Ellis Colvin Mrs. Lewis Literature 8A - #7 29 August 2014 Fever 1793: Summer Reading “Fever 1793” by Laurie Halse is a historical fiction novel about the widespread propagation of a horrid, dastardly pestilence spanning its wing’s shadows over the quaint, unsuspecting port state of Philadelphia, taking place during the late 1700’s. The main conflict within this book is the ruinous plague of the Yellow Fever being stricken into the hearts of millions upon millions of Philadelphians. This disease that is spread by female mosquitoes, with sickness coming from overseas due to the fact that Philadelphia is a port city, causes severe anorexia, nausea, unorthodox chills, and for all intensive purposes, death. The book’s long, winding enactment …show more content…
An example of these traits in play, are in the first chapter when her mother calls down upon her for assistance with her daily tasks in the coffee shop that her family runs. Matilda begins to have feelings of frustration, but finally offers her reluctant hand as succor toward her mother’s constant nagging. Her mother is painted as a tender, kind, and hard working woman, but she is also very strong willed. Although Matilda comes off as a lazy girl when she is first introduced in the book, her character matures, as she proves to be a very hard worker, first demonstrated when she takes action upon herself to be her sick mother’s caregiver once Grandpa and Eliza left the coffee shop when she contracts the yellow fever. Matilda also exhibits an utmost pertinence and concern toward her workmates, Polly and Eliza, always putting her best foot forward to assist them throughout the duration of their long, toiling work hours, occasionally making short, brisk trips to purchase the necessary supplies for her family owned café. She especially expressed deep concern when she heard of Polly’s shocking death to fatal disease. Polly was always made out to have similar mannerisms as Mathilda’s mother, but was pretty reserved and kept to herself as she worked. This was most likely due to the fact that she was there to work, and only work, being a woman of …show more content…
On Matilda’s long, meandering jaunt with the Yellow Fever, she finally comes to terms with the previously incomprehensible thought, of which she can’t stay a child forever. This once self-absorbed, vain girl transforms into the survivor of a deadly plague and enters adulthood with grace, adornment, and intricacy. Another way she morphs into her mature demeanor is that she becomes more self-dependent. At the start of the novel, she relies heavily on adults to solve her problematic situations, and to rescue her from her binds(like when her grandfather was killed), whereas now, she can depend solely on her own power and learns how to handle arduous, tedious things herself. An example of this is when she has to take care of her sick militant grandfather, using the survival skills he once taught her. In the end, she winds up taking the reigns of her family-owned coffee shop and runs everything efficiently (of course, with her business partner Eliza in tow), an unfathomable task that the immature Matilda at the beginning of the book would never have had the courage to preform. The one quote that I find the most memorable from this book is as proceeds: “Wives were deserted by husbands, and children by parents. The chambers of diseases were deserted, and the sick left to die of negligence. None could be found to