Lonesome Dove

Lonesome Dove

by

Larry McMurtry

Clara Allen Character Analysis

Clara Allen is a former love interest of both Augustus McCrae and Jake Spoon. Her parents ran a dry good store in Texas, and she took over the business after they were killed during an attack by Indigenous warriors. Smart and independent, she nevertheless chose to marry an unskilled horse trader named Bob Allen, whom she followed to a homestead near Ogallala, Nebraska. Later, she reveals that she chose Bob because she knew he wouldn’t stray or argue with her. She and Bob establish a successful horse-trading business. They have three sons who die in childhood and two daughters: Sally and Betsey. She hosts travelers like Elmira, Big Zwey, and Luke and not only delivers Martin but takes care of him when Elmira abandons him. Later, she takes in Lorena while the Hat Creek company finishes the drive to Montana. Clara is an honest-talking, strong-willed, and no-nonsense person. She not only runs the homestead but easily takes over the horse-trading business after Bob’s accident and death. She overcomes the tragic loss of her sons and demonstrates remarkable perseverance and grit when she opens herself up to yet another loss by fostering Martin. July Johnson falls in love with her, but she makes it clear that she doesn’t need a man—especially not one who can’t make himself helpful—to take care of her and her family.

Clara Allen Quotes in Lonesome Dove

The Lonesome Dove quotes below are all either spoken by Clara Allen or refer to Clara Allen . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
American Mythology Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1  Quotes

The funny thing about Woodrow Call was how hard he was to keep in scale. He wasn’t a big man—in fact, he was barely middle-sized—but when you walked up and looked him in the eye it didn’t seem that way. Augustus was four inches taller than his partner, and Pea Eye three inches taller yet, but there was no way you could have convinced Pea Eye that Captain Call was the short man. Call had him buffaloed, and in that respect Pea had plenty of company. If a man meant to hold his own with Call it was necessary to keep in mind that Call wasn’t as big as he seemed. Augustus was the one man in south Texas who could usually keep him in scale, and be built on his advantage whenever he could.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Clara Allen , Pea Eye , Maggie
Page Number: 17
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

[Call] had run with Jake Spoon off and on for twenty years, and liked him well; but the man had always worried him a little, underneath. There was no more likeable man in the west, and no better rider, either; but riding wasn’t everything, and neither was likeableness. Something in Jake didn’t quite stick. Something wasn’t quite consistent. […]

Augustus knew it too. He was a great sponsor of Jake’s and had stayed fond of him although for years they were rivals for Clara Allen […]. But Augustus felt, with Call, that Jake wasn’t long on backbone. When he left the Rangers Augustus said more than once that he would probably end up hung. So far that hadn’t happened, but […] Jake prided himself on pretty horses, and would never ride a horse as hard as the bay had been ridden if trouble wasn’t somewhere behind him.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Jake Spoon, Clara Allen
Page Number: 65
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 75 Quotes

And the thing she most wanted to do was plant flowers—flowers that might bloom in the light. She did plant them, ordering bulbs and seeds from the East. The light brought them up, and then the wind tore them from her. Worse than the dirt she hated the wind. […The] wind was endless and fierce. It renewed itself again and again, curling out of the north to take her flowers from her, petal by petal, until nothing remained but the sad stalks. Clara kept on planting anyway, hiding the flowers in the most protected spots she could find. The wind always found them too, in time, but sometimes the blooms lasted a few days before the petals were blown away. It was a battle she wouldn’t give up on: every winter she read seed catalogues with the girls and described to them the flowers they would have when springtime came.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae, Clara Allen , Sally Allen , Betsey Allen
Page Number: 603
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 88 Quotes

“You beat any woman I ever saw for talking the starch out of a man,” he said, a little perplexed. Despite all the complication, he felt his old love for her returning with its old power. So much feeling flooded him, just looking at her, that he felt shaky. It was a puzzle to him that such a thing could happen, for it was true she had become rather boney and her face had thinned too much, and certainly she was as taxing as a woman could be. And yet the feeling made him shaky.

“Think I’m rough, Gus?” she asked with a smile.

“I ain’t been scorched by lightning, but I doubt it could be hotter than being scorched by you,” he said.

“Still think you’d have been up to being married to me?”

“I don’t know,” he said truthfully.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Lorena Wood, Po Campo , Bob Allen
Page Number: 705-706
Explanation and Analysis:

Sitting in the kitchen with the girls and the baby, Lorena felt happy in a way that was new to her. It stirred in her distant memories of the days she had spent in her grandmother’s house in Mobile when she was four. […] It was her happiest memory, one she treasured so, that in her years of travelling she grew almost afraid to remember it […] She was very afraid of losing her one good, warm memory. […]

But in Clara’s house she wasn’t afraid to remember her grandmother and the softness of the bed. Clara’s house was the kind of house she thought she might live in some day—at least she had hoped to when she was little. But […] she had started living in hotels or little rooms. She slowly stopped thinking of nice houses and the things that went with them, such as little girls and babies.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Clara Allen , Sally Allen , Betsey Allen , Mosby , John Tinkersley, Martin
Page Number: 707
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 101 Quotes

“I’ll put it to you once more, in the plainest terms, Mr. Call,” Clara said. “A live son is more important than a dead friend. Can you understand that?”

“A promise is a promise,” Call said.

“A promise is words—a son is a life,” Clara said. “A life, Mr. Call. I was better fit to raise boys than you’ve ever been, and yet I lost three. I tell you no promise is worth leaving that boy up there, as you have. Does he know he’s your son?”

“I suppose he does—I gave him my horse,” Call said, feeling that it was hell to have her, of all women, talk to him about the matter.

“You horse but not your name?” Clara said. “You haven’t even given him your name?”

“I put more value on the horse,” Call said, turning the dun.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Augustus McCrae, Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 845
Explanation and Analysis:
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Clara Allen Quotes in Lonesome Dove

The Lonesome Dove quotes below are all either spoken by Clara Allen or refer to Clara Allen . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
American Mythology Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1  Quotes

The funny thing about Woodrow Call was how hard he was to keep in scale. He wasn’t a big man—in fact, he was barely middle-sized—but when you walked up and looked him in the eye it didn’t seem that way. Augustus was four inches taller than his partner, and Pea Eye three inches taller yet, but there was no way you could have convinced Pea Eye that Captain Call was the short man. Call had him buffaloed, and in that respect Pea had plenty of company. If a man meant to hold his own with Call it was necessary to keep in mind that Call wasn’t as big as he seemed. Augustus was the one man in south Texas who could usually keep him in scale, and be built on his advantage whenever he could.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Clara Allen , Pea Eye , Maggie
Page Number: 17
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

[Call] had run with Jake Spoon off and on for twenty years, and liked him well; but the man had always worried him a little, underneath. There was no more likeable man in the west, and no better rider, either; but riding wasn’t everything, and neither was likeableness. Something in Jake didn’t quite stick. Something wasn’t quite consistent. […]

Augustus knew it too. He was a great sponsor of Jake’s and had stayed fond of him although for years they were rivals for Clara Allen […]. But Augustus felt, with Call, that Jake wasn’t long on backbone. When he left the Rangers Augustus said more than once that he would probably end up hung. So far that hadn’t happened, but […] Jake prided himself on pretty horses, and would never ride a horse as hard as the bay had been ridden if trouble wasn’t somewhere behind him.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Jake Spoon, Clara Allen
Page Number: 65
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 75 Quotes

And the thing she most wanted to do was plant flowers—flowers that might bloom in the light. She did plant them, ordering bulbs and seeds from the East. The light brought them up, and then the wind tore them from her. Worse than the dirt she hated the wind. […The] wind was endless and fierce. It renewed itself again and again, curling out of the north to take her flowers from her, petal by petal, until nothing remained but the sad stalks. Clara kept on planting anyway, hiding the flowers in the most protected spots she could find. The wind always found them too, in time, but sometimes the blooms lasted a few days before the petals were blown away. It was a battle she wouldn’t give up on: every winter she read seed catalogues with the girls and described to them the flowers they would have when springtime came.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae, Clara Allen , Sally Allen , Betsey Allen
Page Number: 603
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 88 Quotes

“You beat any woman I ever saw for talking the starch out of a man,” he said, a little perplexed. Despite all the complication, he felt his old love for her returning with its old power. So much feeling flooded him, just looking at her, that he felt shaky. It was a puzzle to him that such a thing could happen, for it was true she had become rather boney and her face had thinned too much, and certainly she was as taxing as a woman could be. And yet the feeling made him shaky.

“Think I’m rough, Gus?” she asked with a smile.

“I ain’t been scorched by lightning, but I doubt it could be hotter than being scorched by you,” he said.

“Still think you’d have been up to being married to me?”

“I don’t know,” he said truthfully.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Lorena Wood, Po Campo , Bob Allen
Page Number: 705-706
Explanation and Analysis:

Sitting in the kitchen with the girls and the baby, Lorena felt happy in a way that was new to her. It stirred in her distant memories of the days she had spent in her grandmother’s house in Mobile when she was four. […] It was her happiest memory, one she treasured so, that in her years of travelling she grew almost afraid to remember it […] She was very afraid of losing her one good, warm memory. […]

But in Clara’s house she wasn’t afraid to remember her grandmother and the softness of the bed. Clara’s house was the kind of house she thought she might live in some day—at least she had hoped to when she was little. But […] she had started living in hotels or little rooms. She slowly stopped thinking of nice houses and the things that went with them, such as little girls and babies.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Clara Allen , Sally Allen , Betsey Allen , Mosby , John Tinkersley, Martin
Page Number: 707
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 101 Quotes

“I’ll put it to you once more, in the plainest terms, Mr. Call,” Clara said. “A live son is more important than a dead friend. Can you understand that?”

“A promise is a promise,” Call said.

“A promise is words—a son is a life,” Clara said. “A life, Mr. Call. I was better fit to raise boys than you’ve ever been, and yet I lost three. I tell you no promise is worth leaving that boy up there, as you have. Does he know he’s your son?”

“I suppose he does—I gave him my horse,” Call said, feeling that it was hell to have her, of all women, talk to him about the matter.

“You horse but not your name?” Clara said. “You haven’t even given him your name?”

“I put more value on the horse,” Call said, turning the dun.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Augustus McCrae, Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 845
Explanation and Analysis: