Alacrity: Cheerful willingness; eagerness.

Bilious: Of, relating to, or containing bile; biliary.

Maraud: To rove and raid in search of plunder.

Ignominy: Great personal dishonor or humiliation.

Literary Analysis

I really liked the section beginning on page sixty-nine in which Maggie cuts off her hair. "She didn’t want people to think her pretty, she only wanted people to think her a clever little girl and not find fault with her." I think this was a rebellion against stereotypes that, although the action was rash, seems beyond the sophistication level of a nine year old to engage in. In the time Maggie was living in, and even today to a certain extent, the perception was that one of the primary roles of women was to look pretty. In this part of the book, Maggie cuts her hair in an attempt to shed this perception. If she has short hair, she can be more like her brother Tom. She wants to be admired for the characteristics she has that are usually praised in men. I know many women in the current time that cut their hair for similar, liberating reasons.

Reading Response

When I was reading this section of the book, I considered an aspect of family that is very pertinent to our discussion so far in class. This aspect is the extended family. I was especially interested in the effect of the traditions of the wife’s family on the way she functions in the family that she creates for herself. In this section, we were introduced to Bessie’s sisters. We see that pressure is placed upon Bessie to conform to the traditions of the family she was born into. When a woman is married, the perception is that she becomes a part of the man’s family. This is evidenced by the fact that she takes his last name. When she does this, however, she cannot completely leave behind the ideas and traditions of her birth family, and I think we see this tension in Mrs. Tulliver. As much as the man wants the woman to become his property, her experiences growing up in her birth family are things that he cannot obliterate.