Charlotte: Hero and Mentor

            In E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web, Charlotte is both the hero and then mentor.  To be a hero some has to show self-sacrifice.  Self-sacrifice is when one character gives up something of his for another character.  The mentor helps, trains or teaches a hero.  Charlotte is both a hero and a mentor to Wilbur.

            Charlotte is the hero because she saves Wilbur’s life.  Charlotte saves Wilbur’s life when she writes words in her web.  Mr. Zuckerman usually turns pigs into bacon because it is the farmer’s way of life.  When he sees the words he never thinks that a spider can spell so he doesn’t kill Wilbur because he believes the words on the web.  In the web, Charlotte writes some pig, terrific, radiant, and humble.    When Mr. Zuckerman sees the words in the web, he thinks that they must be talking about Wilbur so he spares the pigs life.  Charlotte also shows hero characteristics when she goes to the fair for Wilbur, otherwise he would have been lonely.  Charlotte, because she attended the fair and wrote the last word while there, almost didn’t get to complete her egg sac.  Charlotte shows self-sacrifice with all she did for Wilbur so she is a hero.

            Charlotte is the mentor to Wilbur because she is teaching him along the way.  She teaches him new words.  She aids Wilbur by acting like his mother.  She teaches him all about the life of spiders when she answers his questions while she reads to him.  She helps him mature.  Wilbur is helped a great deal by Charlotte.  He is lucky to have her as a mentor.

            Heroes and mentors change lives.  In Charlotte’s Web Charlottes changes Wilbur’s life by writing words in her web and teaching him.  She saves him from becoming bacon and helps him mature. Wilbur was lucky to find a hero and a mentor all in one.

Growing Up in Charlotte's Web

Annotations from page 9, 15, 49, 156, 173

            Throughout Charlotte’s Web, Fern grows up.  In the beginning Fern saves Wilbur’s life.  Fern convinces her dad not to kill Wilbur just because he is a runt.  She takes care of him even feeding him with a bottle.  She treats him as if he were her baby and as time passes during the story she becomes less of a mother to Wilbur and more like a girl of her age.  In the beginning she treats Wilbur as her baby doll and as girls grow up they lose interest in dolls.  At the fair she wants to be with Henry Fussy instead of being with Wilbur as he gets his appreciation medal.   A few weeks after the fair, all she could think about was being at the top of the Ferris wheel with Henry Fussy. 

            Throughout the book E.B. White tries to teach the reader lessons.  Some lessons are harder to find than others.  One of those lessons is that people and animals grow up.  I think that it is natural that Fern grew up and spent less time with Wilbur.  When Mrs. Arable goes to see Dr. Dorian it shows that Mrs. Arable cares for Fern and sets an example for Fern.  Taking care of Wilbur will teach Fern the responsibility of being a parent.  Wilbur also shows signs of growing up.  In the beginning when Fern wasn’t there to take care of him he adapted to Charlotte being his mother. In the end when Fern wasn’t there at all and Charlotte was dying Wilbur grew up and took care of Charlotte’s egg sac.  When the eggs hatched he took care of the babies and replaced the attention he used to get from Fern with the attention he gave to Charlotte’s babies.  When most of them flew away he didn’t understand why but because he had matured he didn’t cry.  Growing up happens to all living things, it is best to accept the fact, learn from those who took care of us and try to be the best mature person you can.

Racism in Charlotte’s Web

            In Charlotte’s Web on page 28 E.B. White takes the opportunity to teach a lesson.  “Pigs mean less than nothing to me.” A lamb states this to Wilbur and he doesn’t understand why the lamb would say such a thing.  The lambs won’t play with Wilbur because he looks different, the lamb doesn’t know much about Wilbur’s personality and that shows racism.  E.B. White hides racism in the book, this example of racism happens in a conversation between a lamb and Wilbur.  E.B. White hides racism in the book because the word has a very negative feel.  He creates this example hoping that the readers will see that treating others poorly because they are different is wrong and can hurt someone.  He doesn’t want to show them racism between two people because they might worry it could happen to them.  He wants to show them with animals and with a character they care very much about so they won’t do it. 

            A first impression of a lamb is that it would be sweat, soft and cuddly and a first impression of a pig is it’s dirty and dumb.  So you think the lamb wouldn’t be mean to anything even a pig and a dirty, dumb people wouldn’t recognize that someone was being to it.  Wilbur’s response though is very intelligent.  Wilbur says “If there were something that was less than nothing, it would be something- even though it’s just a very little bit of nothing.”  This shows that anyone can be mean and anyone could get hurt by actions and words.

            I like the way E.B. White approached the subject of racism in Charlotte’s Web.  Sometimes when people see the word racism they get turned off by the topic and don’t want their kids knowing about it.  E.B. White though successfully gets the point across without mentioning racism.  It may also open up the discussion of racism, but the kids won’t know it as racism, for some families.