A White Heron Character Analysis

Sarah Orne Jewett’s works show her deep understanding of life and the value of the small things. She writes narratives of small characters with personal struggles that help expand on what it is to be human. Jewett does not explain the human condition, but she expands our understanding of it by her ability to press meaning into any object. Her works are riddled with symbolism and her work “A White Heron” is no different. The main character Sylvia is given the choice of either to give up the white heron’s location for ten dollars to a collector who wishes to stuff it or keep the location a secret and spare the bird. Sylvia’s internal struggle is given greater meaning through Jewett’s extreme use of symbolism. Jewett has such extraordinary ability

A White Heron is viewed as a short story and not a fairytale, but upon further examination it falls within Vladimir Propp’s guidelines for the usual fairytale plotline. In a story of a young girls test of innocence, the use of the fairytale literary structure is clever. The story includes twenty of the twenty for parts of a basic fairytale, but this lack of two does not disqualify it from the list. The linear structure proposed by Propp is as follows: Absentation, interdiction, violation of interdiction, villains reconnaissance, delivery or the villain gains information about its victim, trickery, victims complicity, villainy or harm to a loved one, mediation or the hero brought into the tale, beginning counteraction, hero’s departure, the first function of the donor or the test of the hero, provision or receipt of a magical agent, guidance or the hero being led to the object they search for, struggle, branding or marking of the hero, victory, lack and misfortune are removed, and return. A few examples include the first paragraph in which Sylvia is away from home looking for her cow. This is what begins the fairytale structure with absentation and interdiction. The place of the villain is the hunter, and though her does not harm her family members, he kills many of the birds in the forest, which upsets Sylvia. The magical agent is the aid given by the oak tree she climbs to search for the

The words used to describe the heron leave the author with an understanding that the heron is not just a bird, but a symbol of a higher being. The pure white of the heron’s feathers suggests that it is pure or innocent and the golden light in that air around it gives it a supernatural feeling or an unnatural beauty. The heron is seen as a symbol of righteousness and the struggle between he light and the dark, The hunter is an enemy because he offers monetary benefit for the location of the supernatural and innocent creature, which he intends to kill. The hunter is immediately labeled as an enemy before he gets a proper introduction, but later he is able to smooth talk both Sylvia and her grandmother. The man is an enemy to Sylvia but he is able to gain her trust through deceptively sweet tone and calm words. His abilities and demeanor mirror Satan’s, the ultimate villain. He is also the person who causes Sylvia’s internal struggle by offering