Blackberry Winter

Blackberry Winter Summary | Detailed Summary

Blackberry Winter, written by Robert Penn Warren, tells the story of a young boy who grows up on a Tobacco farm in Tennessee. Seth, the story's narrator, describes the summer of 1910, when he was nine years old. The story is written in first person narration, as Seth recalls his own history. As the story begins, young Seth is warming his feet by the fire. Even though it is June, the temperature is chilly. There county is experiencing what Seth's mother calls blackberry winter, a brief cold spell amidst otherwise warm weather. In spite of the cold, Seth has ventured outside without shoes or socks. Seth's mother had warned him that he needed to wear shoes but he tried to sneak by her. While Seth warms his feet, after being caught by his mother, the young boy insists that he doesn't need shoes because it's June.

As Seth attempts to argue this notion with his mother he notices that a strange man is walking on the path near the edge of the woods next to his family's property. The boy finds this odd because the path extends through the forest and meets up with the river. No one travels along the path unless they are going to fish or hunt. In addition, people always got the permission of Seth's father before they passed through their farm to enter the woods. Seth also recognizes that the man is not a sportsman because of his appearance. Stranger still, the mysterious man is walking from the opposite direction. He is walking toward the farm which makes Seth wonder where the man is coming from. As the man comes closer Seth sees that he moves steadily but not quickly. The narrator notes that the man has hunched shoulders and that his head is thrust forward, "like a man who has come along way and has a long way to go."

Seth tells his mother that a man is walking toward the house. She goes to the window to see him for her self. Seth's mother guesses that the man has come from the Dunbar place and cut through the woods covered section of the path. The family's two dogs bark at the approaching stranger. The man doesn't stop walking but he moves the parcel he is carrying into his other hand and takes a switch knife out of his pocket. He waves the blade of the knife at the dogs as he continues to walk down the path. Seth's mother calls out to the dogs and they stop barking.

Seth and his mother are alone in the house on this particular day but she isn't afraid of the stranger. The narrator describes his mother as small but steady and self-reliant. With hands that are more like boy's hands than women's hands. He explains that when she was young she was the first woman in the county to ride a horse in stride. Seth's mother waits on the back porch for the man to arrive. Seth sees that the man's clothes are old and dirty like a tramp's clothing. He wears old khaki pants, a grey felt hat, a striped jacket and striped shirt without a tie. He isn't dressed as the people from the area dress. Seth finds the man's clothing very peculiar. He notes that the man's face is unmemorable. He has stubble on his face, bloodshot eyes, a newly formed scar on his lower lip, and his front teeth have been knocked out.

Seth's mother asks the man if he is looking for work and he affirms that he is in fact seeking work. Seth's mother offers the stranger some small jobs to do around the farm. There has been a bad storm which caused flooding throughout the county. Although the storm did not damage their crops it has drowned the family's baby chickens, blown over the chicken coops, and damaged the flowerbeds. The narrator's mother offers the man some food before he begins his work and she tells Seth to take the stranger to where he can wash up. The man sets down the parcel he is carrying and follows the boy.

After he eats the man follows Seth into the chicken yard to collect the corpses of the drowned chicks so that they can be buried in the woods. The sight of the dead chicks disturbs the young boy. Seth describes their eyes as having bluish membranes like a sick old man who is about to die. The stranger picks the chicks up by one foot and flings them into a basket. Seth decides to leave the chicken yard because the man's silence makes him uncomfortable.

Seth walks through the woods to see the flooded bridge at the creek. He spots is father there along with a number of other neighbours who have come to marvel at the flood. The narrator notes that whenever an unexpected flood arrived, the county gathered to observe the aftermath. Seth's father is sitting on his mare, Nellie Gray. Seth says that it has always filled him with pride to see his father on a horse, when he can witness his father's quiet and straight nature. Seth tries to make remain unseen by his father because once again he has gone out without his shoes on and he is sure that his father will be angry with him. His father spots him and calls him over. Instead of reprimanding him he helps the boy onto the horse to give him a better view of the flooded bridge.

The crowd sees a dead cow tumbling down the creek. They deduce that the cow must belong to Milt Alley, a squatter that lives in a cabin in the hills. Milt Alley and his many children are what the narrator describes as white trash. The squatter is known to have a cow that jumps fences. A fifteen-year-old boy in the crowd asks if anyone has ever eaten a dead cow. When everyone turns around to view him, he is embarrassed because he had not intended to speak so loudly. An old man amongst the onlookers comforts the young boy by saying that people will eat all kinds of things when the need is great enough. Another man in the crowd comments that hardship will probably occur this year. The adolescent leaves and the others comment that he is Cy Dundee's son, part of a family who is starving.

Seth's father takes him home. He drops the boy off at the gate and leave to check on his cornfields. Seth goes next door to Dellie's cabin to see his friend, Little Jebb. Dellie, Jebb and Little Jebb are an African American family who are well respected by their neighbours. Dellie and Jebb have lived together for twenty-five years but they were never married. Jebb is around seventy years old and he is thirty years older than Dellie. Unlike the other African American tenants near by, Dellie and Jebb always keep a clean house and they grow their own vegetable patch. When Seth isn't around the other kids are mean to Little Jebb because they are jealous of him. The storm has washed a mess into Dellie's yard. Garbage and dirt that had been washed under her house during other storms has now resurfaced in her front yard.

Seth knocks on the door and Dellie calls out to invite him in. Dellie is sick in bed and Little Jebb is playing near the hearth. The two young boys play with trains and when they begin making a lot of noise Dellie calls her son over to her bedside. She yells that she warned him to be quiet and she slaps him firmly. This surprises both of the children. Little Jebb cries and Seth runs out of the house.

Seth decides not to go home. He still isn't wearing shoes and he doesn't want his mother to catch him. Instead, he runs to the stables and goes inside. He finds Big Jebb inside the stable shelling corn. Even at the age of seventy, Jebb is a strong man. Alongside his visible strength, Seth describes Jebb's face as kind and wise. Seth asks Jebb what Dellie is sick with. He tells the boy that its "woman-mizry," meaning menopause. Seth doesn't understand what this is but Jebb does not explain it to him.

Jebb asks Seth why he is shivering and Seth says it because it's Blackberry Winter. Jebb disagrees with him. Jebb says that it's too late in the year for it to be Blackberry Winter. Besides which a Blackberry Winter is a short cold spell and Jebb says that no one knows how long this cold will last. He comments that perhaps it will stay cold from now on. According to Jebb the earth is tired and it won't produce anymore. Jebb explains that once the lord caused rain to fall for forty days and forty nights because he was tired of man's sinfulness, so maybe god told the earth it could take a rest. Seth asks Jebb what will happen and Jebb explains that people will eat the rest of the crops and burn up all the trees for fire. Seth tells Jebb about the tramp that showed up on their farm. Jebb notices that the boy is still shivering and he tells him to go inside the house.

When Seth arrives home his father is standing on the back porch and the tramp is walking toward him. He hears his father apologize to the tramp, saying that he has no more work for him until wheat thrashing begins. He pays the tramp a fifty-cent piece for a half day of work. The man takes the money and curses and screams that he doesn't want to work on that farm. Seth's father yells back at the tramp, telling him to get off his property. The tramp grins and spits on the ground next to Seth's father's shoe. His father stares at the man. The tramp reaches over to pick up his parcel and disappears around the corner. Seth's father goes inside. Seth follows behind the tramp to the path near the woods. As he gains the courage to move closer to him Seth asks the man where he came from. The tramp tells the boy that it's none of his business. Seth asks him where he is going. The tramp looks at the boy and says, "Stops following me. You don't stop following me and I'll cut your throat, you little son-of-a-bitch."

During the wind down of the story the narrator speaks to the reader in present tense to update the reader on what has happened since that day. His father dies of lockjaw after being cut by a mowing machine. His mother sells the farm and moves in with her sister in the city but she dies three years after, his aunt says, "from a broken heart." Dellie dies and Little Jebb ends up in the penitentiary for murder, which Seth credits to the other kids mistreating him when he was a child. Seth guesses that Big Jebb is still alive because he saw him ten years ago where he was living in the city, surviving on relief during the depression. At the age of a hundred Jebb is still as strong as ever. He tells Seth that in his youth he prayed for the strength that god has given him. But now he is alone with his strength and he is too strong to die. Finally, Seth comments on the tramp that told the narrator to stop following him. In a surprise twist, the narrator reveals that he has been following him ever since.