“At the Breakfast Table”

ONE OF NORMAN ROCKWELL'S GIFTS is his ability to bring fresh life to subjects that have become hackneyed. The scene that he treats here is a hoary one. At the breakfast table a wife finds herself isolated from her husband, who has buried himself in his newspaper. It is one of the oldest situations in the book. Even in 1930, when this was painted, the average reader of the Post must have encountered dozens of variations on it. Rockwell approaches the theme with what almost amounts to a sense of reverence. The joke speaks for itself, so he does not attempt to overstate it but instead addresses himself to the poignancy of the situation.

What he does, in effect, is to take the joke seriously. All his sympathy is directed toward the wife. Her pose tells us a good deal about her feelings. She is pressed up against the table as if she longs for physical contact with her husband. Her face expresses resignation but not yet despair.

This marriage, we feel, has only recently entered this phase. It is left to us to decide where this breakfast scene will lead. It is perhaps worth noting, however, that it was painted at a point in Rockwell's life when he had recently been divorced by his first wife.