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Charlotte's Web, by E. B. White | Summary and
Analysis
(English Literature for BS English, M.A English, and competitive exams) For College & University Students
Relationships in Charlotte’s Web I chose to read Charlotte’s Web because it has always been one of my favorite stories. I instantly knew this would be the perfect story to write about human and animal interrelationships. There are many different relationships between the people and the animals throughout this book. Along with those relationships, there are also various interrelationships between the animals as well. I loved reading this book again and found it the perfect book for this type of essay.
The story begins with a litter of pigs being born at the Arable’s farm. There were a total of eleven pigs, including the runt. Normally, Mr. Arable kills the runt because it usually dies anyway. However, Fern, the Arable daughter, became very upset when she heard her Papa was going to kill the baby pig. She begged and pleaded with him until he finally gave in and told her that he would not kill the runt if she took care of it. Fern was so ecstatic to have her very own baby pig. She named her new pig Wilbur. Wilbur loved Fern, and would follow her wherever she went. After Wilbur was two weeks old, he had to live outside in a little wooden box under the apple tree. Fern would go outside every day to feed, walk, and play with Wilbur. They both really loved each other’s company.
Unfortunately, when Wilbur was five weeks old, Fern had to sell him to her Uncle Homer Zuckerman. The Zuckerman’s farm was close to Ferns house, so she could go and visit Wilbur whenever she pleased. The farm had horses, cows, geese, chickens, sheep, dogs, cats, and now Wilbur. Wilbur became very bored on the farm; he no longer got to go on walks or swim with Fern. He was always stuck in his little pigpen.
One sunny day, Wilbur was just walking around his pen talking to himself about how bored he was when a goose overheard. The goose told Wilbur that there was a board lose on his pen and he could get out and do whatever he wanted. Since Wilbur was so bored he decided that he would
like to leave the pen and see what was out there. While walking around the farm with complete freedom, Mrs. Zuckerman saw him. She yelled out to her husband and Lurvy, the hired man to go and catch him. News like this spread fast throughout the farm. All the animals were talking about Wilbur’s freedom. Then Mr. Zuckerman, Lurvy, and the dog surrounded Wilbur. All the animals started yelling for Wilbur to run away. However, the sweet smell of slope soon came over Wilbur’s nose, and he was quickly lured back into his pen.
There is a lot of human and animal interrelationship in these first three paragraphs. Mr. Arable doesn’t really care about the pigs, he just uses them to make money. He doesn’t see them as actual living things that have feelings just like him. However, his daughter Fern makes a real connection with Wilbur. She saves his life and takes care of him just as she would her own child. They become each other’s best friends. If Ferns is not at school, she is with Wilbur. They do everything and go everywhere with each other. They become true companions. Fern also develops a relationship with the rest of the animals on the farm. They all get to know her and start to trust her. They allow her to sit in their pens and watch Wilbur.
In the next three chapters, many things happen at the Zuckerman farm. Wilbur becomes very, very lonely. He had planned his whole day out. He planned when he would eat when he would sleep, and when it would just sit there doing absolutely nothing. Unfortunately, when he awoke all his plans went out the window due to the rain. So he then asked the goose to play with him, but she was sitting on her eggs. Next, he asked a sheep to play with him but the sheep said no and called him less than nothing. Not even Templeton the rat would take time out of his day to play with poor Wilbur. Wilbur then became extremely depressed and started to weep.
Right before Wilbur was about to go to bed he heard a little voice that said, Do you want a friend, Wilbur? I’ll be a friend to you (White 31). Hearing this excited Wilbur, but he was confused because he couldn’t see where this little friendly voice was coming from. The voice then told Wilbur to go to sleep, and that they will meet in the morning. Wilbur did as he was told, and in the morning he discovered his new friend was a spider named Charlotte A. Cavatica. At first, Wilbur was disgusted by his new friend Charlotte. She showed him how she caught her food in her web and sucked out their blood.
tells him to just lie down and relax. After a while of silence, Wilbur asks Charlotte how she plans on saving him from being Christmas dinner. Charlotte says she has not thoroughly thought of the plan yet, but she will think of one that will work. Wilbur is still very curious of how this is going to work and keeps asking Charlotte many questions. Finally, Charlotte tells him not to worry, and just to do as he’s told. She then tells him to eat well, stay healthy, and get a lot of rest. Wilbur does as he is told, and falls asleep.
In these last three paragraphs, the first human and animal interrelationship is between the Zuckermans and Wilbur. The Zuckermans just see Wilbur as a Christmas dinner. The reason they feed him and take care of him is not that they actually care about him; it is because they want a nice, big Christmas dinner. To me, this is so sad. I don’t know how people could raise a pig and then just kill it and eat it! I know this is what happens in real life, and it is how everyone gets their bacon and ham, but it is just so sad to me. The other human and animal interrelationship is between Fern and all the animals on the farm. Fern can understand the animals when they talk to one another. She knows what all of them are saying, but I don’t think the animals know she has this special gift. Fern’s mom just thinks she is going crazy, but Fern’s dad just blows it off like it’s nothing. I think this is probably one of the most important human and animal interrelationships throughout the story.
During the next three chapters many events take place. First, Charlotte figures out a way that she can trick the Zuckermans into not killing Wilbur. However, she knows she has to work fast because there isn’t a lot of time. That day, Fern and Avery come down to the Zuckerman’s house for some blueberry pie. Avery brings a frog with him, which causes a disaster in Zuckerman’s house. After the frog incident, the two of them decide to go swing on the rope in the Zuckerman’s barn. After they got tired of swinging they went and picked some raspberries. While doing this, Avery found a little candy box to put his frog in. Fern then wants to go and visit Wilbur, so they both walk over to the pigpen. Avery discovers Charlotte and her web. He then tries to knock Charlotte out of her web and kill her. Luckily, Avery tripped and happened to break Templeton’s rotten egg. The nauseating smell lures Avery and Fern away from the pigpen, and Charlotte.
The next day was very foggy, which made it easier to see Charlotte’s web. When everyone awoke they discovered that Charlotte had written the words some pig, on her web. The Zuckermans were so startled by this message and tarted believed they truly had an amazing pig. Mr. Zuckerman then went and told a fellow priest, who of course told the whole town. By the next day, people were lined up in front of Wilbur’s pen to see him, as well as Charlotte’s web.
With all this excitement, Charlotte knew her plan to save Wilbur’s life was working. But she knew that in order to keep Wilbur alive she would need to do more, and change the words. So Charlotte then called a group meeting where they decided the new word would be terrific. However, Charlotte wanted more words as well, so she then convinced Templeton to go to the dumpster and collect magazine clips with more words on them that would continue impressing the people.
The first human and animal interrelationship demonstrated in these chapters was between Avery and Charlotte. Avery saw Charlotte and her web and automatically wanted to swat her down and kill her. Even though Charlotte wasn’t bothering Avery one bit, his natural instincts were to just kill her. This shows that not all human and animal interrelationships are good, or fair in this case. Another human and animal interrelationship shown in these chapters was between all the people and their reactions to Charlotte, Wilbur, and Charlotte’s web. The people were so astonished by the sight of the writing in Charlotte’s web. They could not believe that a spider could spin the letters so clearly in her web. The words some pig completely changed everyone’s views of Wilbur. Before, he was just an ordinary pig that one day would be made into dinner, but now he is so good-looking and perfect in their eyes. It’s really interesting how the animals can change the views of the people so easily.
During the next three chapters, many events occur. After the words some pig started to get old, Charlotte decided to reconstruct her web, and write in the word terrific. Once again, everyone came down to the Zuckerman’s farm to see the new web. Wilbur loved all of the attention and started to believe that he was a terrific pig. Mr. Zuckerman also loved all of this attention. He started giving Wilbur all sorts of special treatment and decided that he will enter him in the Country Fair.
shown in this chapter is through Dr. Dorian. Dr. Dorian explains to Fern’s mother that it is perfectly fine that Fern spends all of her time at the Zuckerman barn. He goes on to tell her that animals are very amazing creatures, especially spiders. Dr. Dorian says that he is not surprised by the miracle that Charlotte could spin a letter in her web because he thinks it’s an even greater miracle that a spider can spin a web in the first place. To me, this shows that Dr. Dorian really respects animals and all the amazing things they can do.
During the next three chapters take Wilbur to the County Fair. Mrs. Zuckerman wanted Wilbur to look extra clean, so she bathed him in buttermilk. The buttermilk worked very well, making Wilbur as white as can be. After Wilbur was all clean, everyone went and changed into their best clothes to go to the fair. When they were all done they met at Wilbur’s pen to help load him into his crate. When Mr. Arable saw Wilbur, he made a remark that the Zuckermans will get some extra good ham and bacon from him when they kill him in the winter. When Wilbur heard this he immediately passed out. Fern ran over to him with tears in her eyes, and Lurvy ran over with a bucket of cold water to splash on him. When Wilbur regained consciousness, they all helped load him into the car and took off to the fair. Wilbur felt a lot better now that Charlotte and Templeton were coming with him as well.
When they arrived at the fair many people gathered around to see Wilbur. Charlotte soon became worried because she noticed that the pig next to Wilbur was much bigger than Wilbur. However, when Charlotte went down to meet the large pig she was not impressed with his personality. His name was Uncle, and according to Charlotte he is too familiar, too noisy, and cracks weak jokes. This made Wilbur feel a little better because he knew that he could win over the crowd with his radiant personality.
The next night Charlotte set Templeton out to find a new word for her web. She told him to make it a good word because it will be the last one she will ever create. Templeton found the word humble written on a piece of newspaper and brought it back to Charlotte. He said humbly describes Wilbur perfectly because it means two things: not proud and near the ground. Charlotte agreed that it was a good word for the web, and quickly got to work. Later that night when the web was complete, Wilbur could not see Charlotte.
She told him that she was in a different corner creating a masterpiece. Wilbur wanted to know what this masterpiece was, but Charlotte told him to get some rest and she will show him in the morning.
In these few chapters, there weren’t very many interrelationships between the humans and the animals. The time that there was any interaction between the two was when they were all at the Zuckerman’s farm talking about Wilbur. Mr. Arable made a remark about killing Wilbur, which shows that he has not changed his views on Wilbur from the beginning of the story. He is a farmer who sees pigs as food and nothing else. Fern on the other hand sees Wilbur as a companion, and would never do anything to hurt him. She shows her affection for Wilbur by running over to him and holding him when he passed out. They have a very close bond just like anyone would have with someone or something they loved.
During the last chapters of the book many events occur. The first event was that Charlotte laid an egg sac with five hundred and fourteen eggs in it. Wilbur becomes ecstatic that Charlotte is going to become a mom, and that he will have a whole lot of new friends. However, Charlotte has horrible news for Wilbur. She tells him that she has become very ill. But she doesn’t want to focus on the negative, so she changes the subject and points out how beautiful her web looks with the new word in it. It was the best web out of all the ones she had created before. But then, of course, Templeton returns from a night of ravishing around the fairgrounds with some unfortunate news.
Templeton tells Charlotte and Wilbur that he noticed that Uncle, the pig next door has a blue ribbon placed on his pen. He then went on to tell Wilbur that this meant that Wilbur will soon be forgotten by everyone, and eventually end up at the Zuckerman’s Christmas dinner. This hit Wilbur really hard, but he tried to stay strong and listen to Charlotte. Charlotte told him not to worry, and that everything will be fine. Within a couple of minutes, the whole gang returned to see Wilbur. Fern pointed out the new web, and everyone stood admiring it with astonishment. Then Mrs. Zuckerman began to cry because Avery pointed out that Uncle had already won first prize. Everyone became very upset, except for Mr. Zuckerman. Mr. Zuckerman took control and told everyone to help him bathe Wilbur, and make him look his best. Everyone did as they were told. Suddenly, there was an announcement over the loudspeakers that Wilbur had won a special prize, and everyone was to
In these chapters, the Zuckermans and the Arable all fall in love with Wilbur and his achievement. Wilbur essentially becomes their hero and the highlight of their lives. However, Fern who was Wilbur’s best friend didn’t even want to stay to see Wilbur win his prize. She was too busy running around after a boy on the Ferris wheel. This shows that the human and animal interrelationship changes a lot throughout the story. At the beginning of the story, all Fern cared about is Wilbur and his health. Her parents, along with the Zuckerman didn’t care about Wilbur; they just saw him as a good Christmas dinner. However, as the story develops, the tables turn, and it seems that Fern outgrows Wilbur in a sense. Fern still loves Wilbur, and always will, but she has found other loves in her life now as well. Whereas the Zuckermans find a whole new love in Wilbur, and now see him as their pet. I thought the interrelationships in the last few chapters were very interesting. However, the true relationship in the last chapters was between Charlotte and Wilbur. Charlotte succeeds in saving Wilbur’s life, and in return, Wilbur protects Charlotte’s eggs for her. They both would do anything for one another, whether it meant giving up their own lives or just always being there for the other.
Charlotte’s Web was a great book to read for this essay. Not only did it show human and animal interrelationships, but it also showed animal relationships as well. It demonstrated the many ways people perceive and value certain animals, along with how their views can change. Fern saves Wilbur’s life and develops a very close connection with him. They become best friends and would do everything together. However, no one else saw Wilbur in the way that Fern did. They saw Wilbur as a pig that would be used for food. Poor Wilbur then got sent away to the Zuckerman’s farm where their intentions were to kill him come summertime. There was no interrelationship between them and Wilbur. Eventually, Wilbur develops a close relationship with the animals on the farm, especially Charlotte. As time goes on, Charlotte and Wilbur become extremely close, and Charlotte also saves Wilbur’s life. The Zuckermans and Arables also start to develop a close relationship with Wilbur when he becomes famous. They end up seeing Wilbur as their pet, as well as part of the family. However, it took words in a web for them to realize how great of a pig Wilbur actually was.
