Pony

Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2021

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Part 2

Parts 3-4

Parts 5-6

Parts 7-9

Part 10-Epilogue

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

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Discussion Questions

Parts 3-4Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 3, Chapter 1 Summary

Mittenwool finds Silas again when Farmer is asleep. Although Mittenwool is a ghost, he doesn’t understand why some souls linger and others don’t or why some people can see ghosts while others can’t. He has no idea how he is connected to Silas and cannot remember who he was in life. Mittenwool did hear the same voices that made Pony and Silas run away; he suspects that the voices belong to other ghosts. Silas thinks that Pony purposely brought him to Farmer so that the man can help him find Pa.

Part 3, Chapter 2 Summary

In the morning, Farmer tells Silas that he talks in his sleep and that he said “Mittenwool” again. Silas claims that Mittenwool is his friend from home. When Farmer asks if Mittenwool has accompanied Silas, the boy claims that Mittenwool only came to the edge of the woods and then returned home; he does not admit that Mittenwool is currently present. (The narrative makes it clear that although Mittenwool can see Farmer, Farmer cannot see Mittenwool). Silas wants to go with Farmer to find the outlaws, but Farmer says that he will take Silas to the edge of the woods so that he can find his own way home to safety. Mittenwool agrees that they should go home, but Silas is upset.

Part 3, Chapter 3 Summary

Silas, Pony, and Mittenwool follow Farmer to the edge of the woods. Silas asks what he will do if Pa never comes home; Mama is dead, and her parents disowned her when she married Pa because he didn’t have much money. Farmer suggests that Silas could live with Mittenwool and his family, but Silas admits that this wouldn’t work because Mittenwool is a ghost; Silas shares this information against Mittenwool’s advice.

Part 3, Chapter 4 Summary

When Silas was very little, he used to tell others about Mittenwool, but after the other children started bullying him for it, he took Pa and Mittenwool’s advice to stop telling others about Mittenwool or any other ghosts that he might see.

Now, Silas immediately regrets telling Farmer that Mittenwool is a ghost. Farmer is quiet for a while and then tells Silas to be truthful and stop playing around. When Silas starts talking to Mittenwool in front of Farmer, Farmer offers to let Silas come with him to track down the outlaws, but only if he promises not to cause trouble, lie, or mention ghosts again. Silas agrees.

Part 3, Chapter 5 Summary

When Silas was seven, he attended school in town, with Widow Barnes as his teacher. She noticed that Silas saw and spoke to ghosts, so she made him write on the chalkboard repeatedly that ghosts aren’t real while the other children mocked him. She also slapped him many times. When Pa heard what happened, he told Silas that he would not be returning to school; Pa would be his teacher instead.

Now, Silas and Farmer find and follow the trail of four horsemen. They reach a swampy part of the woods, and Silas hears the voices again, but Farmer doesn’t seem to hear them. Silas tries to ignore the voices because of his promise not to mention ghosts again, but the voices get louder. He starts seeing their figures but tries not to look directly at them. One ghost nearly touches Silas, so he moves out of the way, but this makes the ghost realize that he can see her. All the ghosts then look at Silas and start moving toward him. Most of them have visible wounds, which scares Silas. He screams, startling Pony, who gallops off again.

Part 4, Chapter 1 Summary

Silas waits for Farmer to catch up, thinking about how he used to sit on the porch with Pa in the evenings. Pa would read to Silas from storybooks or scientific journals or tell Silas about constellations. Some of the words Pa used were from Scotland, where he is from.

Part 4, Chapter 2 Summary

Farmer finds Silas and is furious. Silas claims that he ran off because he saw a bear. Farmer regrets bringing Silas along. They set up camp for the night.

Part 4, Chapter 3 Summary

Mittenwool does not like how Farmer treats Silas. He also says that the ghosts won’t come after Silas now because they never leave the bog area. Mittenwool could see the bog ghosts, but they couldn’t see him, which suggests that they are unaware that they have died.

Part 4, Chapter 4 Summary

Farmer says that at one point, there were battles between settlers and Indigenous peoples in the nearby bog. Like Pa, Silas believes that the colonizers’ treatment of Indigenous peoples has been awful, but Farmer disagrees. Silas talks about the Greek story of Ulysses, a warrior from the Trojan War who angered the gods on his way home and was punished by having to wander for another 10 years; when his son Telemachus reached adulthood, he went searching for his father. Silas identifies with Telemachus now because he is searching for Pa, and he claims that Farmer is similar to a character named Mentor, who helped Telemachus on his journey. Farmer says that Silas talks too much.

Part 4, Chapter 5 Summary

The current moon reminds Silas of an incident that occurred one month ago, when he and Pa took a photograph of the full moon from their porch. Silas saw an ad for a contest in one of Pa’s science journals and wanted to enter it. Pa said it would take a lot of work and would require a large telescope, but Silas still wanted to try. It took four months to build the telescope. They photographed the moon when it was full and closer to Earth’s orbit than it normally is. However, Silas dropped the glass negative, and it shattered. This made him cry because the image was destroyed forever.

Parts 3-4 Analysis

In addition to the photographs, the epigraphs at the beginning of the parts also serve as subtle foreshadowing. The epigraph at the opening of Part 3 mentions finding one’s way through a “world of woe” (53), which matches the tone of the bleak, inhospitable forest through which Silas and Farmer are traveling. By contrast, the epigraph at the beginning of Part 4 suggests that once someone has known light, the impression of light remains even amidst darkness, and this epigraph therefore establishes a helpful tone and conveys a promise of a better future despite current hardships.

Combined with such imagery, Palacio uses elements of the setting to introduce a symbolic subtext and add nuance to the narrative. For example, the inherently dangerous woods symbolize the risks and challenges of Silas’s coming-of-age journey and emphasize The Tangible Effects of the Supernatural. When Silas sees a large crowd of ghosts sporting mortal wounds, their sudden movement toward him heightens the tension and the understated threat of the scene and emphasizes the fact that Silas’s ability to perceive the supernatural world differs greatly from the perceptions of those around him—and this ironically includes Farmer, who is himself a ghost. Significantly, although Silas feels threatened by the group’s sudden advance and flees from this particular area, he soon masters his fear, and this about-face indicates that he remains dedicated to The Journey of Self-Discovery and Personal Growth despite momentary lapses.

This section also includes significant world building that further elaborates on the supernatural concepts that Palacio employs. Within the narrative, ghosts are not meant to be villains; instead, they are merely manifestations of people who have died. While their presence can imbue key scenes with an eerie mood, their primary purpose within the story is to raise unanswerable questions about the history of the area, and the behavior of the ghosts that Silas meets also models the “rules” of this particular world. Ironically, the nature of ghosts is mysterious even to the ghosts themselves, as is demonstrated by Mittenwool, who cannot remember who he was in life or how he is connected to Silas. This pattern emphasizes that ghosts have no more information than living humans do. In fact, many ghosts, such as Farmer and some of the people in the bog, do not even realize that they are dead, which raises the question of whether additional characters are also ghosts. In this way, Palacio deliberately blurs the boundary between the mundane and the supernatural. It is also important to note that the author uses ghosts to shed light on the broader historical context, as the description of the ghosts’ lingering wounds serves as an oblique reference to the serious historical trauma and violence enacted upon Indigenous peoples by European colonizers. The bog ghosts therefore serve as a visceral yet symbolic reminder of this grim aspect of American history.

To further understand his own journey of self-discovery, Silas uses an allusion to the ancient Greek story of Ulysses, which is a quest that loosely resembles Silas’s own. In the story, Ulysses is a warrior in the Trojan War, but on his way home, he angers the sea god, Poseidon, who devises ways to force him to wander for 10 years. His son, Telemachus, eventually goes in search of him. Silas compares himself to Telemachus because he believes himself to be old enough to go after his Pa, although at 12 years of age, he is much younger than Telemachus. Even though Pa told him to stay home, Silas is determined to take direct action and does not trust the outlaws’ promise to allow Pa to return in a week. The parallels to Ulysses’ journey continue when Silas also compares Farmer to the character of Mentor, an older man who helps Telemachus along on his journey. Although Farmer scorns this comparison, it is thematically significant in that it helps to recast Silas’s quest as an archetypal hero’s journey.