Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Fever 1793, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Freedom and Independence
Mothers, Daughters, and Familial Love
Disaster and Human Nature
Ingenuity, Ambition, and Survival
Summary
Analysis
In Eliza’s embrace, Mattie is overcome with grief about Mother, Grandfather, and all her suffering. Eliza tells Mattie it’s getting dark, and they’ll talk about everything later. She gives Nell a roll and offers to carry the child, but Nell clings to Mattie’s neck. Soon they reach the home of her brother, Joseph, a cooper. Before they go upstairs, Mattie has to know her mother’s fate. Eliza assures her that Lucille survived the fever and intended to follow Mattie to the Ludingtons’ farm. Mattie wants to find her at once, but Eliza tells Mattie, “you can only climb one mountain at a time.” They should eat supper first.
After battling to survive and finding herself alone, Mattie finally has a chance to grieve openly. Meanwhile, Nell is already forming a bond with Mattie. Mattie also gets some confirmation of her mother’s whereabouts, but Eliza wisely reminds Mattie of what she’s already learned—that crisis must be encountered one step at a time.
Themes
Eliza leads Mattie and Nell into Joseph’s small, tidy rooms above the cooperage. She explains that Joseph’s wife died last week, and Joseph is still in bed, weak and grieving. His twin boys, Robert and William, haven’t taken ill. She hugs the boys and introduces Mattie and Nell. Then a tiny, aged woman enters the room, leaning on a cane, and pokes Mattie’s arm, demanding to know who she is. When Eliza explains Mattie’s and Nell’s appearance, the woman snorts, “So you’ve got to feed them, too?” Mattie says she doesn’t intend to take anything from Eliza, but the woman says she can’t leave without food, then promises to return tomorrow. Eliza explains that the woman is Mother Smith, of the Free African Society, who’s watching Joseph’s boys while Eliza volunteers.
Mattie is welcomed into a different family setting for the time being, although this family, too, is grief-stricken—a reminder that the yellow fever epidemic spread across all classes and demographics, with devastating effect. Though Mother Smith is frank and forthright about their own distressed circumstances, that doesn’t stop her from insisting that Mattie receive hospitality.
Themes
Eliza ladles stew for Mattie, but Mattie pours half of her serving back, saying that the boys need it more than she does. Mattie watches the three children eat and starts to form a plan, but she puts it aside, knowing she needs to “deal with each hour as it came, one step at a time.” Once the children are in bed, Eliza settles Mattie in a chair with a mug of lemonade and demands the full story. Mattie fills in all the details of her adventure with Grandfather, her own illness, and Grandfather’s death. She cries, believing she did everything wrong and that Grandfather’s death is somehow her fault. Eliza reassures her.
Mattie’s readiness to go without food shows how much she’s grown from the relatively spoiled girl at the beginning of the story. Also, her quickness to set aside her newfound “plan” for the time being shows that she’s less inclined to indulge in daydreams, having learned the importance of facing up to the crisis at hand. She’s still burdened with grief, and more apt to criticize her perceived failures than to recognize how much she’s achieved in recent weeks.
Themes
Eliza watches Nell sleeping and tells Mattie that both she and Nell should probably go to the orphan house. Mattie begs Eliza to believe that she’s not a little girl anymore and can take care of herself. Eliza says they’ll discuss it in the morning. Mattie helps her mend Robert’s and William’s clothes while Eliza fills her in on her work with the Free African Society.
In contrast to the beginning of the book, when Mattie mostly thought about her own dreams and desires, now her view of freedom and maturity is tied to caring for someone more helpless than herself.
Themes
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Dr. Benjamin Rush had written to the Free African Society a few weeks ago, asking for help. The doctor believed that Africans could not get yellow fever. Although this turned out to be untrue, Reverend Allen believed that this was an opportunity “for black people to show we are every bit as good and important and useful as white people.” The Society began organizing to visit and care for the sick. Proudly, Eliza acknowledges that the Society “has done a remarkable job […caring] for thousands of people without taking notice of color.” However, black people have gotten sick, too.
The Reverend Richard Allen had been born a slave in Philadelphia in 1760, before gradual emancipation was enacted. He bought his own freedom and later became the first bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. With Absalom Jones, a fellow ex-slave and the first ordained African American Episcopal priest, he founded the Free Africans and directed the benevolent organization in contributing to its broader community during the epidemic, at great cost to its members.
Themes
After a silence, Mattie asks Eliza, “Are we going to die?” Eliza retorts that she can’t die; she has too much work to do. She counsels Mattie not to despair. All they have to do is find a way to survive until the frost comes.
Eliza is not being naïve; obviously, they could very well die. But her point is that such questions don’t help. The only thing they can do is keep fighting to survive, one step at a time, until relief comes. Anything else is a potentially paralyzing speculation.
Themes
