The Luck of Roaring Camp

I choose to discuss “The Luck of Roaring Camp” because of how it made me react to the baby’s untimely fate; as I was sitting on my bed reading for today’s class, I literally threw the book away because I was so mad at how it had ended. Then today in class as we were discussing the story, I asked the question what was it about the story specifically that made me react so strongly to its plot twist? It is a pertinent question I think, because the storyline is so subtle and full of hope that by the time you get to the end you are very heavily emotionally invested in the outcome. And what outcome would be more captivating than the destruction of that object of attention? I’ve noticed this pattern of ending the story with a death or some kind of tragedy in all of the short stories that we have read so far in this class, and probably should have expected something similar in this story, yet it took me completely by surprise.

The intensity in a short story must by necessity build up very quickly. The author only has so many pages in which to write and thus you must quickly get to know the characters enough to care about what ultimately happens to them. Though “the Luck” could indeed have grown up in the camp and become a healthy and happy young boy, this is something that the reader expects and though it would make for a happy ending it isn’t that exciting or captivating. When something unexpected occurs to us, we usually end up trying to figure out why, which leads to a deeper contemplation of the text. If Harte had a deeper meaning he was trying to communicate to the reader, abruptly ending the story is an effective way to spark that.

The biggest thing that I was left wondering after I finished reading this story was what is going to end up happening to these men? They all began to change when the baby came to their camp, cleaning up their lives and their language to make themselves more appropriate company. With the baby dead and gone, will they continue to try to improve themselves as they did when they had “the Luck”? Will they fall back into old habits since they no longer have a motivator? Or will the death of the baby leave them further changed? The story ends before these questions are ever answered, so it may have been intentional on Harte’s part to get the reader to think about what occurs beyond the scope of the text. On top of that, the reader is left to wonder whether the gold brought up by the storm will prove adequate replacement for the loss of the baby. Before Luck came into their lives their money appeared to mostly be spent selfishly and frivolously on gambling and things. As different men then they were previously, will this new wealth be spent sensibly or will it be just another tool for them to fall back into old habits?

The short story format leaves many a question to be answered and is quite useful in demanding deeper reflection upon the material.

The Yellow Wallpaper and Desiree's Baby

Though short stories as a genre are considerably shorter than a full length novel, the manner in which we read them differs considerably and often leads to second or third readings of the text along with careful scrutiny of individual passages. This has been a particularly troublesome genre for me so far since I tend to be a fast reader. Both of our readings this week I have read through, come to the end, and thought to myself "how did that end up happening?" Short stories require much more attention to detail than do novels, which may unveil their secrets over the course of 600 pages.

Though I happen to disagree with our professor that the narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper was dead the entire story, I did benefit from our reading back over of the text and the highlighting of various details that I miss the first time I read through it. What we have read in this genre so far has shown me several parallels between short stories and mystery/thriller movies; you are lead along for most of the story to believe that the plot will resolve itself in a certain manner, but at the end something completely unexpected happens yet is somehow strongly supported by what has already occurred. Both almost always require another viewing or reading, and both usually leave the audience in doubt as to whether the events they witness occurred exactly how they were described by the narrator. Earlier in the story the narrator assumes that the room must have been a nursery at some point, then towards the end exclaims “How those children did tear about here! This bedstead is fairly gnawed!” (Gilman 514). However, only 9 lines later she says that “I tried to life and push it until I was lame, and then I got so angry I bit off a little piece at one corner—but it hurt my teeth” (Gilman 515). Was it really children who had gnawed up the bed before they came to live there? Or was it her all along? Or was it a woman who lived there previously who went through similar circumstances, such as with Sybil in A Whisper in the Dark? Because of the narrators’ psychosis at the end of the story, we cannot ever know for certain. But because of her psychosis, we are persuaded to read over the story again multiple times in order to understand how her condition developed.

Insanity always confuses things when mentioned in a story, even if it does not truly exist as in Desiree’s Baby. When Desiree realizes that her baby is part black, she is told that it means that she must be part black too. She is quick to say “ ‘It is a lie; it is not true, I am white! Look at my hair, it is brown; and my eyes are grey, Armand, you know they are gray. And my skin is fair,’ seizing his wrist. ‘Look at my hand; whiter than yours, Armand,’ she laughed hysterically” (Chopin 519). As he proceeds to throw her out we believe that she is simply crazy and in denial that she is black, with the supporting evidence that no one truly knows who her parents were since she was adopted. But in the end, we learn that it is Armand himself who is half black, and that there was nothing wrong with Desiree to begin with. Again, careful reading shows us that this is true, for example, when Desiree says that her hand is even whiter than Armand’s.

Both pieces speak out strongly against the treatment of women of the time, especially in regard to mental disorders, and both require careful reading to discern all the meaning that exists in their few short pages. 

Week 10 - Little Lord Fauntleroy

I think that we would all like to believe that in an ideal world, an authors’ gender would not be associated with certain stereotypes of writing. But when we found out that Frances Burnett was indeed a woman, too many things about the text suddenly clicked for me to say that the gender of the author did not affect the way the story of Little Lord Fauntleroy was told. Indeed one of my first thoughts upon reading this text was how differently boyhood was depicted from that of Tom Sawyer or Ragged Dick, and I was looking forward to blogging on the topic. Gender of the author does play an important role in the telling of the story, though I think that the difference between the way Tom Sawyer and Little Lord Fauntleroy are told has mostly to do with how Twain based his story on how he remembered boyhood, and Burnett based her story on how she idealized boyhood from the perspective of a mother.

Cedric Errol is presented in Little Lord Fauntleroy as quite different Tom Sawyer or Ragged Dick in their namesake books. Tom is rough, tricky, impulsive, and frequently disobeys his aunt. Dick is wryly humorous, street-smart, and rebellious in a “cool” way. Cedric reminds me much more of Ellen Montgomery than either of these two boys. He is mostly friends with only adults, he cares a great deal for his mother (in fact neither Tom nor Dick had a proper mother), he wears his hair curly and long, and he is finely dressed. I have to imagine that these descriptions of Cedric as such a “beautiful” boy much have sounded effeminate to a 19^th century audience as well as this modern reader, and until we discovered that Frances Burnett was indeed a woman I had wondered at what the intent of creating him like this had been. Now I do not think it is too much of a stretch to compare this story more easily to the didactic tale of The Wide, Wide World than to the other depictions of boyhood we’ve read about so far; Ellen is the ideal daughter, and Cedric seems to be the ideal son.

In fact, Burnett tells us that Cedric’s “greatest charm was this cheerful, fearless, quaint little way of making friends with people.” She goes on to state that “he had never heard an unkind or uncourteous word spoken at home; he had always been loved and caressed and treated tenderly, and so his childish soul was full of kindness and innocent warm feeling” (446). That is certainly a very different description of a young boy than from what the male authors said of their own characters. Well we can see very plainly in Tom Sawyer that Tom causes his aunt no end of grief, and what mother would want to be put through all that with her children? Though we can’t take these texts as artifacts, we can probably argue that Tom is much closer to being a typical boy of the time than is Cedric simply because Burnett could never have experienced boyhood intimately enough to write of it as accurately as Twain or Alger. Little Lord Fauntleroy was probably intended by Burnett to temper troublesome boyish qualities and attempt to make young boys (like young girls) more manageable to a mother.

Week 9 - Tom Sawyer

Tom Sawyer is quite a quotable little book, even from the little that we have read of it so far. Though there exists a plethora of possible blog-able quotes, there was one passage in particular that I felt was worth noting. Right after Tom escapes from Aunt Polly, on page 402 Charles Dickens comes out of the text to tell us that "he was not the Model Boy of the village. He knew the model boy very well though -- and loathed him."

Stopping there, that quote seems largely out of context with the previous dialogue. Out of a rather comical scene featuring one of Tom's many boyish pranks, suddenly he is juxtaposed against some seemingly perfect imaginary being and we are made aware of how strongly he resents this comparison. This passage gives us a brief glimpse inside Tom's head, but is at first seemingly out of context. However we are soon given more insight into these puzzling words upon the entrance of the "citified" boy with an "air about him that ate into Tom's vitals. The more Tom stared at the splendid marvel, the higher he turned up his nose at his finery and the shabbier and shabbier his own outfit seemed to him to grow" (403). This city boy becomes the personification of this "model boy," and we can see that Tom dislikes him instantly because he represents everything that Tom is not. The city boy is wealthy, well-dressed, and well-spoken. He wears shoes on the weekday, and a necktie, whereas Tom does not. Being a confident young lad, Tom takes an instant dislike of the boy probably because his finery throws into stark relief Tom's own ratty clothes and makes him feel self-conscious. Being also proud, having someone make him feel self-conscious cause him to become angry and pick a fight with the boy. It is most likely a move designed to show that boy that he is not better than Tom in all areas, despite the city boys' bragging. 

Tom resents this "model boy." Loathes him even. Not only for the reasons as represented by his encounter with the city boy, but also because the model boy represents a part of the population he doesn't ever see himself resembling. Tom is lazy, he tricks people, lies to his aunt, and gets into a host of other mischief. He wants the glory that comes with being the model boy (such as winning a Bible and impressing the new girl) but doesn't want to work for it. He doesn't think he has the capacity to even be the model boy, so he doesn't try, and just simply lives life his way. Why should he try to fit the image of what everybody else thinks he should be when his tricks and his cleverness win him the same things with less effort? Being crafty is what he is good at, and I know if I were him I would resent being told I have to act a certain way too. To a 12-year-old boy, it must be next to insufferable.

Week 8 - Ragged Dick

One of the first things I noticed about the story Ragged Dick was how different everybody's expectations were for Dick than they were for previous female characters we've read about.  Dicks quick witted and colloquial speech endears him to others rather than provoking a rebuttal. Though he possess numerous faults as stated by the narrator, he is often referred to as "our hero" rather than being offered suggestions on self improvement. His ambition and work ethic are praised; things we never even heard mentioned in our previous stories. Young boys are clearly more free to operate and advance in society in spheres other than the domestic one.

We have read that little girls are supposed to be well mannered, helpful, pretty, and polite, much like Ellen Montgomery from The Wide, Wide World. We have watched bad things happen to girls who were lacking in one or more of these areas, such as when Gerty from The Lamplighter attacks Nan Grant and gets kicked out of her home, or when Sybil from A Whisper in the Dark throws a temper tantrum and gets sent to the insane asylum. These rules of conduct that guide young women are entirely different for young  boys like Dick (the simple fact that he holds a job is proof of this; consider Capitola from The Hidden Hand). The narrator openly admits that Dick "wasn't a model boy in all aspects," yet continually refers to him as a hero throughout the text (339). Dick supports himself by living on the street blacking boots, working for a living, whereas Sybil's only option to keep herself financially stable seemed to be to get married.  Boys and girls appear to have clearly divided duties to which they are expected to attend, and when people blur that line (such as Capitola dressing like a boy) it can make society uncomfortable.

Aside from simply being allowed more freedom than girls, boys of this time seem to be pushed towards what we would call achieving the "American Dream." Dick's industrious nature is constantly highlighted throughout the story; Dick buys himself breakfast almost everyday from the money he earns in the mornings, and chastises his friend Johnny for not earning the same fortunes, calling him lazy. Though he is still poor due to his extravagant spending habits, towards the end of this excerpt we find that Dick does have some rather large ambitions. He tells his new friend Frank that "I really wish I could get somethin' else to do... I'd like to be a office boy, and learn business, and grow up 'spectable" (389). We see finally that, despite his frequent jokes at his own poverty, he really just wants a dignified, legitimate place amongst the rest of society. Frank telling Dick the story of Dick Whittington was no coincidence either; it stuck me instantly as highly didactic and one of the few similarities I could see between this story and our previous readings (391). Dick Whittington (who shares the first name of our protagonist) starts out as a street boy just like Ragged Dick and grows up to become wealthy and "Lord Mayor of London" (392). This story combined with Frank's statement that "If you'll try to be somebody, and grow up into a respectable member of society, you will," tries very plainly to tell the young boys reading this story that no matter where you come from in life, you can be accepted by society if you will just work hard.

Week 7 - A Whisper in the Dark

By introducing the concept of insanity into the story, Alcott warns the reader not to get comfortable with what they are reading because they can no longer trust their perceptions. Being unable to know what is coming can be scary by itself, and introducing that into A Whisper in the Dark allows Alcott to manipulate that unease to catch onto and hold the reader’s attention. It makes the reader feel like they have to keep reading because unlike our other stories, this one doesn’t seem to have the guarantee of a happy ending. 

Since the story is being told in the first person, we are receiving all of our information from one source: Sybil. But in the second half of the book, she is committed to an insane asylum after throwing a tantrum. Though she loudly insists that "I am the best judge of my own health," we can't really be certain that she is (229). She could be unable to accurately judge her own health due to her skewed mental state and really does need to be put away.

As to how insanity being present in the story affects the reader is quite a different story. Even though when I started reading the story Sybil seemed like a perfectly stable young woman, being brought to the insane asylum really does make you doubt if what she is seeing is real or not. For example, when she is sleeping walking and hears “through the keyhole came a whisper that chilled me to the marrow of my bones, so distinct and imploring was it. “Find it! For God’s sake find it before it is too late!”” (235). The reader has no present guarantee that this is anything except the product of a deranged mind, so it begs you to continue to read to find out if Sybil really is insane or not.

Though we find out in the end that Sybil’s mother is indeed present in the story as the other resident of the asylum, she had no impact whatsoever on Sybil’s upbringing; the typical mother/daughter relationship was almost entirely absent. Almost. In many of the other stories we have read, the children typically have loving, caring mothers who try to help them to become successful in the world, such as Mrs. Montgomery in The Wide, Wide World and Marah Rocke in The Hidden Hand. Though Sybil’s mother has a very limited role in her life (that isn’t even discovered until after she is dead), she is the one who effectively hands Sybil her freedom from the asylum by hiding the key in the dogs collar.

But at the same time, her mother was legitimately insane. Though we again only find this out at the end of the story, Sybil must live with the knowledge that her mother was never a suitable guardian for her. For a society that put so much value into the relationship between a mother and a daughter, to have someone tell you that at times you may not be able to trust yourself, but also not be able to trust the people that are supposed to be looking out for you, would produce quite a chilling effect indeed. 

Week 6 - Uncle Tom's Cabin

Uncle Tom's Cabin seems to be a perfect example of a "poster child" cause, in this case the cause being to abolish slavery. Throughout the 80 or so pages of the novel that we read this week, we were introduced to several different groups of slaves, most all of which featured a child. In the very beginning of the novel we are introduced to Eliza "leaving the only home she had ever known, and cutting loose from the protection of a friend whom she loved and revered." (243) Though she was owned by a family that treated her kindly, she decides to risk her own life running away to spare her son the cruelties of being sold to the south, which as we read on we learn is much worse than being a slave in Kentucky. The main audience for this novel I assume was women and mothers, as the novel makes many more examples of children being split from their parents. And what mother reading this novel wouldn't be heartbroken by Aunt Hagar begging Master Haley "buy me too, Mas'r, for de dear Lord's sake!--buy me--I shall die if you don't!" (318) These passages are heartrending; I can imagine the horror white women must have felt back then in learning that every day poor black mothers were being separated from their children forever, and how much these feelings of horror and outrage must have galvanized the population into action.

I don't feel that the novel is drastically changing how we should interpret children's literature. I think what it does is to take the preexisting idea of children as being pure, innocent beings and shows how the institution of slavery perverts and destroys the rights children have to grow up safe and loved. There is no goodness in a 10-month-old child being sold apart from his mother, let along not being allowed to say goodbye to your child, no matter how you spin it. (326) Books like The Wide, Wide World and The Hidden Hand showed American audiences how children should be raised, how they should act, and what qualities should be encouraged. After reading these earlier novels and having formed a schema about what is "good" about childhood, we can see from Uncle Tom's Cabin that the "goodness" of childhood is absolutely absent in the black community of the time. Harriet Beecher Stowe plays on these conceptions like a master musician to show to the reader of the time that slaves have feelings and families, that this institution of slavery is tearing apart their lives, and that no child of any race deserves this kind of treatment.

So, though the theme and mood of this book are obviously drastically different from previous texts that we have read,  the theme of childhood as something to be protected is simply saturated in the text. In just 80 short pages we have three different stories of mothers being separated or threated to be separated from their children (if I've counted correctly), and one young mother even kills herself after the loss of her baby. (329) Uncle Tom's Cabin shows us how children aught to be raised by showing the audience story after story of children who obviously haven't had the luxury of a safe and comfortable childhood.