A White Heron Analytical Essay

In this excerpt from “A White Heron,” Sarah Orne Jewett tells of a young girl, Sylvia, climbing a tree as high as she can and staring out over the world from on top. Through her use of birdlike imagery, a varying narrative pace, and unique point of view, Jewett presents Sylvia as a young heroine conquering a small piece of the world.
The passage immediately begins with a long sentence in lines one through three. The measure of this sentence represents the overwhelming size of the pine tree in the woods. Jewett then tells readers that “Sylvia knew it well.” Succeeding a very long sentence with one with only four words contrasts the size of young Sylvia with the size of the tree. She is miniature in comparison to the great pine that she wishes to climb. While the tree may be larger than she, Sylvia “had always believed that whoever climbed to the top of it could see the ocean” and wishes to ascend. The young girl begins climbing the white oak tree “with utmost bravery” in the dark of night, while the tree stands asleep. Long sentences and punctuation slow the pace of Sylvia’s climb and demonstrate the momentary pauses she must take. Jewett also describes Sylvia like a conquerer of “the great enterprise” and a “housebreaker.”

Though the climb up the oak tree was easy, Sylvia quickly must take “the daring step across into the old pine-tree.” The oak tree is comparable to a glorious stepping stone in Sylvia’s life that she must pass in order to achieve greater things.

In this transitional moment, she must fight for her right to continue the journey up the tree. Jewett further highlights Sylvia’s frailty and “thin little fingers” against the tree’s “great stem.” Like any hero or heroin, Sylvia has to experience some kind of change in order to arrive at her destination. Among the “sharp dry twigs” that “caught and held...and scratched her” Sylvia becomes like a bird and is accepted by the pine

tree.
While she previously had been attacked by the permanent residents of the sleeping pine, following the transition, Sylvia is guided upward by the newly awakened tree. The tree seems to “lengthen itself upward” while the twigs hold themselves “steadily” so as not to make her fall. The narrator allows readers a unique understanding of how the tree views Sylviaas they appear to be someone who understand the importance of what Sylvia has just accomplished. Though she had previously struggled for her place in the tree, Sylvia is now a child of this pine like the birds who make their nests in its branches. Jewett further likens the young girl to a bird when she describes Sylvia as a “solitary gray-eyed child” and later details the “gray feathers” of the birds around her. As the passage comes to a close, Sylvia reaches the crown of the tree and peers out over it’s leaves.