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Granny Weatherall is the protagonist of the story, an eighty-year-old woman on her deathbed. While the narrative is in fact written in the third person, its stream-of-consciousness style closely follows Granny’s wandering thoughts through the present, the past, and the imaginary as she contemplates her oncoming death. At first, she is not a particularly sympathetic character, given that she is fairly rude to and dismissive of the people trying to look after her. As the story progresses and more is revealed about her life, however, her plight becomes increasingly sympathetic. Granny was “jilted” at the altar sixty years ago by a man named George, and despite trying her very best to move on with her life, she is still plagued by the painful memory. Nevertheless, she has remained remarkably strong, and her enduring spirit has carried her through life. She married a man named John, was a very attentive mother to her children, and kept an excellent home. She remains proud of her achievements, and has always tried to remain in control of things through the strength of her will. She can’t help feeling, however, that something was missing from her life, which leads her back to George. In her dying moments Granny is once again jilted, only this time by God when she asks Him for a sign and He fails to provide one. In spite of this cruelty she manages to reclaim her own agency once again, and the story ends with her seemingly dying of her own accord, blowing out the “candle” of her life.
Granny / Ellen Weatherall Quotes in The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
The The Jilting of Granny Weatherall quotes below are all either spoken by Granny / Ellen Weatherall or refer to Granny / Ellen Weatherall. 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:
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The Jilting of Granny Weatherall Quotes
Cornelia was dutiful; that was the trouble with her. Dutiful and good: “So good and dutiful,” said Granny, “that I’d like to spank her.”
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Granny is very ill, and her daughter Cornelia is looking after her. Granny, however, cannot stand being ill or feeling powerless, and she takes out some of her frustration at her situation on Cornelia. Being “dutiful and good” are obviously not bad qualities in a person, but it is Cornelia’s sense of duty that leads her to look after Granny, and thus to become the target of Granny’s frustration. Granny does not dislike Cornelia for being “good and dutiful”—what she actually dislikes is having to be looked after by her own daughter. To fight against these feelings of inadequacy, Granny Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus t
Things were finished somehow when the time came; thank God there was always a little margin over for peace: then a person could spread out the plan of life and tuck in the edges orderly. It was good to have everything clean and folded away, with the hair bushes and tonic bottles sitting straight on the white embroidered linen.
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Here, Granny details her obsession with domestic order. On a straightforward level, this merely extends to her orderly rows of tonic bottles and hair brushes, but on a deeper level, this obsession with household tasks actually gestures towards Granny’s much greater need for control in her life. Life has been unpredictable for Granny: she was unexpectedly jilted at the altar sixty years ago, and the shock of it has stayed with her ever since. Since then, she has tried to regain some sense of personal control over her life by organizing its meticulous details, such as these household objects. This Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commod
While she was rummaging around she found death in her mind and it felt clammy and unfamiliar. She had spent so much time preparing for death there was no need for bringing it up again. Let it take care of itself now. When she was sixty she had felt very old, finished […] she made her will and came down with a long fever. That was all just a notion like a lot of other things, but it was lucky too, for she had once for all got over the idea of dying for a long time.
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Granny thinks suddenly of death and the thought of it scares her, so she attempts to comfort herself by thinking of all the preparations she has already made for death. Given that she has prepared so much, she feels that death can now “take care of itself.” Careful preparations and domestic tasks have always helped Granny to feel more in control of her life, or in this case, of her death. She had thought she would die when she was sixty, and so she made her will, which made her feel a lot more comfortable and prepared. In fact, this Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium r
Little things, little things! They had been so sweet when they were little. Granny wished the old days were back again with the children young.
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Granny, who is now a very old woman close to death, likes to revisit the past. She likes to think back to times when her children were young, and when she was a young and capable mother herself. The time when her children were young appears to have been one of the happiest in her life, because she felt strong and capable and in control. Granny finds being in control very reassuring, because when she was jilted at the altar in her youth she felt as though she was completely powerless in her own life. Being a mother helped Granny Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusa
Why, he couldn’t possibly recognize her. She had fenced in a hundred acres once, digging the post holes herself and clamping the wires with just a negro boy to help. That changed a woman. John would be looking for a young woman with the peaked Spanish comb in her hair and the painted fan. Digging post holes changed a woman.
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Granny thinks back to a particular occasion when she fenced a hundred acres with hardly any help. She places great pride in her achievements as a younger woman, and this occasion seems to be the most important to her: so important, in fact, that she claims that it completely changed her as a person. Granny has always tried to be a strong and determined woman throughout her life, and this example is testament to that, but of particular note is the fact that Granny claims that her deceased husband, John, wouldn’t have been able to recognize her after the digging Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas
I want you to pick all the fruit this year and see that nothing is wasted. There’s always someone who can use it. Don’t let good things rot for want of using. You waste life when you waste good food. Don’t let things get lost. It’s bitter to lose things.
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Granny thinks of an occasion from her past when she instructed her children not to waste any fruit from their orchard. On a literal level, Granny simply does not like wasted food, but it is clear that her sentiment here goes deeper than just rotting fruit. When she compares wasting food to wasting life, it is made explicit that she is referring not just to the food but to her own life, which she feels was wasted after she was jilted at the altar by her first fiancé. This is particularly clear in the implicit comparison between the wasted fruit Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti so
There was the day, the day, but a whirl of dark smoke rose and covered it, crept up and over into the bright field where everything was planted so carefully in orderly rows. That was hell, she knew hell when she saw it.
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The day which is referred to here is that of Granny’s jilting at the altar, sixty years ago. The memory of this day is incredibly painful for Granny, to the extent that she can barely even speak of it. Instead it is simply referred to as “the day.” The dark smoke which accompanies the memory is representative of the horrifying lack of control which Granny had over her own life on that day, and this lack of control is something which she has been fighting against ever since. She meticulously orders her everyday life, (often through domestic tasks such as Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. C
I want you to find George. Find him and be sure to tell him I forgot him. I want him to know I had my husband just the same and my children and my house like any other woman. A good house too and a good husband that I loved and fine children out of him. Better than I hoped for even. […] no, there was something else besides the house and the man and the children. Oh, surely they were not all? What was it? Something not given back.
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George is the fiancé who jilted Granny at the altar sixty years ago. She likes to believe that she got on very well in life without him, and that she didn’t need him after all, but in the moments before her death she realizes that she would still like to see him. It occurs to her that, despite all of her efforts for a perfect life without George, he has always been the something missing from her life, the something which was never “given back.” She tried her best to fulfil every aspect of a good life without him: she Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis.
Yes, John, get the Doctor now, no more talk, my time has come.
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As Granny is about to die, she gets confused with her memories of giving birth. Here she asks her deceased husband John to fetch the doctor because her time has come to give birth, but she is in fact about to die. Porter’s conflation of images of birth and death perhaps makes the idea of death seem less final and more positive, as it encourages the reader to focus on the new possibilities of life, rather than simply the end of it. This is not the only instance of this technique in the story. At other points when she is Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam offic
The rosary fell out of her hands and Lydia put it back. Jimmy tried to help, their hands fumbled together, and Granny closed two fingers around Jimmy’s thumb. Beads wouldn’t do, it must be something alive.
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This episode is one of the key instances of Granny’s rejection of the spiritual over the human. As her death approaches, Granny realizes that the only thing that can really offer her comfort is the hand of her child, Jimmy. It must be something “alive” that she can cling to, not her lifeless beads. Indeed, throughout the story the human and “alive” is consistently given much more credibility and importance than the spiritual and lifeless. Earlier, Granny rejects a photograph of her late husband John, because it does not capture him as a person. It is a good likeness for Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessita
She stretched herself with a deep breath and blew out the light.
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This is the final sentence of the story, in which Granny ends her own life. The way in which she dies is significant because it is done on Granny’s own terms. She commits the act herself by blowing out the symbolic light of her own life, and in doing so she is able to regain control over her own fate, rather than relying on God to control it for her. The light may also be representative of Granny’s hope, which is finally extinguished at the end of the story. Even if George rejected her years ago, Granny appears to have Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tem
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Granny / Ellen Weatherall Character Timeline in The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
The timeline below shows where the character Granny / Ellen Weatherall appears in The Jilting of Granny Weatherall. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
The Jilting of Granny Weatherall
Granny Weatherall tells Doctor Harry, who is inspecting her, to leave her be. She claims that...
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Granny feels that her bones are “loose” and “floated around in her skin,” and that Doctor...
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Granny hears Cornelia and Doctor Harry whispering outside in the hallway. They claim that she was...
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As she starts to drift back off to sleep, Granny thinks about all of the things that need to be done tomorrow, as there is...
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Granny thinks suddenly of death, and the thought of it feels “clammy and unfamiliar.” She decides...
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Again Granny hears Cornelia talking about her behind her back, saying she is “childish,” and Granny becomes...
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As Granny thinks back to the past, she specifically thinks of her children as they were when...
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Granny thinks back again to what she must do tomorrow, but suddenly finds that she cannot...
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Granny then thinks about another memory of the orchard, when she told her children to “pick...
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Granny then drifts into a memory of her jilting at the altar sixty years ago. “What...
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Granny is brought back into consciousness by Cornelia wiping her face with a cold cloth. She...
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Cornelia seems to be speaking to Granny, but Granny can’t understand what she’s saying. Cornelia explains that Doctor Harry has returned to...
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Once the doctor has administered the hypodermic, Granny has a hallucination in which she goes through various rooms to find her daughter, Hapsy....
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Granny slips back into reality as Cornelia asks her if there is anything Granny wants. Granny...
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Father Connolly, the priest, arrives. He was also the priest who was supposed to marry Granny and her former fiancé George. Granny remembers Father Connolly as a man fond of gossip...
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As she comes close to death, Granny gets confused and has flashbacks to the time that she gave birth to Hapsy. She...
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Granny becomes very aware of the room around her. She thinks it looks like a picture....
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Granny drifts in and out of reality but manages to pull a rosary out of her...
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Granny comes closer to death and quickly tries to instruct her children as to what to...
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Granny feels as if she has become a small blue light. As she dies, the light...
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God fails to give Granny a “sign,” and instead abandons her in her time of need, just as George did...
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