Lyddie
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| Lyddie | |
| Author | Katherine Paterson |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
Lyddie is a 1991 novel by Katherine Paterson.
The novel is about the title character, Lyddie, and her coming-of-age in the early 1800s. It starts with a terrifying bear entering her family's house and exiting with a porridge pot over its head. Her mother and younger sisters, Rachel and baby Agnes, leave because the mother believes that the Day of Judgment is coming. Lyddie and her brother Charles remain in their house for a year harvesting maple syrup. When that year is up, a letter arrives from their mother explaining that she had hired Charles to work in baker's mill and Lyddie to Cutler’s Tavern to be a maid.
After a year at working at the tavern, she decides to go home to hide the twenty-five dollars she made from selling their cow while Mistress Cutler is visiting Boston. When she arrives home, a runaway slave named Ezekiel Abernathy is staying in her home until spring sets in. Lyddie gives the twenty-five dollars to Ezekiel to help with his journey.
Lyddie is fired from the tavern when Mistress Cutler returns to find her having left without permission. Lyddie heads to Lowell, Massachusetts, to work in the mill there to earn money to pay off her family's debt and return to her farm. After the long journey to Lowell, the driver takes her to his sister, Mrs. Bedlow, who runs a boardinghouse for Concord Corporation. She gets a one year contract to work in the mill and an inoculation. A few days later, she begins work.
Diana, a longtime worker who is considered radical, helps Lyddie learn how to run the looms. The working conditions are unhealthy, with all of the windows in the factory nailed shut, the danger of flying shuttles and the "Kiss of Death" as Diana puts it, which is when the girls must suck a new thread through a shuttle and risk it entering their windpipes. Mr. Marsden, the overseer, only adds to the troubles by flirting with Lyddie.
After work, her roommate Betsy reads Oliver Twist to her. Lyddie uses the book to teach herself how to read, eventually buying a copy for herself.
Betsy announces that as soon as she earns enough money to go to Oberlin college, which accepts women as students, she will sign the petition calling for a shorter work day from thirteen hours to ten. She also develops tuberculosis. Eventually she does sign the petition while seeking out cough medicine and Lyddie frets that her roommate will lose her job.
A letter arrives for Lyddie, from her mother informing that her little sister, Agnes, died. Reluctantly, Lyddie sends money to her mother, reflecting how it was easier to give the twenty-five dollars to Ezekiel.
Lyddie is soon adept at working the looms, so she is given more. As she rises, her fellow workers sink in health and endurance. Prudence Allen leaves the mill due to her bad cough. Amelia goes home for a visit and never comes back. Betsy's cough gets worse and worse, and is soon sent to the hospital. By the time Betsy's uncle comes to pick her up, she is out of money and her dreams of going to college have yet to be realized.
Many girls begin to leave the mill and Irish immigrants take their places. Mr. Marsden, the overseer, informs Lyddie that she will help a new girl.
Brigid, like Lyddie, works the looms clumsily at first, but she takes more time to catch on. When Lyddie loses patience with her, Diana takes over. One day, Luke Stevens, her old neighbor, delivers her a parcel. It is from Ezekiel, telling her that he and his family are now safe in Canada and thanking her for the money. With it comes fifty dollars as repayment. She rushed to the bank to deposit the money in her account. She writes to her mother to ask her the sum they owe the landlord. One day her uncle arrives in Lowell with Rachel. He comes to tell her that they put her mother in the insane asylum and are selling Lyddie's farm to pay for her medical bills. He departs, leaving Rachel in Lyddie's care. Rachel initially doesn't say a word, and eats like she hasn't done so in days. One day, Lyddie leaves work with a high fever, after a romantic advance by old Mr. Marsden. She can't go to work for several weeks, and Diana, Brigid, and Rachel are always there for her. Slowly, she gets better and returns to work. Rachel got a job doffing at the mill, but she develops a bad cough as Prudence and Betsy did. When her younger brother Charlie comes, he takes her with him, at the request of his kind employers who wish to adopt her along with Charlie. Lyddie doesn't want her to leave, but she knows Rachel will die if she stays, and with Charlie's new family, she would be properly cared for. At this time, Lyddie reads a letter from Luke Stevens, proposing marriage. She tears it up, unwilling to be a 'slave' or his charity project.
Lyddie wants to sign the ten hour day petition, but when she goes to the meeting to sign it, it has been already sent to the legislature. Diana breaks the news to Lyddie that she is pregnant and leaving the mill. Lyddie later catches Mr. Marsden "alone" in the weaving room with Brigid. Slamming a full bucket of water on the overseer's head, Lyddie takes Brigid's hand and runs away. The next day, Lyddie is sent to the agent Grave's office, and gets fired for "moral turpitude". After discovering the definition of the phrase in a dictionary she bought after getting fired, Lyddie is furious. This compels her to give Brigid a copy of Oliver Twist and leave with her a letter written to Mrs. Overseer Marsden explaining what happens in the weaving room "after hours", after which she confronts Mr. Marsden and explains that if any harm should come to Brigid, his wife will be informed of his activities. At the end of the book, Lyddie returns to her family's cabin, now sold to the Stevens, and sees Luke Stevens once again. He apologizes for his letter, and she tells him of her plan to go to college in Ohio. He wishes her well and she silently hopes that he will wait for her return.
