76 pages • 2 hours read
Gary PaulsenBrian's Winter
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 1996A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Part 1, Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1: “Fall”
Part 1, Chapter 1 Summary
As fall arrives in the north Canadian woods, Brian Robeson counts the days since the plane crash that left him stranded in the wilderness: 68. For months, he’s been living on his own, surviving in the woods. After the first two months, he found a survival pack in the plane wreckage, which made his situation easier in some ways, but harder in others. Although the tools and weapons were a godsend, the food rations “softened” him (6), making him miss the foods from his former life. When the rations ran out, Brian was relieved to finally shake his discontented hunger, and return to hunting for his food.
Now, as the summer flows into fall, Brian notices a change in the air. However, before he can register that cool weather coming, a problem with his rifle distracts him. The firing pin breaks beyond repair, so he must return to hunting with his bow and arrow, as he did before finding the survival pack. After practicing with the bow and arrow, he kills a rabbit and boils the meat to make a stew.
Brian stays busy each day with the tasks necessary for survival: gathering wood, checking his fishing lines, hunting, cleaning the meat, cooking the meat, and stretching the hide. Only rarely does he have time to sit and think. Tonight, as he gets into his sleeping bag, he feels thankful for its warmth, but again fails to realize that thankfulness for warmth indicates that the cold approaches.
Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary
Brian enjoys two weeks of exceptionally warm weather, reveling in sunshine and successful hunting. He reflects on the many ways he learned about animals in the woods. He recognizes different bird songs, interprets what they mean, and knows that animals will always protect their territory. He sees a wolf pass near his camp every week or so, and knows the wolf runs in a loop—a hunting circuit.
Even so, Brian still has a lot to learn about predators like bears. Brian thinks that as long as he leaves the bears alone, they will leave him alone. However, he’s proven wrong one night when a bear comes to Brian’s shelter in search of food. The bear ransacks the shelter, rips off the roof, and cuffs Brian, sending him flying ten feet away. Although Brian is not seriously hurt, he realizes it was a narrow escape. He resolves to make a weapon to defend himself should something like that happen again. However, he’s so caught up in the enjoyment of the warm weather and puzzling over how to make a stronger weapon, that he remains ignorant to his true enemy—the onset of winter just around the corner.
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary
Brian decides he needs a stronger bow, and spends an entire day shaping it. He calls it his “war bow” (22) because it will be more powerful than his small bow. That night, Brian feels the cold, and finally realizes summer is over, and the weather will only grow colder. The many unknown aspects of winter hit Brian in the morning, but he knows he can only address one thing at a time. He sets to work making arrows for his new bow. As he works, he wonders how to make the arrows sharp enough to pierce and kill a large animal. He remembers seeing a collection of arrowheads at a sporting goods store back home, and resolves to find a rock he can use to make some of his own.
The next day, Brian goes hunting. As he’s walking carefully with an arrow on his bowstring, he disrupts a foolbird and sends it flying into the air. He reflexively takes a shot, and successfully hits it. After removing the arrow and walking back towards his camp, he sees a rabbit, and again takes a reflexive shot that meets his target perfectly. Brian feels lucky to take two animals so instinctively with the same arrow, and calls it his “medicine arrow” (30). He sets the arrow on a ledge in his shelter, knowing that whenever he sees it, he will remember those perfect shots and the abundance he experienced that day.
Part 1, Chapters 1-3 Analysis
The novel picks up where Hatchet left off, as if Brian had never been rescued from the woods. Paulsen uses the changing seasons to foreshadow the coming weather’s danger, while highlighting Brian’s failure to recognize it and creating a tone of foreboding. Although all is well with Brian now, his sense of security is false, and his understanding of risk is flawed: Brian views the bears and wolves as his most dangerous enemy, but the narrator explains that actually, winter will be “the most dangerous thing he had faced since the plane crash” (21).
Paulsen establishes one of the novel’s motifs from the beginning: the necessity of food and the emotional impact of different ways to sate hunger. When Brian found rations in the plane’s survival pack, he tried to eat only small amounts to save it for emergencies. However, within two weeks, he had eaten it all. The rations made him miss foods from home; once they ran out, his usual meals of fish or game were no longer satisfying. This discontent did not last, however, and Brian felt relieved when his intense hunger finally faded. However, now that Brian must again kill to survive, his sense of unease about killing, especially when the animal dies slowly, returns. Yet Brian has grown wise, learning from the patterns of nature: Just as everything else in nature must kill another living thing to survive, so must he. The themes of food’s importance and the necessity of one creature’s death for another’s survival continue throughout the novel.
Paulsen also emphasizes Brian’s continual growth and learning as he encounters various obstacles. Even though he developed many skills since the plane crash, Brian must continue to learn as the weather changes his environment. For example, when the bear comes to his camp, Brian realizes his assumption that the bear would leave him alone was mistaken. He learns and reacts to this situation by resolving to make a stronger weapon. He draws on his observations in nature and knowledge from books and shows in his old life. For instance, relies on his memory of arrowheads from a sporting goods store to make arrows.
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