True Grit Themes

In the beginning Grandfather refuses to believe there is a fever until it hit them mother falls ill and they are forced to flee Mattie try’s to stay but mother and grandfather and Eliza force her to go this kills Mattie. But she must go. Grandfather finds a wagon but soon they get kicked off. Mattie finds food but soon realizes that they need more then she falls ill. Mattie wakes in bush hill ( a hospital for the ones with fever) She insists on leaving but is not well enough to go.

Mattie Ross clearly portrays the hero of a quest novel. To begin, a hero gets a call that leads them into their journey. The call happens as the basis for the task they wish to achieve. They tend to get the call which bases their entire adventure, and allows the character to become a hero. Mattie receives a call for adventure when hearing the news that Tom Chaney killed her father, Frank Ross. After hearing about her father’s death, Mattie will stop at nothing to get revenge on his killer. Not many people know Mattie’s father, so, Tom Chaney does not have a group of Marshals after him immediately. Mattie claims that her father “was just trying to do that short

Mattie confirms, it is her fathers body, she declares, “That is my father. Tom Chaney would pay for this! (24).” This is her quest to reclaim the injustice in her life. The threshold is next, this the jumping off point in Mattie’s journey. “the initiate may encounter people, or situations which block her passage into the journey. The two men who were hired to get the culprit didn’t want her presence, they left on the journey alone, then try to turn her into the sherriff, for being a runaway and told the man who tried to stop her “I have business across the river (106)”. Above all, Mattie still insisted she go. Mattie stated, “We hit the river running…we were up and free I reined in (107) .” These situations, display that she was being blocked on her passage into the journey. This is brings her to Choctaw Nation, the initiate begins the journey into the unknown.

Soon after being deserted on the road, grandfather comes down with a summer grippe and becomes helpless. Mattie then needs to take care of them both by finding food and water. This shows responsibility because she not only had to take care of herself, but of her grandfather too with no help from anyone, and no one to tell her what to do.

Mattie had so many traumatizing events occur in just a few months, yet she stayed strong and fought through the pain day by day. One of these events were when she tried to leave Philadelphia. Her and her grandfather were on a cart leaving Philadelphia, When they got thrown off because they thought that Mattie’s grandpa had Yellow Fever. All of their belongings were on that cart. Now Mattie and her grandfather faced starvation in the middle of nowhere.

At the beginning of the story, Mattie is a normal girl living in the glorious city of Philadelphia. Soon a fever outbreak appears and starts to frighten the people of the capitol. “ Some doctors warn we may see a thousand dead before it's over. There are forty thousand people living in Philadelphia, William. Can you imagine if one in forty were to die?”(59). Clearly the people of Philadelphia were terrified. As the story moves along, this fever begins to create a devastating mess in the city of Philadelphia, “ They say bodies are piling up like firewood” (64). This illustrates the nervous fear of the

They ride on a wagon to the country, but they are mistaken for fever victims. As a result, they get kicked off of the wagon which leaves them with no food or water. Mattie’s grandfather falls ill, and Mattie has to try to find ways to help him survive. She has to find food and water sources. When she goes to a nearby river, she becomes dizzy and faints. As Mattie awakes, she finds herself in Bush Hill hospital. The hospital is staffed with French physicians who do not believe in bleeding, but instead to let the patients rest and hydrate. Eventually, Mattie recovers from the yellow fever. Mattie and her grandfather return to Philadelphia, and they find the coffeehouse has been robbed. Once again, Mattie has to find food for her grandfather and herself. One night, Mattie left a window open. Thieves enter the coffeehouse to try to find money or goods. Then, the thieves attack Mattie and ask her where the money is. Her grandfather wakes up, and he tries to kill the thieves. One of the thieves kills him, and Mattie is all alone. Mattie takes him to be buried, and then, she walks around the city. While walking around, she finds an orphan named Nell. Matties takes Nell with her, and

Eventually, he found a new hope pinched in his fingers, Mattie. This light was true, but his failures would not allow him any kindness. In the end, Mattie developed similarly. He ruined her as

Mattie does not beat around the bush when it comes to justice. She has a fixed view on how law should be carried out against Tom Chaney and stops at nothing to achieve this. Put simply, Mattie wants him dead, and she wants him to know that he is dying as a result of him killing her father. This view and interpretation of justice closely resembles the “eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” philosophy of the Code of Hammurabi where the life of Tom Chaney must be payed for

Taylor could not afford the new tires she needed for her car so Mattie allowed Taylor to store her car at the shop. She eventually gave Taylor a job, so she could save money to pay for the tires. This showed that Mattie had a caring heart and was happy to help those in need. She taught Taylor many useful lessons, such as teaching Taylor to be a confident mother for Turtle. She told Taylor that raising a kid could be challenging but worth it if you were willing to try. Even through the bad times, Mattie was willing to give Taylor the love and support she needed, the whole way through. Mattie started off as being a good friend to Taylor, but due to her big, gentle heart, she was more like family. Through thick and thin, family is always there no matter

As you can see Mattie put herself at risk facing her father’s killer and also showed that her weakness is her poor skill on how to handle a gun. Second part is the abyss where, “the initiate faces the greatest challenge of the journey…. Often final step…

Will Mattie get to tag along with Rooster on the hunt for Tom Chaney? Rooster is very uneasy about letting Mattie, a child, accompany him for this manhunt. Although, Mattie is willing to pay Rooster one hundred dollars, he is still unwilling to budge on letting her join. The next morning Mattie arrives at the Chinese restaurant, where Rooster is staying, only to find out he has already set out on the long journey without her. Once Mattie realizes she has been left she jumps on her horse, Blackie, to chase after Rooster and LaBoeuf. When Mattie gets to the river and finds that the men have already crossed she meets a gentleman and asked him to take her across. This gentleman has specific orders to take Mattie back to the train station and send her on her way home. Mattie then knocks him in the head and makes her horse swim across the river to meet the men. When Mattie gets to the other side LaBoeuf jumps off his horse to beat her, at this moment

Mattie Michael grew up in Tennessee with her family and the father of her child, Butch Fuller. Everyone tells her to avoid him, including Butch himself who warns her saying, “eating cane is like living life. You gotta know when to stop chewing– when to stop trying to wrench every last bit of sweetness out of a wedge…. trick is to spit it out when the wedge is still firm… It’s hard, but you gotta spit it out right then, or you gonna find yourself chewing on nothin’ but straw in that last round” (18). Butch clearly tells her about how he he lives his life, and his issue with staying, yet, Mattie makes the mistake of getting herself involved which leads to her being impregnated by him. This results in her father savagely beating her to the point where she has to flee to Chicago and start her life alone raising her son. Though, Mattie gets through all of this and finds herself in the grace of Ms. Eva who shelters her. Then, after getting the house after Ms. Eva’s death,

Matt is a middle class man who becomes obsessed with the need to get revenge on his son’s death. His son Frank is killed by a man named Richard. He is the husband and dads father of the women his son is in love with. This is what leads Matt into killing someone he wants pay back for his son death. Matt kills because he loves.

When Mattie is to be sent away, Ethan and Mattie grow desperate looking for a way out of their impossible situation. They decide that it is better to die in a sledding accident together than live their lives apart. Ethan hesitates slightly, “But in a flash