55 pages • 1 hour read
Nancy E. TurnerThese Is My Words: The Diary of Sarah Agnes Prine, 1881-1901
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1998A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Books
Books become an important symbol in the novel early on. Beginning with Sarah’s family Bible, books are initially associated with education and righteous living. However, books’ associations take on new contours toward the end of Chapter 1 when Savannah Lawrence lends Sarah a reader to help develop her writing skills. Savannah is a beautiful and devout young Quaker woman who is well-educated and aspires to be a teacher. With Savannah’s introduction into Sarah’s life, books and their value become additionally associated with the feminine refinement and gentility that she admires in her educated new friend. When Sarah begins reading The Happy Bride, an etiquette manual she hopes will educate her in the ways of being a proper and marriageable lady like Savannah, these associations are further underscored.
More subtly, as the novel progresses, books also come to be associated with Sarah’s connection to Jack Elliot and the love they share. For instance, prior to their courtship, Jack refuses to return Sarah’s copy of The Duchess of Warwick and Her Sorrow by the Sea to maintain a connection to her. Sarah later learns, however, that Jack refused to return the book because he faithfully carried it with him into every military campaign; during one battle, the book was irreparably damaged. After they are married, books also become one way Jack shows Sarah his love, regularly gifting them to her at birthdays and “for silly holidays he makes up” (323).
Horses
Horses hold special importance in Sarah’s early life, and their waning prominence in the novel traces her process of growth and maturation. Sarah was raised on Papa’s New Mexico horse ranch, where she came into her own as an adept breaker and rider of horses. From this experience, she gets her roan horse, Rose, who becomes her faithful companion on the wagon trail to San Angelo. When she marries Jimmy Reed, who owns a horse ranch in Arizona Territory, Sarah continues the hard work of breaking and caring for horses. Thus, they come to signify security and a sense of home for her. The labor of caring for them structures her days and gives her a sense of purpose, particularly amid her loveless marriage to Jimmy. Following his death, however, horses gradually begin to hold a less prominent position in the novel’s action, as Sarah’s feelings toward the ranch begin to shift.
After Jimmy dies, Sarah is bitter and overwhelmed by all the work she must do to support her late husband’s ranch. She also learns that he stole his horses from Mr. MacIntosh, his previous fiancée’s father, rather than having received them as payment for work, as she previously believed. The memory of her unhappy marriage, combined with this new information, sours the labor of horse ranching for Sarah; suddenly, it feels more burdensome than purposeful. At her first opportunity, she declares her willingness to dispense with all of Jimmy’s horses. When she announces her engagement to Jack Elliot, she tells him he may sell all the horses on the ranch, other than Rose. With this, Sarah articulates her desire not only to abandon her childhood associations of horse ranching with security but also to move on from her bitter first marriage. Rose remains Sarah’s favorite horse, but she moves toward a future in cattle ranching with Jack.
Wagons
Wagons are not easily replaced by the newer and more modern modes of transport that Sarah encounters in the booming town of Tucson. They stand for a trustworthy and traditional way of moving people, livestock, and belongings. For example, despite the presence of railway travel throughout the American West, Sarah’s family elects to uproot their ranch in New Mexico and move to Arizona via wagon. At the time of their first journey, the Prine family includes five children and two parents; Papa’s herd of ranch horses also goes with them on the trip. While Sarah’s diary does not explicitly state this, transporting the family and their livestock by train would not have been practical, nor would they have been able to afford this mode of travel. Although wagon travel was more common in the decades prior to 1881, it remains a more sensible choice for the Prines than the modern, faster railways. Moreover, wagon travel is associated with Sarah’s family history, as both Mama and Papa traveled the Oregon Trail by wagon during their respective childhoods.
Like their comparison with railway travel, when measured against horse-drawn buggies, wagons also stand for practicality. For example, while Sarah is dazzled by the beautiful “shiny black buggy” that Jack rents during their courtship in Chapter 10, she nevertheless defaults to her old wagon for her ride home following their date (177). Sarah mentions that she would like to own a buggy one day, and several chapters later, she gets one after she and Jack marry and move to Tucson. However, she uses it only for short-distance small errands in town with her children. While the buggy is more beautiful than her wagon and offers a smoother ride, it is also too small to accommodate all the people and items Sarah takes with her on trips to and from her ranch outside town. As was true of moving the Prines and their livestock by train, Sarah’s choices indicate that traveling long distances by buggy is similarly impractical and limiting. Thus, wagons signify an as-yet-irreplaceable link to the past.
