Friday, January 27, 2012

What is some of the symbolisim in A WHITE HERON?

i am reading the short story "a white heron" by sarah orne jewett and one of the questions i need to answer is how some of the setting and characters are symbols (the heron, the pine tree, the geranium)...does anyone know the symbolisim in the story and what it symbolizes?!?!? please answer in details...thanks!!
What is some of the symbolisim in A WHITE HERON?
It is a lovely story about a young girl finding out what is important to her. It's hard to explain symbolism to someone else, because different people see it differently, and that's actually good.



The white heron becomes a symbol in the story because it is the thing that stands between a girl who is probably just old enough to notice young men, and who is certainly old enough to understand poverty, and her love for nature, that seems very important to her.



Here she has an opportunity to look good to a young man, and please him, maybe for the first time in her life (this is in the most innocent romantic sense, you understand), and also an opportunity to have him pay for the chance to shoot a white heron.



At first it's just a theory -- she hasn't seen the heron.



But when she does see the heron, she has to choose. Impress the young man and get money, or follow her heart, which says she should protect the bird? So do you see the heron as standing for all the moments in our lives when we have to choose which direction to go on? Or maybe as the magical being that leads her in the right (for her) direction?



So, what about the pine tree? Read the part where she climbs it. Is it like going out on the brink, taking a chance? Do we have to stretch ourselves, do something hard and scary, to find out something important? Look at it that way.



You'll have to do the geranium yourself -- I can't recall it.



Please understand I'm trying not to give you an answer that you can just repeat, but rather help you find your own by walking through the process that helps you see.



Hope I helped.

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