Summary: Chapter 1
Well, good gosh a’mighty! She’s dead
as she’ll ever be, ain’t she? Well, ain’t she?
See Important Quotations Explained
In the year 1914, the novel’s narrator,
Will Tweedy, recalls the summer of 1906 in
Cold Sassy, when he was fourteen years old. His story begins on
July 5, 1906, right after Cold Sassy’s first
Fourth of July celebration since the Civil War, a conflict known
in Cold Sassy as the War Between the States. Rucker Blakeslee, Will’s
grandfather, stops by Will’s house and takes a shot of corn whiskey,
as he does every day. Rucker’s wife, Mattie Lou, always refused
to let Rucker keep corn whiskey in the house, and even though Mattie
Lou died three weeks earlier, Rucker still keeps his whiskey at
Will’s house. Rucker asks Will to find his mother, Mary Willis,
and Will’s aunt, Loma. Will runs to Aunt Loma’s to tell her of her
father’s arrival; she doesn’t have a phone. Many people in Cold
Sassy, including Will’s family, have phones, indoor plumbing, and
electricity, but Loma and her husband, Camp, cannot afford such
luxuries. Rucker does not have them either, but in his case the
problem is stinginess. Once Will, Loma, and Mary Willis have gathered,
Rucker announces that he and Mattie Lou had a fine thirty-six years
together but that he now plans to marry Miss Love Simpson, the pretty
young hat-maker who works at his store. When Loma reminds Rucker
that Mattie Lou has been dead only three weeks, he replies, “She’s
dead as she’ll ever be, ain’t she?”
Summary: Chapter 2
Rucker leaves for the store, and Loma and Mary Willis
vent their shock and outrage. Not only is Miss Love young enough
to be Rucker’s daughter, but she comes from Baltimore, which nearly makes
her a Yankee. Loma and Mary worry about what people in the town
will say. They think a quick marriage will dishonor their mother’s
memory. They know they cannot dissuade their father from the marriage,
since once Rucker Blakeslee makes up his mind he does what he wants
to do.
Summary: Chapter 3
Loma leaves with her baby, Campbell Junior, and Mary Willis
goes upstairs to rest. Will does not mind his grandfather’s impending marriage.
Shortly after the Civil War, Rucker lost a hand in a sawmill accident,
and Will reasons that Rucker needs someone to look after him now
that Mattie Lou is dead. Will begins thinking about how much he
hates being in mourning, because it means he can’t go fishing, play
with his friends, or read the funny papers. Will notes the distinction
between being in mourning and actually mourning, and says he does
not think his grandmother would want him to stop enjoying life.
Will’s father, Hoyt, who works at Rucker’s store, comes running
home with the news that Rucker and Miss Love have just set off to
get married. This news comes as a shock, since the family had assumed
that Rucker would wait to marry until the end of the yearlong mourning
period. Mary Willis weeps and says she thinks that Miss Love will
go after the store and the inheritance.
Summary: Chapter 4
Will thinks about the irascible old Rucker, a Confederate
and a man who still gets into fistfights. Rucker considers Will
the son he never had. Will remembers seeing the pretty Miss Love
for the first time, shortly after Rucker hired her. Miss Love is
fashionable and wears bright colors, nothing like the town’s other
women, who wear muted tones. She is a suffragette, or advocate for
women’s right to vote, which makes her unusual in Cold Sassy. She
makes fashionable hats and helps the women with their hair. Will
thinks Loma is jealous of Miss Love because Loma was the prettiest
woman in town until Miss Love moved in. Now Loma is stuck with a
husband whom she married just to spite Rucker, who angered her by
refusing to let her join an acting troupe. Will thinks about how
much he dislikes his bossy aunt.
Analysis: Chapters 1–4
Cold Sassy Tree tells two stories: the
story of Will Tweedy and his coming of age, and the story of Rucker
and his new love. Will and Rucker share many qualities; in many
ways, they are the same figure, shown at opposite ends of life.
Townspeople frequently remark on Will’s and his grandfather’s similar
appearance and personality. Will and Rucker both love practical
jokes, storytelling, and fighting. Rucker provides the model for
what Will might become in his old age. Rucker’s integrity informs
his actions, including his marriage to Miss Love Simpson. Throughout Cold
Sassy Tree, Will struggles with the moral consequences
of his actions and begins to acquire the convictions that shape
Rucker.
Both Will and Rucker question the conformity demanded
by the residents of Cold Sassy, although Will simply puzzles over
the rules that strike him as illogical while Rucker has grown used
to making stubborn, principled objections to those rules. Will resists
the trappings of mourning and questions the logic of refraining
from pleasure in order to pay tribute to the dead. He begins to
understand that one does not need to be in mourning in order to
mourn for someone. Rucker, who likely thought just as Will
did when he was a boy, does not simply muse about illogical rules,
he takes action. For instance, he insists on marrying Love Simpson
and ignores the gossip-conscious objections of his daughters. Furthermore,
rather than wait and mourn for an amount of time that society arbitrarily
considers appropriate, he proceeds with his marriage precisely when
he wants to.
