Voyager: Vocation (Roger and Claire)

Following closely on all of the literacy moments in Ch. 7, Roger, thinking about how he stepped into his role as scholar after his uncle and adoptive father, the Reverend Wakefield, and how Fiona stepped into the role as housekeeper after her grandmother Mrs. Graham, considers vocation as a possible hereditary inclination:

     It made one wonder, he thought, as he went into the study. In the old days, when a man’s son usually followed his father’s profession, was that only a matter of convenience— wanting to keep the business in the family— or was there some sort of family predisposition for some kinds of work? Were some people actually born to be smiths, or merchants, or cooks— born to an inclination and an aptitude, as well as to the opportunity?  (101)

He provides for exception, but seems to rest on the idea that certain families do have a predisposition to a certain vocation:

      Clearly it didn’t apply to everyone; there were always the people who left their homes, went a-wandering, tried things hitherto unknown in their family circles. If that weren’t so, probably there would be no inventors, no explorers; still, there seemed to be a certain affinity for some careers in some families, even in these restless modern times of widespread education and easy travel. (101-102)

As this contemplation comes right after Roger's condescending (but affectionate) regard for Fiona as not really literate by his definitions, and after his memory of Mrs. Graham "manning the stove, supplying the old man's bodily needs during bouts of late night scholarship, just as Fiona was now doing for [Roger]" this might not register as very positive.  After all, a hereditary predisposition to a certain kind of work forms a rather neat justification for limited social mobility.  If people are inclined to keep menial work in the family, why should social mobility be an issue?  And in this case, it means that he gets a really great housekeeper (who might have aspired to more through her designs on Roger).  It might be such moments that Roger seem a rather uninteresting character--at least to this reader!  I actually think he has quite a fan following, but when he is introduced in Dragonfly and Voyager, he is defined by his somewhat stuffy scholarliness--something he doesn't ever quite shake--and his attraction to Brianna.  I read Roger as another contrast between 18th Century men and 20th Century men, not unlike Frank Randall--and this develops more later.  But unlike Frank Randall, Roger is exposed to, and feels the pull of, that vivid physicality that Claire finds in Jamie, which we assume will redeem him.

It is Claire who pulls Roger out of his contemplation, asking about his thoughts, and in response to his question about "how people become what they are," and how she became a doctor, for example, asks him how he came to be a historian (102).  For his part, Roger opts for nurture, not nature:

     “I grew up in the midst of it all; I was ferreting round the Highlands in search of artifacts with my father from the time I could read. I suppose it just seemed natural to keep doing it.” (102)

Claire, who did not grow up around doctors, nevertheless claims a similar experience, but it registers very differently:

“Well, it was something like that for me,” she said. “It wasn’t so much that I suddenly decided I must become a doctor— it was just that I suddenly realized one day that I’d been one for a long time— and then I wasn’t, and I missed it.” (102)

She elaborates, drawing on her experiences in World War II and in 18th Century Scotland and France:

“I’d seen Paree,” she said softly. She looked up from her hands, alert and present, but with the traces of memory in her eyes, fixed on Roger with the clarity of a second sight. “And a lot of other things besides. Caen and Amiens, Preston, and Falkirk, the Hôpital des Anges and the so-called surgery at Leoch.  I’d been a doctor, in every way there is— I’d delivered babies, set bones, stitched wounds, treated fevers  …” She trailed off, and shrugged. “There was a terrible lot I didn’t know, of course. I knew how much I could learn— and that’s why I went to medical school. But it didn’t really make a difference, you know.” She dipped a finger into the whipped cream floating on her cocoa, and licked it off. “I have a diploma with an M.D. on it— but I was a doctor long before I set foot in medical school.”

The sense of doing what is "natural" or comes naturally is common between Roger and Claire--and, by proxy, between Frank (whose profession Roger shares) and Claire.  They choose their professions because the profession simply means the continuation of something that feels "natural," as Roger says--though it could be argued that a profession is artificial, not natural.  But as they describe what natural means, a difference emerges.  Roger feels that scholarship seems natural because he accompanied Rev. Wakefield as a lad.  Claire feels it is natural because she has already done it.  And when she doesn't do it, she misses it.  To be a doctor is, to Claire, a part of her being.  For Roger, it seems as though being a historian is simply a matter of habit.  Roger will have a long and difficult road to real discernment.

But next time, Frank...

Gabaldon, Diana (2004-10-26). Voyager (Outlander). Random House, Inc.. Kindle Edition.