Kay Boyle's Winter Night

Every girl needs a mother. Winter Night by Kay Boyle is about a young girl named Felicia who lives in a New York apartment and has everything she could want, except her mother works all day and goes out most nights leaving Felicia with night sitters. The night sitter who visits Felicia on the night the story takes place was in a concentration camp and is remembering a little girl, much like Felicia, who she had met three years before on the same date. By contrasting the anniversary girl, who lacks basic necessities and is in a concentration camp to Felicia, who has luxuries and lives in a New York apartment, Boyle suggests that all girls need a mother’s love and affection.
Felica, who has money and necessities of life still desires the love

The anniversary girl used to have “a mother, real mother, but the mother had to go away"(3). The anniversary girl lost her mother to another concentration camp and even if the night sitter tries to fill that position she can never be her real mother. The anniversary girl lacks basic necessities because the camps do not have“any soap”, “water to wash in", or "any toothbrushes or toothpaste"(4). The anniversary girl"did not have any dresses except the little skirt and pullover"(2). The anniversary girl lacked luxuries, but “they are not crying because they don’t have something to eat. They are crying because their mothers have gone away.”(3) The anniversary girl has nothing, but the thing she desires most is her mother because she needs her mother’s affection to feel safe and secure despite the lack of necessities. The night sitter explains that “the little girl became my little girl because her mother went away”(3). Even though the anniversary girl’s mother’s love can not be replaced she still needs someone to help her feel safe. The anniversary girl helps convey the message that even when you have nothing and are starving you still yearn for the love of a mother more than anything