Unproblematic Domestic Bliss and Great Camps

Through his exaggerated use of hazy highlight and unrealistic glow, Thomas Kinkade creates quaint tableaus of American nostalgia. His work fundamentally reveals distorted depictions of cottages nestled within the natural world, filtered through the gaze of “unproblematic domestic bliss,” as astutely noted by Onno. A similar haze of traditional Americana seems to cloud the Great Camps of the Adirondacks, and while Kinkade paintings portray obvious falsities, the domestic bliss presented in The Truth and Legend of Lily Martindale seems more temptingly consumable.

While reading the novel I hoped Lily’s role as a Great Camp caretaker might present the possibility of rupturing a patriarchal space, with Lily acting as an active agent in a masculine sphere. Instead, in her hermitage Lily seemed to centrally orbit in this traditional space of domestic bliss. Perhaps the most fundamental ‘legend’ and myth of the novel is thus that of the Great Camp itself as an accessible place where families are endlessly happy and immersed in tradition, straight out of a Kinkade painting, singing hymns in holy light. The novel is as unaware of its underlying context of wealth as avid supporters of Great Camps seem to be of the problematic themes that the places reproduce and reify. To write about the rich while not knowing you’re writing about the rich is problematic, just as the unselfconscious patriarchal conservatism, masculine dominance, and appropriation of animals as a symbols of power and wealth is rooted in deeply problematic Great Camp traditions.

And yet, I wonder why criticism along this vein seems to be absent in discourse about these institutions. I find it perplexing and unsettling that the pride owners and supporters of Great Camps feel in preserving tradition manifests in their minds as a utilitarian duty – that they believe their efforts contribute to the greater beneficial ‘good’ in the Adirondacks. Perhaps this notion of cultural work is an unconscious effort to downplay their wealth, but the context of the stark wealth disparity of the Adirondacks makes this privilege-blindness feel all the more disconcerting. 

At Camp Wenonah, once Dennis Phillips presented the case and the mock trial began, I watched a table of old white men in front of me finish 3 bottles of wine throughout the first 40 minutes of his speech. I was perplexed both by this scene and that something seemingly so banal and unimportant as a singular person canoeing down a stretch of water could amount to such serious and deliberated discussion. It quickly emerged that the significance of ownership as a marker of masculine authority is perhaps foundational in Adirondack private and public land disputes and discourses. I felt like an intruder in an overly masculine space flanked with animal busts and racist paraphernalia - a true celebration of “authentic Adirondack tradition.”