What Children’s Literature Teaches Us About Money: Patricia MacLachlan’s ‘Sarah, Plain and Tall’
Welcome to the next installment of What Children’s Literature Teaches Us About Money! (I already love this series so much.) Last week, we looked at Eleanor Estes’ The Hundred Dresses and discussed middle class markers.
This week, we’re reading Patricia MacLachlan’s Sarah, Plain and Tall.
Here’s what I remember about Sarah, Plain and Tall, which might represent what I took away from this book as a child:
A widower cannot manage his rural farm and children on his own, so he puts an ad in the paper asking for a woman to help him. Sarah, who is plain and tall, responds. The daughter, Anna, does not like Sarah because she is worried that Sarah will take the place of her deceased mother. It turns out that Sarah and the widower fall in love, so Anna’s worries were kinda legit? But it’s okay because she loves Sarah too. Also, there’s a movie with Glenn Close and Christopher Walken, and the name “Caleb” means “bold.”
Takeaway: be open to new people in your life and family.
My remembered plot summary was not entirely correct, so let’s start at the beginning. Jacob Witting does not ask for a woman to help him on his farm. He places an ad for a wife.
Here is Sarah’s response to the ad:
Dear Mr. Jacob Witting,
I am Sarah Wheaton from Maine as you will see from my letter. I am answering your advertisement. I have never been married, though I have been asked. I have lived with an older brother, William, who is about to be married. His wife-to-be is young and energetic.
I have always loved to live by the sea, but at this time I feel a move is necessary. And the truth is, the sea is as far east as I can go. My choice, as you can see, is limited. This should not be taken as an insult. I am strong and I work hard and I am willing to travel. But I am not mild mannered. If you should still care to write, I would be interested in your children and about where you live. And you.
Very truly yours,
Sarah Elisabeth Wheaton
P.S. Do you have opinions on cats? I have one.
I have so many questions:
- Where did Jacob print this ad? Did he put it in a national newspaper? How did a woman in Maine learn about this man living on the prairie?
- Does the young and energetic wife-to-be not want Sarah around? Does it have anything to do with the part about how she’s “not mild mannered?”
- What are the options for a single woman like Sarah? Could she live on her own in Maine? Later in the book she describes “three aunts” who live near her brother’s house, who “wear silk dresses and no shoes.” Is that what she could expect for herself if she did not marry?
- If we assume that Sarah does in fact want marriage and family, and is not just doing this because her brother and his new wife no longer want her in their home, why is she crossing state lines? Why not get married to someone who lives a little closer, especially if she’s going to be so pragmatic about it and sign up with anyone who asks? (What about that person who did ask? Why did she turn that person down?)
- Did Sarah review a number of “wife wanted” advertisements before writing Jacob? Did Jacob get a bunch of letters but only choose to tell his children about Sarah?
We know a few things about Jacob’s farm and finances: first, that he’s not capable of doing both the farming and homemaking work on his own; and second, that he was previously able to hire a housekeeper. This isn’t a Little House on the Prairie scenario, where the family lives in a one-room cabin and dreams of getting glass panes for their windows. The Wittings appear to live a relatively comfortable life. Their home has small rooms, but it also has a spare bedroom. They have sheep and cows and a barn. The children talk about wearing “hundreds of sweaters” in the winter. This isn’t a family who regularly deals with scarcity.
We know less about Sarah’s finances, but we do learn that she is educated, loves books, and can afford small luxuries like velvet ribbons and colored pencils.
So Jacob didn’t ask for a wife instead of a housekeeper because he needed unpaid labor, and Sarah probably didn’t respond to the ad because she had no other way of supporting herself. (Her brother and his wife wouldn’t have turned her out into the street, right?)
Instead, I have to imagine this as an old-timey OK Cupid; they both set their location settings to “anywhere in the world,” they connect, and after a few months of letters they agree to meet up in person. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
(The Wittings’ closest neighbors also met and married through “wife classified ad.” Dating has always been like this, hasn’t it.)
Sarah, Plain and Tall is shorter than I remembered, and simpler; there’s no subplot about Anna worrying if Sarah will take their mother’s place (that’s in the movie) and there’s no subplot about Jacob needing to learn how to love again (that’s the movie, too). Jacob places the ad, Sarah and the family exchange multiple letters, Sarah plans a one-month visit, the family wonders if Sarah will choose to stay, and Sarah chooses to stay.
It’s refreshing that this is entirely Sarah’s choice, although in many ways Jacob and the children choose first; if they hadn’t liked her, she would have had to return to Maine and figure out what to do with herself.
I still feel like “be open to new people in your life and family” is probably the biggest takeaway here, although after re-reading this book I’d be tempted to say it’s also “if you have the economic privilege to look for romantic partners anywhere in the world, and if you have the financial privilege to leave everything behind and visit your potential partner for a month—because Sarah’s labor and her earning capacity is not needed in Maine, she has no family who require either her caretaking skills or any income she might be able to contribute—you can find love on your own terms.”
What do you think? Are there any financial clues I missed? I’m very happy to discuss the movie as well, which I rewatched; it holds up, and it strikes me that both the movie and the book are much more about the adults than about the children, which is something I feel was more common in children’s stories from a few generations ago. You’d never get away with writing a children’s book about a widower and the woman who answers his wife advertisement anymore, that’s for sure.
Also: no, I haven’t read any of the sequels.
Next week: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
