The Yearling Study Guide

Jody Baxter, his father, Penny, and his mother, Ora, live on an island of high good land surrounded by the Florida scrub. It is a meager existence, often filled with hardship, but the Baxters get by on what they have. Jody and his father have a special relationship, sharing a common love of nature and the simple pleasures of life. Penny is indulgent, allowing Jody to "kick up his heels" while he can. "The day'll come," Penny thinks, "he'll not even care to." In contrast to the quiet, peaceful lives of the Baxters, their nearest neighbors, the Forresters, are loud, argumentative, and prone to being troublemakers. Jody finds their zest for life and their free and easy ways appealing. But relations between the Baxters and the Forresters are strained when Penny and Jody intervene in a fight between Lem Forrester and Oliver Hutto, a friend of the family. When their hogs go missing, they go on a hunt where Penny is bitten by a rattlesnake and nearly dies. While recovering, he allows Jody to adopt a fawn who becomes Jody's constant companion. Floods, failing crops, and dying animals all contribute to hungry wolves and even a marauding black bear prowling the area. Tragedy strikes as the Forresters seek revenge on Oliver Hutto, and the rift between the Baxters and the Forresters widens. In the spring planting, Penny is hurt, and Jody must be the man of the family. Flag, his yearling deer, is now destroying the new crops as fast as they grow. The struggle Jody must go through as he first fights what his father tells him must happen, and when Jody realizes it himself, is poignant. The Yearling is a story about that special relationship between a father and a son, examining that year in the life of an adolescent who is "betwixt and between," no longer a boy, but not yet a man. Filled with struggles, moments of sheer fun, and family closeness, this is a wonderful story. Setting: Florida, 1800s American Literature Pgs: 68 13 sections including pre-reading activities and summary section.… (more)