Charlotte’s Web: A Fantasy Pig, A Positive Attitude towards Death

陳少秋 東北師范大學外國語學院

Abstract: Elwyn Brooks White (1899-1985) was an American writer, who was famous for his essays and children’s literature. His children’s books Stuart Little (1945), Charlotte’s Web (1952) and The Trumpet of the Swan (1970) are considered as the most beloved fairy tales of the twentieth century. Charlotte’s Web is the most popular one of them. The book is famous for its special language style and its gripping story.Since it was published in 1952, it has continued to hold its place at or near the top of “Best List” among children’s books. It has been translated into more than twenty languages and over five million copies have been sold. This paper tries to explore White’s positive attitude towards death through the ideal pig he created in his novel.

Key words: White pig death

1 A Fantasy Pig

In his essay “Death of a Pig”, White said that“He (the pig) had evidently become precious to me, not that he represented distant nourishment in a hungry time, but that he had suffered in a suffering world.(77) While several years later, when Charlotte’s Web becomes popular, many readers ask that why he created such a story, E.B. White’s in his letter replied that:As for Charlotte's Web, I like animals and my barn is a very pleasant place to be, at all hours. One day when I was on my way to feed the pig, I began feeling sorry for the pig because, like most pigs, he was doomed to die. This made me sad. So I started thinking of ways to save a pig's life.

These evidence shows that the death of the pig caused a profound trauma to him. The relationship between pig’s fate and humans’ entangles him for a long time because the essay was written in 1947while the book was published in 1952. The passing of time does not alleviate his guilt for the death of pig so that he considers saving pig’s life as his mission.Therefore, White depicts an ideal world in the novel where the pig is full of vitality. He not only gets rid of the fate being killed but also enjoys warmth and love.

2 Enjoying the Right to Subsistence

When the pig was born, he was a runt. Thus, the owner decided to kill him. But his daughter Fern appeared timely and said “It's unfair; the pig couldn't help being born small, could it? If I had been very small at birth, would you have killed me?" (3)By arguing with her father, Fern saved the pig’s life and name it Wilbur. When Wilbur encountered the fate of death second time, it was Charlotte the spider that comforted him and decided to save his life. She adopted her wisdom by weaving the four different words each time when Wilbur was faced with the coming death. With her unremitting effort and patience, the pig survived in the end.

2.1 Favorable Living Condition

In terms of the place the pig lives, it is no longer the sawdust that possibly caused his death but the large barn which “often had a sort of peaceful smell - as though nothing bad could happen ever again in the world.”(11) Moreover, “The barn was pleasantly warm in winter and it was pleasantly cool in summer when the big doors stood wide open to the breeze.” (11)After experiencing many difficulties and happy moments,Wilbur thought that “Life in the barn was very good -night and day, winter and summer, spring and fall, dull days and bright days. It was the best place to be” (174)

2.2 Enjoying Warmth and Love

When Wilbur was small, Fern considered him as treasure and loved him more than anything. “She loved to stroke him, to feed him, to put him to bed. (7)Sometimes, Fern went out with Wilbur and put him in the carriage alongside the doll.”(9) In the barn,Charlotte gave much encouragement and support to Wilbur which was helpful to make Wilbur keep innocence and carefree. When Wilbur boasted that he can spin a web,Charlotte did not laugh at immediately rather than say"Let's see you do it."(52)

Charlotte often gave him confidence and hope to ensure him live a happy life. When it was time to sleep, Wilbur asked Charlotte to tell him a story.Charlotte did what Wilbur wanted although she was tired. Then Wilbur begged Charlotte told him another story, Charlotte did again. After that, Wilbur continued demanding Charlotte to do something for him.Charlotte sang a lullaby according to his requirement with patience so that Wilbur would not feel afraid and lonely. From these examples, it is obvious that White describes a fantasy world where the pig is surrounded by love and care.

3 A Positive Attitude towards Death

3.1 Death is Cyclic

When Wilbur first met Charlotte, their conversations started like this: "Salutations!" said the voice. Wilbur jumped to his feet. "Salu-what?" he cried."Salutations are greetings," said the voice. (32)In the end, when Charlotte’s children were born, three of them still used the same way and same word to greet Wilbur. The seemly repeated situation represents a kind of cycle of life to some extent.

Gloria Goldreich gave a much more vivid explanation about Charlotte’s death in his essay “What Is Death? The Answers in Children’s Books”. He points out that “in E. B. White’s classic book Charlotte’s Web, Charlotte, that rare and delicate spider who is not only a good writer but a good friend as well,devotes her life to ensuring the survival of Wilbur.Charlotte dies in the natural course of events…Just as there will be new trees spawned by the dead tree,new puddles to replace the dead puddle, so there will be new Charlottes to replace the brave dead spider.The children here are not assured that anything lived happily ever after but that another generation will spring up and live, if not forever, at least through a natural orderly life cycle”. (Goldreich, 19)

For individual, life is a short period when we are alive. White thinks of the death of person from the death of pig, here, in the novel, he warns people again that death is unavoidable for any living things by the death of Charlotte. As John Donne mentioned in his poem “Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions” that “No man is an island entire of itself/Everyone is a piece of continent, a part of the main/If a clod be wash away by the sea, Europe is the less/as well as if a manor or a friend’s or of thine own were/Anyone’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind/ And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls/It tolls for you.”

Nevertheless, he does not treat these gloomily due to he also depicts that the beautiful changes happened in the nature.“These autumn days will shorten and grow cold. The leaves will shake loose from the trees and fall. Christmas will come, then the snows of winter.You will live to enjoy the beauty of the frozen world.”(167) White eulogizes the power and charm of life in the nature between the lines since for the whole universe, life is eternal since life and death forms a cycle.

3.2 How to Lead a Meaningful Life

Although life is cyclic, life is transient for individual. Therefore, how to lead a meaningful life becomes the crucial question. In the novel, White demonstrated two kinds of life through the contrast between Charlotte and Templeton. When Charlotte was exhausted and close to death, Wilbur asked why she spared no effort to save him. Charlotte replied that“I weaved my webs for you because I liked you. After all,what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while and we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that."(156) Charlotte chose to help others to strengthen the value of life so that her ordinary life is changed. Moreover, the friendship lights up Charlotte’s life and endows her life a more profound meaning.

On the other hand, Templeton said that “I prefer to spend my time eating, gnawing, spying, and hiding.”(26) As a glutton, Templeton often helped others on the condition that he can gain interest. Such as when Charlotte needed new ideas to save Wilbur’s life, his indifference and cruelty were revealed clearly. Only when the sheep told him that Wilbur's leftover food is his chief source of supply and Wilbur's destiny and his destiny are closely linked, he decided to accept the assignment. When Charlotte needed Templeton to go to the fair with her to ensure Wilbur was safe, he grumbled that "I haven't the slightest interest in fairs." Actually, it was another excuse to refuse to offer help. When the old sheep remarked, "A fair is a rat's paradise. " (116) with the temptation of the food, he promised to go. In the end, when Wilbur asked him to bring Charlotte's egg sac, what he cared about was not the danger of Charlotte’s children but complained that he had done too much. It is the interest that made him take action to help Charlotte once again. Templeton was a greedy and selfish figure,which forms a sharp contrast with the image of selfless Charlotte. Instead of lecture, White adopted those simple and persuasive evidence make people see clearly how to make a choice in finding ways of living a meaningful life.

4 Conclusion

From his essay “death of a pig” he said that “The scheme of buying a spring pig in blossom time, feeding it through summer and fall, and butchering it when the solid cold weather arrives, is a familiar scheme to me and follows an antique pattern.” (77) Nevertheless,in looking for the sick pig, his role was changed,from the butcher in winter to the pig’s friend and physician, and with the change of the role came the change of feelings. “From the lustiness of a healthy pig a man derives a feeling of personal lustiness… the pig's imbalance becomes the man's, vicariously, and life seems insecure, displaced, transitory.”(80)

As time goes by, his sympathy for pig is deepening, and the inner relationship of fate between pig and people is more much inseparable. Therefore, he created Charlotte’s Web to express his will to save pig and expound his profound thinking about death.In the novel, the pig enjoys the happiness of life.Firstly, he obtains the dignity and right to live and then he lives a comfortable place and tastes rich food.More importantly, he has an affectionate and loyal friend who accompanies him, comforts him and saves his life. If we say White outlines an ideal world to ease his sorrow and sorry for the death of pig, he also exhibits his positive attitude towards death in the fantasy world. Life is eternal for the nature and universe but transient for the individual and death is unavoidable. Life can be valuable and the premise is that do something meaningful. The novel not only provokes readers’ imagination, touches their heart, it also gives an example of how to face life and death and brings warmth and hope to people. As some scholars put it “E.B. White probed the uncertain relation between life and death of an individual and the relation between friendship and love and provided a sort of comfort without sentiment in a dark world”. (Thacker&Webb, 2002: 49)