Alexandra Bergson's Characters: The Environmental Impact On People

Does the environment really impact people and the decisions they make? The lives of the following characters show that the environment does indeed have a significant impact on people. In O Pioneers, Alexandra Bergson is the protagonist; she is an independent woman who increases her family’s wealth through her innovative ideas. Emil, Alexandra’s youngest brother, is in love with Marie Shabata, a married woman who is unhappy in her marriage. Although, Marie admits that she loves Emil, she begs him to leave town. The day before he is to leave, Emil visits Marie to say goodbye; upon seeing them together, Marie’s husband, Frank, becomes enraged and kills both of them. Frank is sent to prison, a heartbroken Alexandra visits him and forgives him.

She lived in the prairie and in a community where everyone knew each other, making it impossible for her to leave Frank because the community would not accept if a married woman were to leave her husband for another man. Also, women did not have much rights and tacit rules were set regarding the acceptable decorum of women. For example, when Marie introduced the idea that Alexandra might have feelings for Carl, Emil was amused by the thought that his sister, who lived as a spinster for most of her life, would actually have feelings for someone. Likewise, Alexandra’s other brothers were opposed to the idea of her getting married because they were fearful about what others in the community would think. If this is the way people treat Alexandra, who has always made her own decisions, consider the consequences, Marie, who is not as assertive as Alexandra would have faced if she acted on her feelings. Cather writes that Marie “had lived a day of her new life of perfect love, and it had left her [exhausted]”(102). She had tried to deny her desire by continuing to live with her husband who had intentionally “tried to make her life ugly”(Cather 105). In the late nineteenth century, which is the setting of this novel, the society tried to promote the idea that women belonged in homes to care for their husbands and children in order to give citizens a sense of security. Marie’s decision to punish

She grew up feeling like an outsider because of her family, especially because of her mother’s suicide. Lucille and Ruthie most often felt “cruelly banished” (Robinson 81).As Lucille try to make friends with other students in school, Ruthie realizes how introverted she herself has become. Ruthie grows up feeling that she doesn’t belong and when this feeling is strengthened by the initial indifferent attitude of the townspeople, Ruthie makes the decision to follow Sylvie and become a transient. In Ruthie’s case, it was her age that affected her more than her gender. The neighbors were quick to come to make certain that Sylvie is stable enough to take care of Ruthie. Robinson writes that Lucille and Ruthie were scared when they first “heard of the interest of the state in the well-being of children”(68). The laws that were created to protect her, made her feel unsafe and that was what caused her to follow