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My Side of the Mountain

by

Jean Craighead George
1959

MonkeyNotes Study Guide by Ray Mescallado

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Reprinted with permission from TheBestNotes.com Copyright  2008, All Rights Reserved 
Distribution without the written consent of TheBestNotes.com is strictly prohibited.

KEY LITERARY ELEMENTS
SETTING
The wilderness of the Catskill Mountains near Delhi, New York in Delaware County.

LIST OF CHARACTERS
Major Characters
Sam Gribley – A young boy who runs away from home to live in the wilderness .

The Baron – A weasel who befriends Sam.

Frightful – Sam's falcon.

Dad – Sam's father.

Mother – Sam's mother.

Bando – A man who spends several days with Sam in the forest.

Tom Sidler – At first called "Mr. Jacket" by Sam, a young man in Delhi who becomes a friend.

Matt Spell – A young boy who wishes to report on Sam for a newspaper.
Minor Characters
Nina – The youngest of Sam's eight siblings.

Mary – Sam's sister. 

Alice – Sam's sister.

Joan – Sam's sister………..
Additional characters are identified in the complete study guide.

CONFLICT
Protagonist – The protagonist of a story is the main character who traditionally undergoes some sort of change.  He or she must usually overcome some opposing force.  In this novel, the protagonist is Sam Gribley, who…….. 
Antagonist – The antagonist of a story is the force that provides an obstacle for the protagonist. The antagonist does not always have to be a single character or even a character at all.  In this story, the antagonist is Civilization, whose rules……… 
Climax – The climax of a plot is the major turning point that allows the protagonist to resolve the conflict.  The climax of the story occurs when Sam befriends…….

Outcome – The outcome, resolution, or denouement of this plot is when Sam's becomes more "civilized" in the forest as friends and reporters visit him more frequently, culminating in……. 

SHORT PLOT SUMMARY (Synopsis)
The novel begins in the middle of the events' chronology, with a detailed account of Sam Gribley's first snowstorm while living alone in the wilderness. He does quite well through the storm, but in hindsight Sam admits he was afraid at the time.

Going back to the start of the chain of events, New York City resident Sam decides to run away to the upstate farm that his great-grandfather had abandoned in order to go to sea. He informs his father of his decision, and Dad humors Sam, clearly not believing he'd be gone for long. Sam prepares himself with some tools but arriving in the Catskills wilderness, his first night is a disaster as he cannot start a fire. He goes to a nearby cabin the next morning and receives help from its owner, Bill, who also shows him the correct way to start a fire.

Sam then goes to the town of Delhi to find the abandoned Gribley farm; with the help of Miss Turner, a librarian, he finds the property and settles in. Seeking a home in the wilderness where nobody can find him, he decides to hollow out a very old, very large hemlock. He learns to take advantage of what nature offers, finding plenty to hunt and gather. When he is forced by a local resident to help her pick strawberries, he sees a falcon as he walks back to town with her and decides he wants a falcon of his own. He tracks down the bird and steals one of its babies for his own, naming it Frightful. When he returns to his tree home with Frightful, he finds a fire warden waiting for him, as his camp's smoke was noticed. He stays away until the warden leaves the next day, and begins to train Frightful to hunt for him. He decides that he needs deer……….. 

THEMES
Major Themes
Communing with Nature is the most obvious theme of the novel, as Sam surrounds himself with the untrammeled and unforgiving wilderness of the Catskill Mountains. However, while this initial theme brings to mind a natural idyll of peaceful harmony, Sam's decision is in part a response to his past – he is not simply going to nature, he is running away from urban life and towards this setting. Thus, Wilderness and Civilization is a related theme – the main difference being that the first theme is…….. 
Minor Themes
Literacy is an important minor theme of the book, a tool that …….
 
MOOD
The mood is relatively straightforward, a relatively unemotional and very rational recounting of what Sam lived through. This is most evident in the way Sam passes along

BACKGROUND INFORMATION - BIOGRAPHY
Jean Craighead was born on July 2, 1919 in Washington, D.C. Raised in a family of naturalists – her father was an entomologist and ecologist.  She earned degrees in English and science from Pennsylvania State University and in the 1940s was a reporter for The Washington Post and a member of the White House Press Corps. In 1944, she married John Lothar George and collaborated with him for her first novels; the couple divorced in 1963, though she continued to use his last name as Jean Craighead George.  From 1969 to 1982, she was an editor and contributor to Reader's Digest. 

George has written over eighty books, most dealing with nature and aimed for young readers. She is best known for the Mountain trilogy and the Jule trilogy. Both series were inspired in part by real life. The Mountain series came about from George's own experiences exploring the Potomac River in her youth: her father taught her how to survive in the wilderness and she was given her own falcon to train at the age of thirteen. The Mountain trilogy is made up of My Side of the Mountain (1959), On the Far Side of the Mountain (1990), and Frightful's Mountain (1999). She has since continued the series with picture books about……. 

LITERARY / HISTORICAL INFORMATION
An important part of growing up is being able to take care of oneself and not rely on others. This real life concern can be heightened dramatically when a young person's self-sufficiency becomes a necessary part of survival. Survival tales about adults are in themselves often dramatic and powerful, as the image of man against nature – or man in communion with nature – plays upon the delicate balance between man's progress and the forces beyond his control. The image of children alone in the wilderness goes……. 

CHAPTER SUMMARIES WITH NOTES / ANALYSIS
I Hole Up in a Snowstorm
Summary
Sam narrates that he is on his mountain in the cave he made for himself in a large hemlock tree, which he now calls home. He then recounts the letter he wrote the previous winter on December fourth or fifth, during the first snowstorm he experienced when he came out to live on his own in the woods. In this letter, he details his living condition and good health, as well as wondering about The Baron, a weasel who lives nearby. After quoting that letter, Sam in the present day explains that he was sacred during the blizzard but laughed after enduring this storm. Leaving his home, he discovered that The Baron had already been out and playing in the snow, so Sam called upon his falcon Frightful to join him in play.

Sam had arrived in the woods the previous May and prepared himself for the coming of winter from that time. He recalls the arrival of the storm clouds and returning to his shelter to ride out the storm. He also recalls his family in a New York City apartment and the stories his father told about Great-grandfather Gribley, who abandoned land in the Catskill Mountains to become a sailor. Dad went on to add that land was still in the family's name but is no place for a Gribley. Sam now lives three hundred feet from the beech tree with Gribley carved on it, which marks the northern boundary for what his Dad called "Gribley's folly".
Notes
The story begins with a detailed account of what Sam considers his first big challenge, surviving a winter snow storm. Note how Sam is able to admit he was scared at the time, which gives his present day narration added authority by seeming more candid and rational.

I Get Started on This Venture
Summary
Sam left New York the previous May, taking a train to the Catskills; among the things he brought was flint and steel he bought at a Chinese store, and a man there showed him how to use it. Sam hitched rides into the Catskill Mountains, including one bemused trucker who noted he was a farm boy who ran away to the city, not the reverse like Sam. Dropping Sam off at a forest, he laughed and offered to give Sam a ride home the following morning on his return trip. Sam recalls that his Dad also laughed at him when he said he was running away to Great-grandfather Gribley's land, telling him he should try it.

In the forest, Sam whittled a fishhook for himself and located a grub for bait. Though he lost his first bite, he was able to catch several trout from there. He made himself a bed and shelter from tree boughs and limbs, but was unable to start a fire that first night. He admits today that he made the mistake of setting up camp right in the stream valley of winds, which was why he couldn't start the fire. 

After a miserable night, he felt encouraged by the new morning and found that there was a house only a hundred feet from where he was camped. He knocks on the door and asks for help from the old man who lives there, whose first name is Bill but whose last name he didn't learn. Sam slept, then ate food that Bill cooked for him, including the trout he'd caught the day before. Bill then teaches Sam how to make a fire.
Notes
Sam continuously refers to information he read or was told about surviving in the wild. Again, this is another tactic that lends his narration added authority as it makes his story a kind of reference source as well as adventure………..

OVERALL ANALYSES
CHARACTER ANALYSIS
Sam Gribley - The only character who clearly develops over the course of the novel is the narrator and protagonist, Sam Gribley. This is no surprise, as he is the focus of the book and remains secluded in the woods for many of its pages. Other human characters come and go into the woods, and thus into Sam's life, so they are meant to help measure how Sam develops, as opposed to developing themselves.

The most obvious way Sam develops in the novel is his proficiency as an outdoorsman. Though he comes to the Catskills wilderness as prepared as possible, it takes actually living in the……. 

PLOT STRUCTURE ANALYSIS
The plot of this story is, like the narrative voice, mostly straightforward and direct. It covers the start of Sam's journey to the Gribley Farm to the point where his family joins him to live there. Thus, it can be argued that the structure of the novel is built around Sam's adventure in self-sufficiency: running away from home, then having home (that is, his family) follow him so that he no longer needs to be…….. 

THEME – THEMES ANALYSIS
Communing with Nature is the most obvious theme of the book. The main point of Sam running away to the Gribley Farm is to live a life that is harmonious with nature, that is not bound by the rules or expectations of polite society and the civilized world. The theme does not so much develop and evolve as unfold luxuriously over the course of the book. The most beautiful and moving passages in the book deal with natural wonders, large and small, that fascinate Sam and in doing so fascinate the reader as well. Sam takes a clear pleasure in the sensory experiences of nature, be it the taste of the food he has gathered and…….. 

AUTHOR’S STYLE
For the most part, the story is written in a direct, straightforward manner. Sam presents himself as a person of common sense and practical concerns, which is particularly useful since he's placed himself in an unusual situation. His writing reflects not only his youthful age, but also his uncomplicated view of himself and his surroundings.

In keeping with his rational, practical approach, Sam refers to his notes throughout the course of the story, and even begins with an extensive quotation of a letter he wrote during his first snowstorm in the wild. On the one hand, this seems to be a simple enough ploy – a child referring to his……. 

QUOTES – IMPORTANT QUOTATIONS AND ANALYSIS
The novel begins with this paragraph:

	I am on my mountain in a tree home that people have passed without ever knowing that I am here. The house is a hemlock tree six feet in diameter, and must be as old as the mountain itself. I came upon it last summer and dug and burned it out until I made a snug cave in the tree that I now call home. (3)

It's a simple series of statements that convey an unusual situation, which is very much the strategy of this book. The first sentence emphasizes how he's made a home for himself in nature, as well as how he's hidden himself away from other people – they can pass by his tree home and not realize his presence, which is a mark of both his cleverness and his desire to avoid others. 

About his decision to run away to live in the forest, Sam is sensitive to all those who laughed at him or who doubted him in some manner. About the truck driver who lets him off at the forest in the Catskills:

	He laughed. Everybody laughed at me. Even Dad. I told Dad that I was going to run away to Great-grandfather Gribley's land. He had roared with laughter and told me about the time he had run away from home. He got on a boat headed for Singapore, but when the whistle blew for departure, he was down the gangplank and home in bed before anyone knew he was gone. Then he told me, "Sure, go try it. Every boy should try it." (11)

Sam tries to tell people what he will do and nobody believes he can do it. Dad's laughter and own story about trying to run away show how his experiences have colored his own views on………. 

SYMBOLISM / MOTIFS / IMAGERY / SYMBOLS 
By being Sam's worst case scenario, the first snowstorm is a metonym for the difficulties of living in nature.  For the inexperienced Sam, it symbolizes the fear over nature when there is no buffer of civilization, the threat to life and the loneliness of solitude. In short, it is the fear of failure in Sam's wilderness adventure. However, after the first snowstorm passes and Sam proves himself admirably, it becomes a symbol of his ability to survive and succeed in the wilderness. In this light, it isn't surprising that Sam begins his story by cutting ahead to the snowstorm: it is a clear statement that, despite being afraid during that time, he

IMPORTANT / KEY FACTS SUMMARY
•	Title: My Side of the Mountain.
•	Author: Jean Craighead George.
•	Date Published: 1959.
•	Meaning of Title: The area Sam claims for himself when he goes to live in the wild.
•	Setting: The Catskill Mountains wilderness near Delhi, New York.
•	Genre: Juvenile fiction, nature account…….

STUDY QUESTIONS – MULTIPLE CHOICE QUIZ
1. What brings Sam to the wilderness of the Catskills?
a. A family farm long-abandoned by his great-grandfather.
b. A magazine article about hemlock forests.
c. He arrived randomly to the area.
d. None of the above.

2. How many siblings does Sam have?
a. Eleven.
b. Eight.
c. Six.
d. None……….

Answer Key: 1a, 2b, 3b, 4b, 5c, 6b, 7c, 8d, 9d, 10c, 11d, 12d, 13d, 14c, 15a.
ESSAY TOPICS / BOOK REPORT IDEAS
1.) Explore the idea of Sam as a prophet. What is his message? Is it an attractive message, and who is most suited to it? How does he attract followers? How does he feel about his effect on others? Is his role as a prophet successful? Why or why not?

2.) Is the notion of a "return to the wilderness" an eternal idea, or can it also reflect the values of the times in which it's told? How would Sam's experiences be similar in a modern day situation? How would it be different, if at all? Are general attitudes towards nature and self-sufficiency different today? How would that influence a modern retelling?……….

COMMENT ON THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 
The study of literature is not like the study of math or science, or even history. While those disciplines are based largely upon fact, the study of literature is based upon interpretation and analysis. There are no clear-cut answers in literature, outside of the factual information about an author's life and the basic information about setting and characterization in a piece of literature. The rest is a highly subjective reading of what an author has written; each person brings a different set of values and a different background to the reading. As a result, no two people see the piece of literature in exactly the same light, and few critics agree on everything about a book or an author. 

In this study guide, we have tried to give an objective literary analysis based upon the information actually found in the novel, book, or play. In the end, however, it is an individual interpretation, but one that we feel can be readily supported by the information that is presented in the guide. In your course of literature study, you or your professor/teacher may come up with a different interpretation of the mood or the theme or the conflict. Your interpretation, if it can be logically supported with information contained within the piece of literature, is just as correct as ours; so is the interpretation of your teacher or professor. 

Literature is simply not a black or white situation; instead, there are many gray areas that are open to varying analyses. Your task is to come up with your own analysis that you can logically defend. Hopefully, these booknotes will help you to accomplish that goal.

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Reprinted with permission of TheBestNotes.com. All Rights Reserved. 
Distribution without the written consent of TheBestNotes.com is strictly prohibited.