42 pages • 1 hour read
Forrest CarterThe Education of Little Tree
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 1976A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 9-13Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 9 Summary: “Granpa’s Trade”
Granpa begins teaching Little Tree the art of distilling whiskey by teaching him the difference between types of whiskeys. He explains the qualities of aged and unaged whiskey and relates his own opinions on how others have complicated the process to raise prices. Despite the challenges that Little Tree’s age and height present in the process, he quickly learns what to do, and soon Granpa recognizes him as a partner in the whiskey-making business. Little Tree soon owns half of Granpa’s whiskey trademark.
During a workday, one of Granpa’s hounds comes to the still; this is a warning to them that people are moving on the mountain in the direction of the still. Granpa starts hiding the still while Little Tree goes down the mountain path and distracts the men by drawing them away from Granpa. The men eventually give up, and Little Tree waits at the top of the mountain until his grandparents find him.
Chapter 10 Summary: “Trading with a Christian”
The next morning, one of the dogs is missing; they go looking for him and find him injured by a tree. Granpa tries to clean him up, but the dog passes away before they can get him home. Little Tree feels guilty that the dog died looking for him, and he is only comforted when Granpa reassures him that the dog would have wanted to die that way.
Once a month, Granpa and Little Tree go to sell whiskey at the crossroads store in the nearby settlement. Little Tree saves up his money and has 50 cents when a man comes up one day and offers to sell him a calf. (In the background, a politician is speaking to a gathering of people.) The man praises his calf’s quality and high value and declares that out of the goodness of his heart, he will sell it to Little Tree for 50 cents. Granpa and Little Tree head back to the farm with the calf, and the calf dies along the way. Granpa cuts the calf open to show Little Tree that it had been sick all along. After this, Little Tree learns not to be so easily convinced by pretty words.
Chapter 11 Summary: “At the Crossroads Store”
Despite unwisely spending his 50 cents, Little Tree quickly begins to recoup his loss and begins keeping his money in his fruit jar at home rather than bringing it to the market with him all the time. At the store, he meets a little girl who is the daughter of a sharecropper. The girl has very few possessions, and Granpa explains to Little Tree that her poverty is a result of the way that sharecroppers live and the limited resources they get from the people they work for. The next time they go to the store, Little Tree brings a pair of moccasins that Granma made and gives them to the girl. The girl loves them, but her father makes her take the moccasins off, spanks her, and then gives them back to Little Tree, saying that they do not take charity. Granpa tells Little Tree not to take the man’s reaction personally because he acted out of pride, not necessarily from any ill will toward Little Tree himself.
Chapter 12 Summary: “A Dangerous Adventure”
When the spring and summer seasons come, Granpa and Little Tree fish for food rather than trapping animals. During one of these fishing trips, Little Tree gets too close to a rattlesnake and angers it. The snake almost bites him, but Granpa puts his hand in the way and intercepts the snake’s fangs, protecting Little Tree. While Granpa works to get the venom out, Little Tree goes and brings Granma to the scene to help with her herbal remedies. He wants to blame the rattlesnake for attacking his grandfather, but neither Granma nor Granpa blames the snake for acting according to its nature.
Chapter 13 Summary: “The Farm in the Clearing”
While Granpa recovers from the rattlesnake bite, he tells about his memories of a house with a family that struggled financially. When he came upon the family, they were pulling the plow themselves, with no animal to help, and they made little progress that day. A few days later, a Union sergeant came and delivered a mule for the family, although they did not see him do it. The soldier continued to bring assistance and soon began helping the family directly. Granpa also helped them by bringing fish that he caught in the river. Sometime later, the taxes on the house were raised, and the Regulators came to take the property from the family. A battle broke out and the family was killed, as were the Regulator and the soldier. The politicians managed to explain the incident away, but Granpa never forgot the family.
Chapters 9-13 Analysis
Now that Little Tree has learned the most essential life lessons from his grandparents, he must start applying them to new situations. The first application of his lesson is to learn the nuances of his grandfather’s trade so that he will always have a career that he can use to sustain himself, because he should not have to depend on others to sustain him. This brings to light the theme The Value of Quality Work. Not only does Little Tree recognize that the work he is doing is hard, and that people who claim it is easy have never done it before, but he also learns that it is important to put out a low quantity of high-quality products rather than the other way around. Granpa puts additional pressure on Little Tree by telling him that his name will now be associated with the product they make, because he will become a partial owner of their whiskey business. This new level of responsibility is another major step in Little Tree’s Coming of Age and makes him more personally invested in ensuring the high quality of their whiskey learning the details of the industry.
Chapter 10, “Trading with a Christian,” becomes another moment in which Carter’s biased personal views permeate the narrative of the story. When the Christian man swindles Little Tree, a politician is speaking to a crowd, and this image becomes a recurring trend throughout the novel; events that are personally important to the characters occur while political scenes act as a distraction in the background. Though Carter was well-spoken and had a fair writing ability, he often believed that the nature of politics and its pushes for change were best used as a distraction for the events that he himself took part in. The intended lesson is one of caution, for Little Tree must learn the hard way that he cannot be taken in by pretty words and allow others to convince him of what is not true. While the overt message may be logical, Carter’s underlying tone is one of hate, division, and mistrust. “Don’t let people’s flowery language distract you from their true goals and their true intentions,” he seems to say, and thus, this particular scene duplicates the message on a larger scale, for just as Little Tree is “taken in” by the sly older man in his personal dealings, so too does Carter imply that the crowd around the politician is being equally hoodwinked by clever talk.
The final lessons that Little Tree encounters in this section are among the hardest he must learn. When he is placed in danger because of his own inattentiveness, his grandfather comes to his rescue and takes the snake bite meant for him. On the surface, Granpa is only protecting his grandson. However, the moment also serves to demonstrate to Little Tree that careless mistakes often have serious consequences for others, as well as emphasizing the often-unseen forces that protect individuals on a daily basis. Even though Little Tree does not initially realize that Granpa will help him out of this situation, his grandfather is always there to protect him. However, juxtaposing this lesson is Granpa’s memory of a family who were killed because the person aiding them was unable to protect them from stronger forces—in this case, the Regulators. The story soon becomes a parable: a simple story that hides a larger meaning. In Granpa’s story, the family working hard to build a life for themselves represents the efforts of the individual. The sergeant delivering the mule and Granpa delivering fish are both representative of those unseen protective forces that make a difference in the hardships of everyday life: the people who help others or the objective advantages that help solve problems. Finally, the Regulators represent those forces beyond anyone’s control that can always swoop down and ruin the results of one’s hard work. No matter what anyone in Granpa’s story did, no one was able to subvert the strength and harmful actions of the Regulators. Thus, the story is both a parable and a cautionary tale about the strength and reach of the overbearing government who does not respect the rights or the hard work of individuals if there is a way to make more money.
