Imagery In Laurie Halse Anderson's Fever 1793

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Laurie Halse Anderson’s historical fiction story Fever 1793 takes place in Philadelphia. Mattie is a fictional character along with Mother and Grandfather. In the story Mattie learns how to deal with all the stumbling blocks that happen throughout the story. She has to deal with these different situations through this terrible epidemic yellow fever. Through all of the difficult times that Mattie has gone through she realizes that those that stuck by her side are like family. By using imagery and character development Laurie Halse Anderson creates the lesson that one does not have to be related by blood to be family.
Family does not have to be related by blood. In Fever 1793 Mattie, Eliza, Joseph, Nathaniel and everybody come together for a dinner of thanksgiving. Even before this event, Eliza acknowledges that she looks upon the Cooks as family. QUOTE This illustrates that they all truly have respect for one another; it does not matter the class they are from. Even though all of the people around the table are not related by blood, the bond they have shows how much they love each other. Some people …show more content…

She illustrates word choice by using words to describe what is happening around the table. The imagery, “Crack! Mother Smith banged her cane so hard on the floor that it dented the board… She’ll take it, I know you Eliza you’ll worry about shillings and pence”(225). This is is significant because it shows how Anderson helps the reader to visualize how Mother Smith dented the board. Also she shows how Mother Smith really cares about Eliza and is trying to help her in the best way that she can. Another way that Anderson showed that family does not have to be related by blood to be family is by character development. In the beginning of the book Mother lectured “ Too much sleep is bad for your health, Matilda” (6)Mattie tried not to listen to

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