Summer of the Seventeenth Doll

by

Ray Lawler

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Olive Leech Character Analysis

Olive is a thirty-seven-year-old, happily employed barmaid who lives with her mother, Emma, in Carlton, Victoria. Olive looks forward to the layoff season when her lover, Roo, and Roo's friend Barney visit and spend five months vacationing away from the cane fields where they work. Every year Roo brings Olive a kewpie doll, and Olive arranges them throughout the living room. She sees them as a symbol of Roo's love for her. For the seventeenth summer, Olive invites her coworker Pearl to take Nancy's place. Olive laments Nancy's absence regularly and also speaks disparagingly about marriage in general. When Pearl talks about how she doesn't see the charm in any aspect of the layoff season, Olive angrily silences her. As the play goes on, Olive becomes progressively more distraught that Pearl seemingly refuses to see the magic of the season, though Olive eventually comes to the understanding that a person needs to have experienced the last sixteen layoffs to truly understand the significance and the beauty. Her relationship with Roo is generally tender and caring, though Olive is very upset when Roo has to get a job. After Roo and Barney fight and break a vase, Olive spends the night tidying the living room of all the decorations, including the dolls, and doesn't redecorate when she's done. Emma tells Roo that she saw Olive sobbing in the middle of the night, cuddling the seventeenth kewpie doll—something that makes Roo understand the extent of Olive's intense immaturity. When Roo asks Olive to marry him, she's shocked, hurt, and confused, and yells for Roo to give her the seventeen summers back. Her refusal of marriage is a refusal to mature, grow up, and accept the reality that the layoff seasons as she knows them are over.

Olive Leech Quotes in Summer of the Seventeenth Doll

The Summer of the Seventeenth Doll quotes below are all either spoken by Olive Leech or refer to Olive Leech. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Youth, Maturity, and Growing Up Theme Icon
).
Act 1, Scene 1 Quotes

That's what the lay-off is. Not just playing around and spending a lot of money, but a time for livin'. You think I haven't sized that up against what other women have? I laugh at them every time they try to tell me. Even waiting for Roo to get back is more exciting than anything they've got.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 15
Explanation and Analysis:

All round would be the regulars—soft city blokes...and then in would come Roo and Barney. They wouldn't say anything...there'd just be the two of them walkin' in, then a kind of wait for a second or two, and quiet. After that, without a word, the regulars'd stand side to let 'em through, just as if they was a—a coupla kings. She always reckoned they made the rest of the mob look like a bunch of skinned rabbits.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham, Barney Ibbot, Nancy
Page Number: 16
Explanation and Analysis:

Not as good as Roo when he's fit, mind yer, but he could run rings round the best of us. And this time he even made Roo look like a has-been. I never seen Roo git so mad, in no time at all he made it like a running fight between 'em, tryin' to git the better of this kid.

Related Characters: Barney Ibbot (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Johnnie Dowd
Page Number: 25
Explanation and Analysis:

Olive: You didn't go with him?

Barney: No.

Olive: Why not?

Barney: I dunno. It was all messed up. You know what Roo's always been to me, a sort of little tin god. I've never seen him in the wrong before.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Barney Ibbot (speaker), Roo Webber
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 1, Scene 2 Quotes

No, they're not. Someone's taking special care. Other times they've been pretty, but this one's beautiful. You can see.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:

Gettin' a bit crowded, maybe you should start upstairs.

Related Characters: Roo Webber (speaker), Olive Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 2, Scene 1 Quotes

The way you went on about everythin'—sounded just as if when they arrived, the whole town was gunna go up like a balloon.

Related Characters: Pearl Cunningham (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 52
Explanation and Analysis:

...We come down here for the lay-off, five months of the year, December to April. That leaves another seven months still hangin'—what d'yer reckon Olive does in that time? Knocks around with other blokes, goes out on the loose every week? No, she doesn't, she just waits for us to come back again—coz she thinks our five months is worth all the rest of the year put together!

Related Characters: Roo Webber (speaker), Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 60
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 2, Scene 2 Quotes

H-how can I? All that's happened in a house makes a feeling—you can't tell anyone that. It's between people.

Related Characters: Bubba Ryan (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot, Johnnie Dowd
Page Number: 73
Explanation and Analysis:

Bubba? Is that what they call you? Seems to me they're keeping you in the cradle, too. What's your real name?

Related Characters: Johnnie Dowd (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot, Bubba Ryan
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 3, Scene 1 Quotes

I started off trying to fix up what they broke. After that, I couldn't seem to stop. Emma always sez tryin' to shift heavy furniture on your own's a sign you're crooked on the world. Wonder what spring cleanin' at two o'clock in the morning means?

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Pearl Cunningham, Emma Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 82
Explanation and Analysis:

All right. But the least you can do is to see what you've got as it really is. Take a look at this place now you've pulled down the decorations—what's so wonderful about it? Nothing! It's just an ordinary little room that's a hell of a lot the worse for the wear. And if you'd only come out of your day dream long enough to take a grown up look at the lay off, that's what you'd find with the rest of it.

Related Characters: Pearl Cunningham (speaker), Olive Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls, Pearl's Black Dresses
Page Number: 83
Explanation and Analysis:

And it's more than looking—it's havin' another woman walking around knowin' your inside and sorry for you 'coz she thinks you've never been within cooee of the real thing. That's what hurts. It was all true, everythin' I told her was true, an'—and she didn't see any of it.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham
Page Number: 98
Explanation and Analysis:
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Summer of the Seventeenth Doll PDF

Olive Leech Quotes in Summer of the Seventeenth Doll

The Summer of the Seventeenth Doll quotes below are all either spoken by Olive Leech or refer to Olive Leech. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Youth, Maturity, and Growing Up Theme Icon
).
Act 1, Scene 1 Quotes

That's what the lay-off is. Not just playing around and spending a lot of money, but a time for livin'. You think I haven't sized that up against what other women have? I laugh at them every time they try to tell me. Even waiting for Roo to get back is more exciting than anything they've got.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 15
Explanation and Analysis:

All round would be the regulars—soft city blokes...and then in would come Roo and Barney. They wouldn't say anything...there'd just be the two of them walkin' in, then a kind of wait for a second or two, and quiet. After that, without a word, the regulars'd stand side to let 'em through, just as if they was a—a coupla kings. She always reckoned they made the rest of the mob look like a bunch of skinned rabbits.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham, Barney Ibbot, Nancy
Page Number: 16
Explanation and Analysis:

Not as good as Roo when he's fit, mind yer, but he could run rings round the best of us. And this time he even made Roo look like a has-been. I never seen Roo git so mad, in no time at all he made it like a running fight between 'em, tryin' to git the better of this kid.

Related Characters: Barney Ibbot (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Johnnie Dowd
Page Number: 25
Explanation and Analysis:

Olive: You didn't go with him?

Barney: No.

Olive: Why not?

Barney: I dunno. It was all messed up. You know what Roo's always been to me, a sort of little tin god. I've never seen him in the wrong before.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Barney Ibbot (speaker), Roo Webber
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 1, Scene 2 Quotes

No, they're not. Someone's taking special care. Other times they've been pretty, but this one's beautiful. You can see.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:

Gettin' a bit crowded, maybe you should start upstairs.

Related Characters: Roo Webber (speaker), Olive Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 31
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 2, Scene 1 Quotes

The way you went on about everythin'—sounded just as if when they arrived, the whole town was gunna go up like a balloon.

Related Characters: Pearl Cunningham (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 52
Explanation and Analysis:

...We come down here for the lay-off, five months of the year, December to April. That leaves another seven months still hangin'—what d'yer reckon Olive does in that time? Knocks around with other blokes, goes out on the loose every week? No, she doesn't, she just waits for us to come back again—coz she thinks our five months is worth all the rest of the year put together!

Related Characters: Roo Webber (speaker), Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot
Page Number: 60
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 2, Scene 2 Quotes

H-how can I? All that's happened in a house makes a feeling—you can't tell anyone that. It's between people.

Related Characters: Bubba Ryan (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot, Johnnie Dowd
Page Number: 73
Explanation and Analysis:

Bubba? Is that what they call you? Seems to me they're keeping you in the cradle, too. What's your real name?

Related Characters: Johnnie Dowd (speaker), Roo Webber, Olive Leech, Barney Ibbot, Bubba Ryan
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:
Act 3, Scene 1 Quotes

I started off trying to fix up what they broke. After that, I couldn't seem to stop. Emma always sez tryin' to shift heavy furniture on your own's a sign you're crooked on the world. Wonder what spring cleanin' at two o'clock in the morning means?

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Pearl Cunningham, Emma Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls
Page Number: 82
Explanation and Analysis:

All right. But the least you can do is to see what you've got as it really is. Take a look at this place now you've pulled down the decorations—what's so wonderful about it? Nothing! It's just an ordinary little room that's a hell of a lot the worse for the wear. And if you'd only come out of your day dream long enough to take a grown up look at the lay off, that's what you'd find with the rest of it.

Related Characters: Pearl Cunningham (speaker), Olive Leech
Related Symbols: Kewpie Dolls, Pearl's Black Dresses
Page Number: 83
Explanation and Analysis:

And it's more than looking—it's havin' another woman walking around knowin' your inside and sorry for you 'coz she thinks you've never been within cooee of the real thing. That's what hurts. It was all true, everythin' I told her was true, an'—and she didn't see any of it.

Related Characters: Olive Leech (speaker), Roo Webber, Pearl Cunningham
Page Number: 98
Explanation and Analysis: