Critical Analysis Of Sarah Ensor's The Country Of The Pointed Firs

A writer arrives at Dunnet Landing, a seaside village east of Maine. She would reside as a border on the home of Mrs. Almira Todd, an herbalist. Later on, she rents the village schoolhouse, seeking privacy to work on writing for the rest of summer. One by one, she meets with the other townsfolk of Dunnet Landing and its nearby islands. The villagers welcome her as one of their own. As one nostalgic season is nearing its end, she says farewell to the people who sheltered her. The novella ends with reflection of her experiences at The Country of Pointed Firs.

The Country of the Pointed Firs is a turn of the century novel that tells of the story of a woman and her association with the members of a picturesque rural community in Maine. The small

Writers have all taken diverse perspectives in drawing understanding of the story. Strategic analyses between reviews will aid in establishing not simply the good or the bad points of the novel, but also, the critic’s take on the message being imparted by the story.

The paper aims to analyze critical essays that examine the novel “The Country of the Pointed Firs”. Based from the material collected, the researcher further analyze and explore Sarah Ensor’s argument about the “spinster” from her review the “Spinster Ecology: Rachel Carson, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Nonproductive Futurity”. It will then be contrasted from Heather Love’s book, “Feeling Backward: Loss and Politics of Queer History”. Sarah Ensor subscribes to a different teleological approach when discussing the spinster ecology and nonproductive futility in Sarah Orne Jewett’s novel, The Country of Pointed Firs. Her review of the turn of the century novel, depicted the prevailing sociopolitical issues of the era. Ensor’s discussion is centered on the Spinster as an archetype of stewardship, or so she goes on in this statement: someone who tends the future without contributing directly to it (Ensor

Indulging in a sociological perspective, she writes about the following subjects: feminism, white race, race suicide, and the elderly women in society. The Country of the Pointed Firs was written during the last years of the 19th century and on the onset of the 20th century. The time it was written was a period of worldwide societal shifts. The initial issue brought forth by Jackson in her reading of the novel reflected concerns regarding the perpetuation of the white race (Jackson