Summer, Part One
The first quote that stood out to me is, "Poor and ignorant as she was, and knew herself to be-humblest of the humble in North Dormer, where to come from the Mountain was the worst disgrace-yet in her narrow world she had always ruled." (p.13) I really like this quote because it really did make me feel good. the mountain has this horrible reputation as being a place where trash and dirt poor people live. Charity knows that she comes from this place, and she still still was ok in her mind. With this quote I just felt that she was saying that she knows where she comes from, she isn't ashamed; in fact she is proud she overcame that horrible place. Who cares if she had help from lawyer Royall, fact is she did it!
The second quote that really stuck out was, "...I'm going to lose my job, and I wanted it more'n anyone in the village, becasue I haven't got anybody belonging to me, the way other folks have." (p.31). This quote really stuck out to me because it contrasts the other quote so much. I feel like she is saying yeah I rose above the mountain, but I still don't have anything. It made me really sad because if the library is all she has, and she treats that job with hardly any respect, what her life really means to her. I mean if that is all I had I would devote so much to it, spend so much time making it better for everyone.
The second quote that really stuck out was, "...I'm going to lose my job, and I wanted it more'n anyone in the village, becasue I haven't got anybody belonging to me, the way other folks have." (p.31). This quote really stuck out to me because it contrasts the other quote so much. I feel like she is saying yeah I rose above the mountain, but I still don't have anything. It made me really sad because if the library is all she has, and she treats that job with hardly any respect, what her life really means to her. I mean if that is all I had I would devote so much to it, spend so much time making it better for everyone.
posted by Tarah at 8:23 PM
1 Comments:
Summer part II
In response to your post about the passage on page 31:
“…and she would find herself as much alone on the Mountain as anywhere else in the world. The sense of unescapable isolation was all she could feel for the moment….”158
“But how could she leave her only treasure with that evil woman? She wanted it for her baby: she meant it, in some mysterious way, to be a link between Harney’s child and its unknown father.” 188
These are just some of the passages I think relate to the one you chose. At first glance, they may seem distantly—if at all—related, but these and others contribute to the isolated woman narrative shown in Charity.
Your quote shows that, even in the beginning of the novel, Charity realizes she doesn’t have anyone to really depend on. She is quite alone, and needs the library job to establish some sort of independence from the drunken Mr. Royall. The library job is her first claim to isolation. The job in itself requires being alone for two hours a day. Charity mentions that no one ever comes into the library. She is isolated from others physically and mentally. She needs the job to save money to get away from the small town life that confines her, which is a separate narrative all together. You mention that she doesn’t treat her job with much respect, and that that fact correlates with her lack of respect for her own life. I partially disagree. She does, in the beginning, seem to disrespect her job. She gets better about it after her position is challenged. I also see that Charity is possessive of her library job, which speaks to her proud and independent lifestyle.
The passages that I quoted earlier relate to your passage because they show similar personality traits from Charity.
The first is from when Charity goes to see her mother, who recently died. Charity had resorted to her last hope…she was pregnant and alone, she felt her mom was the only person who may be able to help her. Charity feels even more alone once she learns her mother has died. All of her hopes exhausted, Charity must fall back on her ability to rely on herself—something learned partially through the library job.
The second is from Charity’s trip back to the doctor to get her brooch back. Charity has a choice between keeping Mr. Royall’s money to spend on fancy clothes or getting back Harney’s present. I think she chose the later because it made her feel like she was still special to Harney. It was something that his new wife could not take away. IF she had spent the money on clothes, Royall would have been beating out Harney (as far as purchasing material goods goes) in the competition for Charity. Charity also mentions she wanted to pass it on to her baby so that the baby would have something from her real father. Charity knows that she will have to raise the baby isolated from its father. Although she is now married, Charity is still isolated because she does not have any feelings towards Royall, now is the child his. She has more security, but will never be able to escape. I think that correlates with your passage because Charity could never have saved enough money from the library job to leave, but it gave her a false sense of independence.
These passages all work together, with others, to show the isolated woman narrative in Summer.
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