A Mother In Mannville

Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1936

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Story Analysis

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Themes

The Different Kinds of Isolation

“A Mother in Mannville” takes place in a physically remote setting—an orphanage in the mountains, where bad weather sometimes cuts off the residents from the nearest town. The isolation mirrors the alienation and probable loneliness of the orphan boys themselves. They exist on the margins of both society and societal awareness, and though they presumably live in close quarters, they lack real interpersonal ties. Although the story provides no direct insight into Jerry’s thoughts, Rawlings implies that he at least feels such isolation keenly, as he seeks out contact with the narrator: “He made simple excuses to come and sit with me. I could no more have turned him away than if he had been physically hungry” (245).

The implication that the narrator might otherwise have turned Jerry away reflects her own very different relationship with solitude. For the narrator, isolation is necessary to complete her work, and she has sought it out for that purpose. The details that she reveals about her life—in particular, her travels to regions as far-flung as Mexico, Alaska, and Florida—suggest that, for her, solitude is not merely the absence of distraction but the positive freedom to do as she likes. For a woman of this era, marriage and children would all but inevitably impinge on such independence. Nevertheless, the fact that she could choose to forgo her isolation—she can return to her daily life and what relationships she does have at any time—undoubtedly causes her to experience the solitude differently than Jerry.

These divergent experiences create distance between the narrator and Jerry even as the barriers between them seem to break down. Jerry contributes to the distance, possibly recognizing the narrator’s attachment to her independence. His “confession” about his mother encapsulates the mixture of intimacy and loneliness that characterizes his relationship with the narrator. The impulse to discuss family represents a new level of closeness, as the narrator notes: “He was suddenly impelled to speak of things he had not spoken of before, nor had I cared to ask him” (250). What’s more, the admission, though false, probably does speak to Jerry’s deepest longings. However, its ultimate effect is to reinforce the distance between them, as the knowledge that Jerry is not entirely alone in the world makes the narrator feel less responsible for him.

The Nature of Integrity

Integrity draws the narrator to Jerry. She is dismissive of Jerry until she begins to recognize this attribute in him, although she acknowledges that it is a difficult quality to define. She describes it as “bedded on courage, but it is more than courage. It is honest, but it is more than honesty” (242). She follows this description with the example of Jerry offering to pay for the broken ax, taking responsibility by declaring that he had “brought the ax down careless” (242). Jerry typically shows attention to detail in chopping different types and lengths of wood, a testament to his steady, hardworking nature: His rhythmic chopping is so even that the narrator repeatedly notes it does not disturb her work. His inattention on this occasion is out of character, but his acknowledgment of it serves as another indication of his morals.

Alternatively, the confession could be a small lie: Perhaps Jerry was not truly careless but nevertheless feels responsible for the damage. “Cracks” of this kind begin to appear in Jerry’s integrity when he tells the narrator he “told maybe a story” (247)—that the narrator was expecting him—to convince the orphanage to allow him to visit her at night. However, the narrator is quick to reassure Jerry that she did wish to speak to him, suggesting that his lie was an anticipation of her needs (if also a reflection of his own wishes) rather than an outright fabrication. This echoes the various chores the narrator describes Jerry as taking it upon himself to do for her—mending a loose paving stone, creating a nook to store kindling, etc.—before she even recognizes there is a problem in need of fixing. It also suggests one reading of Jerry’s central lie: In telling the narrator that he has a mother, Jerry may seek to spare her worry or responsibility for him.

This suggests a distinction between integrity and, as the narrator says, simple honesty. Integrity in the story involves what the narrator earlier calls “independence”—an assumption of responsibility for oneself that avoids ever encumbering others. This principle seems to underpin many of Jerry’s actions; for example, saying nothing after the narrator forgets one of his visits, leaving him to sit alone on her doorstep. The narrator clearly admires this combination of selflessness and self-reliance, but her wistful tone also conveys its cost.

Rationalization and Guilt

The bittersweet tone that pervades the story stems from the sense that the narrator and Jerry might have developed a more meaningful relationship than they in fact did. This missed opportunity results from choices both the narrator and Jerry make, but the narrator draws particular, if subtle, attention to the ways in which she failed Jerry—a vulnerable child. She is frank, for example, about the fact that she forgot a visit from Jerry because she became absorbed in her writing.

This tendency to revert to her own preoccupations persists throughout the story; it is what causes the narrator to forget or ignore her resolve to ask the orphanage about Jerry’s mother. At the time, however, she does not fully recognize what she is doing but rather rationalizes Jerry’s plight and her own actions in order to absolve herself of guilt:

I was a trifle abstracted about the boy, because of my work and plans. And after my first fury at her—we did not speak of her again—his having a mother, any sort at all, not far away, not in Mannville, relieved me of the ache I had had about him. He did not question the anomalous relation. He was not lonely. It was none of my concern (254).

The clipped, emphatic diction and syntax (“He was not lonely. It was none of my concern”) suggest the narrator’s efforts to persuade herself of what she is saying. In the next paragraph, she uses a similar style to contrast the happy days she and Jerry spent together with her eagerness to leave, implying that she did not appreciate his companionship when she had it:

He would lie on the floor in front of the fire, with one arm across the pointer, and they would both doze and wait quietly for me. Other days they ran with a common ecstasy through the laurel, and since the asters were now gone, he brought me back vermillion maple leaves, and chestnut boughs dripping with imperial yellow. I was ready to go (254).

The narrator even admits that she was grateful to be spared an emotional goodbye scene with Jerry, though she does not specify whether it was his response, hers, or both that she dreaded. In this context, her decision to leave some money for him reads as an attempt to allay her sense of guilt. However, she ends the story on the revelation that Jerry lied about having a mother, highlighting the communicative gap that characterized their relationship and the implied guilt she feels regarding this.