Blogging the Limberlost: A Naturalist Is Not Necessarily An Environmentalist, And Everybody Loves Elnora

Thoughts early in my reading of A Girl of the Limberlost:

Naturalists Vs. Environmentalists

A naturalist has knowledge of the natural world. An environmentalist wants to protect the environment. See the difference? Naturalists have knowledge of the natural world but aren't necessarily interested in protecting it. Environmentalists don't have to have any great knowledge of the natural world to want to protect it.

That's what I was seeing at this point in Girl of the Limberlost. Elnora voiced a lot of knowledge of caterpillars and different types of moths. But she didn't indicate any realization that maintaining the Limberlost (which was drained in 1913, by the way) was important to her life there. Her concern to this point was all about getting what she needed from the Limberlost so she could sell it and continue her schooling.

I'm not pointing this out to be judgmental, by the way. I'm just saying that we're talking a very different thing here than I would expect to see in a book written and published now.

Is Lovable...Boring?

Already at this point in the story, Elnora's neighbors couldn't do enough for her. Her hard-hearted mother was possessive. Poor children were taken with her. A week after starting high school as a poor, rural, outsider, she had won everyone over. She meets a guy in the swamp who was a few years ahead of her in elementary school and immediately has him collecting nuts and berries with her. Everybody loved her, and as I find with most characters of that kind, I had no idea why.

Her problems were similar to the problems of many other YA characters, making her not particularly unique. The people I found more interesting were her neighbors, who she called Uncle Wesley and Aunt Margaret, and her mother. What made them interesting was that they're competing for children.

Wesley desperately wanted to love and nurture a child. His wife was fussier. She wanted to love and nurture a nice one. One like Elnora. Mrs. Comstock, Elnora's mother, had a child to love and nurture but didn't find it to be that big a deal. But her knickers were in a twist because Wesley and Margaret spent years providing Elnora with care and support. So when Wesley and Margaret tried to bring an orphaned boy into their home, she made clear to the young'un that if he ever had any problems with his new home, he could have one with her.

That's pretty damn diabolical. And a lot more interesting than being loved by all.