In Sarah Orne Jewett’s short story, The White Heron, the protagonist is a young girl named Sylvia. Sylvia is nine years old and still very much a child, but during the course of the story she begins to get her first awareness of her womanhood and femininity. She experiences her first sexual attraction to a male. While this awareness may only be present in her subconscious, she is conflicted and vacillates between her love of nature, and increasing interest in the young visitor. This confusion is typical of the timeless dilemma of head versus heart. Nevertheless, Sylvia is forced to make a final decision by the end of Jewett’s tale. The choice: whether or not to not reveal the secret location of the white herons’ nest to the bird collector. This choice, is one that Jewett impresses upon readers in a gentle suspense, will change the course of Sylvie’s future. The reader learns about Sylvia’s fondness for her current surroundings in the second paragraph where for Sylvia, “…it seemed as if she never had been alive at all before she came to live at the farm.” and “that this was a beautiful place to live in, and she never should wish to go home.” This affinity for nature is further …show more content…
She undergoes a transformational journey when she bravely climbs, the primordial pine that stands like a guardian of the forest. She believes that scaling this ancient landmark wil be rewarded in a vision of the world, the ocean, and ultimately a revelation - the nest. “It was almost too real and too great for the childish heart to bear.” (nineteenth paragraph) Sylvia returns from this quest exhausted, bedraggled, and baptized in pine sap. When grilled by her grandmother and the young man, she is mute. She is unable to accept opportunity, recalling the sound of the wind in the pine and her shared sunrise with the white heron. She is forever
Harwood’s poem Barn Owl, expertly conveys the poem with emotion and tells the story of a young girl losing her childish innocence by rebelling against her father and killing a barn owl. Using a variety of literary techniques, the poem has the ability to provide the audience a visual image of the scene. Expressed in great detail, the themes of innocence, death and rebelling against authority within the poem offer the audience another intriguing poem written by Gwen
There are also differences in the two stories. Sylvia is at home with the birds, beasts and almost all the creatures in the forest, she regards them as her family members, and the forest as her home. Like the author mentioned, “…but their feet were familiar with the path, and it was no matter whether their eyes could see it or not.” (118) Nevertheless, the man who build the fire is a newcomer with little experience. Sylvia’s grandmother advises her to give the bird’s location for the money which will lead to the death of the bird, whereas the survivor from Sulfur Creek advises the man to have a trail mate, a precaution that will be life-saving. The suggestion of “The old-timer on Sulphur Creek was right, he thought in the moment of
Yet after climbing the tree and realizes the importance of the white heron. The choice she has over the heron’s life is that same she has over her own. She can sacrifice her own wants for the hunters, or choose to live the life that is most authentically her. It is at this moment when Sylvia is confronted with the concept of sexuality and though she understands what it is, she wants no part of it. This is asexuality.
Elizabeth George Speare’s The Witch of Blackbird Pond. Elizabeth George Speare’s The Witch of Blackbird Pond shows the maturation process of a young girl from Barbados. Kit’s life in Barbados is shattered when her grandfather dies. As a result of his death, Kit is forced to leave the island and her carefree lifestyle.
Throughout history, the story of womankind has evolved from struggles to achievements, while some aspects of the lives of women have never changed. Poet Dorianne Laux writes about the female condition, and women’s desire to be married and to have a home and children. She also seems to identify through her poetry with the idea that women tend to idealize the concept of marriage and settling down and she uses her poetry to reach out to the reader who may have similar idyllic views of marriage or the married lifestyle. Though Dorianne Laux’s poem “Bird” reads very simply, it is actually a metaphor for an aspect of this female condition.
Our first introduction to these competing sets of values begins when we meet Sylvia. She is a young girl from a crowded manufacturing town who has recently come to stay with her grandmother on a farm. We see Sylvia's move from the industrial world to a rural one as a beneficial change for the girl, especially from the passage, "Everybody said that it was a good change for a little maid who had tried to grow for eight years in a crowded manufacturing town, but, as for Sylvia herself, it seemed as if she never had been alive at the all before she came to live at the farm"(133). The new values that are central to Sylvia's feelings of life are her opportunities to plays games with the cow. Most visibly, Sylvia becomes so alive in the rural world that she begins to think compassionately about her neighbor's geraniums (133). We begin to see that Sylvia values are strikingly different from the industrial and materialistic notions of controlling nature. Additionally, Sylvia is alive in nature because she learns to respect the natural forces of this l...
The story is about a friendly hunter who comes to a budding girl named Sylvia for help to find a bird for his collection. He offers her ten dollars. At first, she agrees because of the impression the hunter makes on her. Later, she has a revelation through her love for the forest and neglects to tell him where the bird is. Sylvia represents the purity of innocence and has a bond with the natural world. Many of Sylvia’s thoughts are associated with the ability to be free. This exemplifies the women’s rights activism that was happening in the 19th century. Sarah Orne Jewett develops her theme of the change from innocence to experience in her short story “The White Heron” through the use of imagery, characterization, and symbolism.
Sylvia uses her daydreams as an alternative to situations she doesn't want to deal with, making a sharp distinction between reality as it is and reality as she wants to perceive it. For instance, as they ride in a cab to the toy store, Miss Moore puts Sylvia in charge of the fare and tells her to give the driver ten percent. Instead of figurin...
She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which some one was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves. ( This description of the scenery is very happy, usually not how one sees the world after hearing devastating news of her husbands death.)
“If happy I can be I will, if suffer I must I can” (William Faulkner). Have you ever experienced a hard time in your life, but you use determination and courage to overcome it? The book, Catherine Called Birdy, is about a young girl named Catherine who experiences, torture, pains and sorrow. Catherine is the lady of manor of her household who does all the lady-task, betrothed to a man named Shaggy Beard and her family physical abuses her and tries to overcome it all. Catherine starts to experience the troubles in her life but goes after the things she wants, not what her father wants. In the book, Catherine Called Birdy, by Karen Cushman is about how Catherine cannot escape her marriage, lady-task and family.
A devoted mother, Anne Bradstreet is concerned with her children as she watches them grow up. “Or lest by Lime-twigs they be foil'd, or by some greedy hawks be spoil'd” Anne Bradstreet uses to describe her fear for her children. Not wanting to see her children suffer, Anne Bradstreet turns to God to help her children. Bradstreet imagines her bird’s being stuck on a branch and a hawk eating them, a grim image of all of her sacrifice being lost in a single moment. “No cost nor labour did I spare” describes how much Anne loves her children.
The females begin responding “stiffly” rather than “quietly”(7) as before. This adjective usage serves to support the speech even more by allowing readers to see the progression from silence to a bold rebellion in the women regarding their husbands, for “by hiding the canary Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are also going against their husbands” (Bee2). Indeed, this act was the major act of defiance that secured the women’s strengthened devotions to each other rather than their husbands. Peters especially undergoes a drastic transformation when she eventually joins in as “support of her fellow oppressed women” (Block B 1). When, at the climax of the story, the bird is hidden from the men in the sentimental tin box, Glaspell exhibits the tension with the selection of detail. She chooses to focus on the clammy hands of Mrs. Peters as she stuffs the tin away and the quivering voice of Mrs. Hale as she denies knowing any information about the crime. The descriptions of the seemingly miniscule and weakening objects around her house match the “quiet desperation” (Schotland 3) Foster repressed until it overflowed the night before. Considering that the adjectives show how burdensome it is for the women to conceal the evidence, it truly demonstrates how strong the relationships between them has grown based
From here we start to get the impression that Sylvia is becoming attached to the young man, where now she may be able to overcome her fear of mankind. However, to do so would be a sin, as she would betray the natural world she so much loves. Sylvia must make in important and life changing decision by choosing between her home and the young
...usting civilization upon it? (P. Miller, p.207). With all this, the author has achieved the vividness implication that aggressive masculine modernization is a danger to the gentle feminine nature. In the end of the story, Sylvia decides to keep the secret of the heron and accepts to see her beloved hunter go away. This solution reflects Jewett?s hope that the innocent nature could stay unharmed from the urbanization.
... discussing the pine tree the white heron lives in. Jewett says “...at the farther edge of the woods, where the land was highest, a great pine-tree stood, the last of its generation” (Jewett). While this quote has symbolism of the pine tree, there are two different meanings of the tree. For one, it shows the goodness of nature and the clearness of thought. The pine tree can also represent the climax of the decision Sylvia has to make. “Sylvia can view everything from the top of the pine tree and it splits in two showing two paths Sylvia could go down in her life” (Norton). Since this is where the white heron lives, the pine tree is probably the most important part of the setting in the short story. Both of these meanings of the pine tree relate to Sylvia choosing nature over human. As a result, Sylvia decided not to tell the hunter where the white heron was settled.