Post your personal response to one of the two analyses of Sarah Orne Jewett's The Country of the Pointed Firs. Craft a paragraph that clearly identifies which interpretation you chose and communicates your agreement or disagreement in the topic sentence. Support your topic sentence with specific examples from the “Mrs. Todd” section of The Country of the Pointed Firs.
respond to this article:
Deciding to spend the summer at secluded Dunnet Landing in order to work on her writing, the narrator finds the seemingly taciturn villagers only too willing to confide to her the important events in their lives and in the life of the community. The various character sketches establish the sense of place, a connection to nature, and the feeling of loss as story after story reveals a missed or thwarted opportunity.
The inhabitants of Dunnet Landing include both those who seem competent and fulfilled in life (such as Mrs. Todd, the herb-gatherer, and her mother, Mrs. Blackett, eighty-six years old but still youthful and open to life) and those who are not (such as Abby Martin who thinks she is Queen Victoria's twin because they were born on the same day, and Joanna Todd who has become a hermit after being jilted by her lover). The narrator's comments on their stories universalize the characters and their feelings.
The novel's plot emerges both from the narrator's stay at Mrs. Todd's house and from various past events in the lives of the characters she encounters. It is this interweaving which creates the texture of the novel and moves it away from the realm of a short story collection. Jewett's story primarily focuses on the women in the community and honors the lives of the elderly, but in a natural way since the loss of sea trade has limited work for the young. Despite the stagnation and decay present, the novel represents the old ways as worthy and important and their loss as lamentable.