Guitar Bains is Milkman Dead’s best
friend, and this has been the case for quite some time. They grew up together, and even at the age of
thirty years old still hang out regularly.
So, considering the strong bond that exists between the two characters,
it seems strange that Guitar would come to kill Milkman, even taking into
account the extensive changes that both of the characters experienced as they
grew up.
Even stranger is how these actions
contradict his earlier ones so much. For
example, Guitar didn’t react in a super negative way when Milkman told him
about the incident where he got Henry Porter kicked out of his house. That, to me, seemed to be a fairly major and
problematic event, since it put one of the members of the Seven Days in
jeopardy, and I would have expected Guitar to do something violent towards
Milkman then if at all.
I suppose it is likely that Guitar
became more and more suspicious about Milkman’s motives. I think that it is important to note that Guitar
never saw any of Milkman’s (rather sudden) character development, since it all
occurred after Milkman decided to go for the gold solo. I think that it would be reasonable to assume
that Guitar became to get more and more worried about whether he’d get his share
of gold. After all, doing something like
this for himself was new territory for Milkman. Would he suddenly forget his promise with
Guitar upon seeing the gold? Guitar had
no way of knowing.
Another interesting tidbit is how
Guitar puts down his rifle and decides to fight Milkman in hand-to-hand combat
after seeing him rise up and shout over to him.
I think that, since he knew Milkman for so long, he was able to spot
some semblance of change in the way he acted, and out of respect for this decided
to fight him fairly. I certainly could
have imagined it, but the way I read them, Guitar’s words “My man. My main man” seemed to carry an element of nostalgia.
But the book never explicitly mentions
his motives, both when he comes to shoot Milkman, and when he suddenly decides
to fight him hand-to-hand. What do you
guys think? What could be the reason
behind Guitar’s change of heart?
