wild and untamed nature of the surroundings. This idea of roughness and wildness in turn transfers to the people of the Mormon town and represents the lawlessness of their society.

Organized religion is supposed to be spiritual and warm, something that people turn to in times of need, especially those who are poor. However, the organized religion in the book is the opposite and they believe that by attacking those outside of their faith they are strengthening their own religion when they are really destroying it and its ultimate meaning.

Zane Grey draws a parallel between Milly Erne, who is the long-lost sister of Lassiter, and between Jane in chapter 2. Milly was forcibly taken from her family by a group of Mormons and forced to live in a Mormon society, where she was harassed. Jane was born into the society, but she faces the same persecution as Milly did because of the Mormon church and ends up hating it. In the end, Milly and Jane represent a very similar person.

The author uses synecdoche when he instead of referring to a horse and its rider as what they are, he refers to them as hoofs on the ground. He also uses metonymy when he repeatedly refers to the church as the bell tower.

In chapter 12, the "invisible hand" is referred to as an entity that can consciously think and perform actions.