Narrative Style of Little House on The Prairie

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Narrative Style of Little House on The Prairie

When you first start reading Little House on the Prairie you notice it is told through the eyes of a little girl named Laura. Her point of view is very realistic and captivating. She pays very close attention to the details of the day to day living and the events that are happening around her. She also notices how the prairie looks and what the weather is like each day. With her descriptions you can picture everything in your mind clearly, and you feel like you are right there next to Laura living her life.

When Laura is describing something she appeals to our senses by informing you how something smells, feels, sounds, or tastes. She describes how Ma makes their food and what they eat each day. "She set the iron bake-oven in the coals too. While it heated, she mixed cornmeal and salt with water and patted it into little cakes. She greased the bake-oven with a pork-rind, laid the cornmeal cakes in it, and put on its iron cover. Then Pa raked more coals over the cover, while Ma sliced fat salt pork. She fried the slices in the iron spider" (30). Laura also lets you know how the food tastes and if it is warm or cold. She sometimes describes Ma ironing and cleaning or doing some other household chore but barely spends any time doing it. "Then Ma took the sadiron out of the wagon and heated it by the fire. She sprinkled a dress for Mary and a dress for Laura and a little dress for Baby Carrie, and her own sprigged calico. She spread a blanket and a sheet on the wagon seat, and she ironed the dresses"(47). She loves to talk about her Pa though, he is her hero and she feels that her father is invincible and can protect her from anything. When describing the day's e...

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...n the war-cries came" (295). This was a very tense and scary time for the Ingalls family because they didn't know what the Indians were planning to do to the settlers on the prairie. The Indians were very memorable moments to Laura since they struck so much fear and awe in her.

Laura Ingalls Wilder's narrative style in her book, Little House on the Prairie, is a very interesting topic to look into. Laura uses a very realistic approach to write this story. She pays very close attention to details and descriptions of the events taking place that everything becomes very real to you. Not only this book, but all the rest of her books are very fun to read and you get a great insight into how life was like back then.

Work Cited:

Wilder, Laura Ingalls. Little House on the Prairie. 1935.

Illustrated by Garth Williams in 1953. New York: Harper and Row.

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