Literary Analysis of Winter's Bone-draft

Literary Analysis of Winter’s Bone

            Picture a seventeen year old young woman who is the primary caregiver of her two brothers, and mentally ill mother, while her father, a known meth cook and dealer is in trouble for his habits. The father, Jessup, is out and put the family’s house and land up for bond. Ree, the seventeen year old, who hunts for the family to eat, bathes, teaches, and protects her siblings and her mother feels obligated to search and find her father before his court date to make sure the family keeps their home. Their home is in a holler in the Ozarks of Missouri. The house is a cabin, made of wood with poor insulation. The extended family is made up of a long line of meth users, cooks, and dealers. The rich neighbors are kind to Ree’s family and help provide them with food and logs for their fire.

            Winter’s Bone is a sad, dreary, story about family struggles, drugs, poverty, and courage. The reader has difficulty continuing to read as it only seems to get worse and worse for Ree. Ree continues to take care of her family while on a treacherous journey to find her father, running into unwilling family members who do nothing more but try to steer her away from finding Jessup. Ree is courageous, strong, and perseveres through all of the struggles to save her family’s home. Woodrell’s purpose in writing this novel is to show how rough of hands people have been given and to show how courage and perseverance can pay off.  It appears that the area in which the story took place is of low economy, social status, and male dominated. The primary industry is meth. The males in the story did not want anything to do with Ree, and she was even told “don’t you have a man to do this” (Winter’s Bone, film).

Ree’s father has been in and out of jail for cooking, doing, and dealing meth. Now that he is out on bond Ree feels obligated to find him so that she can save her home. Without that house her mother and siblings and her will have nowhere to live. Ree’s mother is quiet and keeps to herself inside of their home. She hardly even talks to any of her children. Ree relates her mother’s condition to her father cheating on her and his bad habits. Ree cooks for her, bathes her, and brushes her hair. At one point Ree begs her mother for help, advice on the situation and what she should do. Her mother says nothing. Not even a head nod or a glance into her eyes. This leaves Ree no choice but to take care of her siblings. She cooks for them and teaches them how to do things so that they are capable while she is gone.

            Meth, or methamphetamine is a drug that is easily concocted out of over the counter items and easily made in any environment. The dangers of cooking and mixing these items together are deathly. This drug became the way of life for many people. Ree’s whole line of family became meth cooks and dealers. Of course they were using it as well. The effects of methamphetamine are similar to other simulants, alertness, and enhanced mood. Long term effects of methamphetamine can cause brain damage, increased blood pressure, teeth loss, weight loss, psychotic behavior, and even similar symptoms to Parkinson’s disease (semcaprevention.org).

            Methamphetamine is produced by combining ingredients such as ammonia, lye, ephedrine/pseudo-ephedrine, solvents, starter fluid, iodine, red phosphorous, lithium metal, and salts (semcaprevention.org). Every cook of meth uses different combinations of these various ingredients. Meth users never know exactly what they are ingesting. Meth can be injected, snorted, smoked, or orally digested (justice.gov).

            Methamphetamine has widely spread across the United States. In 2000, 4% of the nation’s population admitted to trying meth at least one time. Damage to the brain can cause effects similar to Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, and stroke. Chronic use of meth “can cause violent behavior, anxiety, confusion, insomnia, auditory hallucinations, mood disturbances, delusions, and paranoia” (justice.gov).

            Although this horrific drug is so dangerous and causes so many negative effects on people, so many use it. The locals and family in this area uses methamphetamines as a way of life. They all use it, cook it, and sell it. They all know not to talk about it. Jessup must have owed someone money or drugs because when Ree comes around asking about her father, no one wants to talk to her. She is sure at someone knows where he is but no one will tell her anything. She’s even told “He knows what you want to ask and he don’t want to hear it” ( pp. 63).

            Ree tries to find Jessup by any means she can. She gets choked and threatened by her Uncle Teardrop, her father’s brother. She gets beat up by her other relatives, the Dolly’s for asking too many questions as to where her father is. When Ree is persistent in talking to Thump Milton, his wife tells her, “Nope. Talkin’ just causes witnesses and he don’t want for any of those” (pp 61). Yet she still keeps looking for him.

            Ree’s dream is to join the army. Ree only has one year left until she’s old enough to join. She wants to make sure her family is stable before she goes. This is one of the reasons she teaches her siblings how to shoot a gun, to hunt, to cook, and how to take care of their mother and the house. Ree does not count on either of her parents for anything. Ree makes sure her siblings know how to handle themselves also. She does not want them growing up thinking they can rely on their parents either. Independence is a necessity in this family.

Finally Teardrop stands up for Ree and some of the female Dolly’s show up to take Ree to show her that her father is dead. Once they arrive at the place where Jessup is buried, they make Ree cut off his hands to take to the law to prove he is dead. The proof that he is dead will void the bail bondsman’s agreement and they will get to keep the house. Ree is courageous enough to cut off her dad’s hands because she knows the proof will save her home.

After Ree takes her father’s hands to the law, she realizes that the police officer is the one who leaked information out on Jessup. Jessup was working with the local sheriff then the sheriff had told some people in the community about Jessup working with him. This is what caused Jessup to get killed. The next day the bail bondsman shows up at her house and hands her a bag of money. He told her that the money was given to him by an anonymous person so now that Jessup is dead they don’t know who to give it to other than Jessup’s family (film). Fortunately the ending is as good as it can get for Ree. Although her father is dead, the family can keep their home and their land. They don’t have to worry about Jessup causing any more problems for them. Now they just have to keep up on their own.         

Work’s Cited:

Woodrell, Daniel. Winter’s Bone. New York: Back Bay Books; Little, Brown and Company.

Winter’s Bone. Dir. Debra Granik. Perf. Jennifer Lawrence. 2010. Film.

www.semcaprevention.org 25 March 2012. “Know the facts about Methamphetamines”.

www.justice.gov/dea/concern/meth_factsheet.html 25 March 2012. “Methamphetamine”.