In Kent Haruf's Plainsong, Ike and Bobby are important characters through the story. They are first introduced as being neglected and abandoned by their mother. You soon see how independent they are, as they have a job, and go to school and basically live life without parental help. They face many problems in the book, and their close relationship with each other helps them overcome all these obstacles, and make them stronger people. Through constant …showed first 75 words of 741 total…

…showed last 75 words of 741 total…they simply left. Their mother was as dead to them as she could be, but they took it like adults and symbolically buried their mother's coins in the dirt next to the train tracks. After Mrs. Stearns died, they went out on horseback on a journey to go outside of Holt. Their journey on the highway symbolized their strive for independence, and there is no end in sight to this rough, uneven road of adolescence.