Synopsis of Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks
Background and Historical Context of ‘The Great Plague’
The Great Plague of London (1665–1666) was a massive outbreak of bubonic plague that is estimated to have killed 100,000 people, or around 20 percent of London’s population. Also simply known as ‘the plague’, the infection was caused by the bacterium yersinia pestis which was carried by the fleas of black rats. The rich largely abandoned the poor by fleeing London. Many of the nobility and gentry escaped London soon after the first outbreak of the plague and were followed by lawyers, merchants, clergy and surgeons. Such events make the true story of the village of Eyam all the more heroic. Just as in Year of Wonders, the local rector convinced the village to quarantine themselves. Local histories suggest that the plague is thought to have originated in cloth received from London, just as it does in Brooks’ novel. Some accounts of the Eyam ‘Plague Village’ put the number of dead as high as 259 of the 292 villagers.
Year of Wonders is narrated from the first person perspective of an 18-year-old woman, Anna Frith.
Widowed as the result of her husband’s tragic mining accident two years prior to the commencement of the story, Anna is left to support herself and her two young sons, Tom and Jamie, with her modest income from tending her own flock of sheep and working as the housemaid for the local rector Michael Mompellion and his wife Elinor. While Anna has already endured great hardship and heartbreak in her young life, she and the other inhabitants of Eyam live largely peaceful lives until the outbreak of the plague in the autumn of 1665.
The Plague’s Origins In Eyam
The plague’s origins in Eyam lie in a seemingly innocuous piece of cloth sent from London to Anna’s boarder, the tailor George Viccars. Shortly after receiving the cloth, Viccars begins to exhibit the gruesome tell-tale symptoms of the plague: fever, pus-filled and exploding lymph nodes, aching joints, bloody vomiting and decaying flesh. Not long after Viccars’ death, the plague claims the lives of Anna’s two young sons Jamie and Tom and most of the neighbouring family, the Hadfields. It is not long before the plague has engulfed Eyam and it eventually claims the lives of more than half of its population.
The Rector Michael Mompellion
The charismatic and evangelical rector Michael Mompellion convinces the villagers that they must quarantine themselves to prevent the spread of the plague to surrounding areas. While the villagers are initially galvanised by their faith and local spirit, it is not long before they turn on one another as a result of the devastation wrought by the disease and the claustrophobic atmosphere of the self-imposed quarantine.
Death in Eyam
Death visits nearly every household in Eyam and as the villagers seek answers and justification for their plight, many are consumed by fear, anger and desperation. There appears to be no cure for the plague and many villagers abandon their faith and turn to superstition and witchcraft in an attempt to deliver themselves from the horror. In some cases, the siege mentality brought on by the scourge sees the townspeople direct their fears towards marginalised and misunderstood characters who become easy targets for accusations of witchcraft. This irrational apportioning of blame leads to senseless acts of violence and even murder. Others seek to appease God through flagellation and extreme self-deprivation in the belief that they are appeasing God’s wrath for their innate sin. Unfortunately, the plague also brings out the darker side in some characters’ human nature as they seek to benefit from others’ misfortune during a time of crisis.
A Story of Courage, Compassion and Rebirth
Nevertheless, Year of Wonders is also a story of courage, compassion and rebirth. Despite great suffering, Anna and other characters such as Michael and Elinor Mompellion demonstrate that humanity can triumph over adversity through self-sacrifice, friendship, love and a belief in the preservation of human dignity.
Anna is Transformed at the End
By the end of the novel, the plague has abated in Eyam and Anna has been transformed. Through the necessity of circumstance, the encouragement from Elinor Mompellion and her own courage, Anna becomes the local midwife and healer. Readers witness Anna’s emotional and intellectual growth throughout the novel as a result of her relationship with the Mompellions and her exposure to the extremities of the plague. She is no longer subservient to anyone. She has thrown off the manacles of her abusive childhood, the spectre of the plague, religious dogma and even the patriarchy of the time. She has had to flee Eyam to ensure her own safety and that of an illegitimate child marked for death. The child’s father, a member of the local gentry, is enraged at having being betrayed by an unfaithful wife and seeks to destroy the evidence of his wife’s betrayal. Anna escapes from England and begins a new life in Oran (modern day Algeria), the home of the Andalus Arabs. At the conclusion of the novel Anna has become a doctor, scholar and mother whose compassion and talents mark her as woman of independence and strength.
Structure of Year of Wonders
Year of Wonders commences about two-thirds of the way through the chronological sequence of events covered in the novel. A narrative structure such as this is known as starting the novel’s events in medias res, which is Latin for ‘in the midst of things’.
The Novel Opens
The novel opens in autumn 1666 with Anna’s recollection of how she ‘… used to love this season’ (p.3). Her fond memories of apple harvesting and its accompanying sensory delights have been forever tarnished by the carnage wreaked by the plague over the previous year. Readers learn only vague details of the tragedies that have befallen the town of Eyam. The opening chapter also focuses on the broken and fallen state of the previously charismatic Michael Mompellion. Anna describes him as one of the living dead, and his words and actions are those of a bitter and haunted man (p.4). When Anna tries to wake him from his grief-induced torpor, he inflicts physical pain upon her by forcefully grabbing her wrist while trying to impress upon her the bleak nature of existence (p.19). Anna reveals that she only serves Mompellion out of her love for his recently deceased wife, Elinor. We also witness his cold and harsh treatment of Elizabeth Bradford along with his apparent lack of faith and his contempt for the idea of a compassionate God (pp.16–19).
The opening chapter also hints that Anna has undergone a transformation during the past year. When going to confront Elizabeth Bradford she reveals that, “It was as if there were two of me, walking down those stairs. One of them was the timid girl who had worked for the Bradfords in a state of dread, fearing their hard looks and harsh words. The other was Anna Frith, a woman who had faced more terrors than many warriors. Elizabeth Bradford was a coward. She was the daughter of cowards. As I entered the parlour and faced her thunderous countenance, I knew I had nothing more to fear from her” (p.15).
Brooks’ choice to start the novel in medias res is a deliberate attempt to provoke curiosity in readers as to why the characters find themselves in their current states. It encourages readers to contemplate the enormity of the force that has caused such devastation in the town of Eyam during the previous year.
Significance of the Title ‘Year of Wonders’
While at first it may seem odd to have Year of Wonders as the title of a novel that catalogues the horrors of a village beset by the plague, it is the transformation of Anna Frith that provides the title with its multiple meanings. On one level the novel documents the tales of human suffering, depravity and heroism that could only leave readers in a state of wonderment. Nevertheless, the true wonder of the novel is the way in which Anna is transformed from an illiterate, god-fearing handmaid, who displays flashes of courage and natural intelligence, to a midwife, scholar, doctor and mother of two who frees herself from the shackles of domineering males and religious dogma. By the conclusion of the novel she is a woman truly in control of her own destiny. Furthermore, it is the journey she undergoes in this transformation that makes her an individual of special qualities. As Elinor realises, Anna’s transformation “… is the one good, perhaps, to come out of this terrible year” (p.235).
Transformation and Rebirth in Year of Wonders
While Year of Wonders documents the horrors of the plague, it also explores how such an ordeal has the capacity to test individuals. Some characters never completely recover from the hardships, but despite extreme suffering and heartbreak others are strengthened and transformed by their experience. As such, the novel examines humanity’s capacity for regeneration after catastrophic events. It also celebrates those characters that possess the necessary fortitude to emerge reborn from the devastation, and it honours the friendship, guidance and sacrifice of those characters who allow others to move beyond the station that they were seemingly destined to occupy.
Anna’s Journey
Anna’s journey from illiterate housemaid to scholar, doctor and independent woman is such a remarkable transformation that it provides the novel’s title with much of its significance. It is worth emphasising that Year of Wonders suggests that such transformations do not occur simply by chance.
Anna’s Transformation
Much of Anna’s transformation occurs as a result of the compassion and guidance of Elinor Mompellion. Through Anna and Elinor’s relationship, the novel suggests that loving and nurturing friendships have the ability to transform lives and provide individuals with new opportunities. Nevertheless, Year of Wonders also suggests that an individual must possess special characteristics if they are to emerge reborn from a devastating event such as the plague. For example, it is Anna’s immense courage and compassion that continually allow to her to make the best of extremely harrowing circumstances and also to look beyond the prejudices and misconceptions of the time to follow what she regards as the most appropriate course of action.
Towards the end of the book there are two significant events that clearly symbolise Anna’s growing awareness of her own transformation. Firstly, she tames Michael Mompellion’s horse, Anteros, and rides him past the Boundary Stone (pp.272–4). Such an action symbolises her desire to leave the devastation of the plague behind. Furthermore, she knows that she has emerged from the plague reborn when she says:
“We live, we live, we live, said the hoofbeats, and the drumming of my pulse answered them. I was alive, and I was young, and I would go on until I found some reason for it. As I rode that morning, smelling the scent of the hoof-crushed heather, feeling the wind needle my face until it tingled, I understood that where Michael Mompellion had been broken by our shared ordeal, in equal measure I had been tempered and made strong” (pp.273–4).
Secondly, it is Anna’s growing sense of self-determination that sees her rescue Mrs. Bradford’s newborn child from death. While her actions are borne out of maternal instinct and the need to protect the defenceless, the rescue also represents a moment of rebirth for Anna. By adopting the baby girl in order to ‘….raise her with love’ (p.289), Anna challenges the dominant patriarchy of the period, becomes a mother once more and inadvertently forces herself to move beyond the confines of Eyam into the world of the unknown. Moreover, it is this event that sets her on the path to Oran where she becomes a scholar and doctor.
Analysing a Sample Essay Topic on Year of Wonders
‘Year of Wonders demonstrates that a time of crisis brings out the darker side of human nature.’ Discuss.
The first thing to do with any essay topic is to identify the key phrases and define them so that they have meaning relevant to the context of the novel. In this essay topic the phrases that need to be defined are ‘time of crisis’ and ‘darker side of human nature’. ‘Time of crisis’ could refer directly to the devastation and confusion caused by a plague that appears to have no apparent cure. The term ‘darker side of human nature’ could take on a number of meanings in the context of the novel. It might refer to people’s capacity to exploit others for their own benefit; humanity’s capacity to revert to barbarity during times of fear; the need to control or exert power over others or the refusal to accept responsibility when faced with danger.
After defining key terms you must then judge whether you agree, disagree, or partially agree with the essay topic. In most cases, the better text responses are those that attempt to address the ‘grey areas’ of the topic rather than completely agreeing or disagreeing with the proposition. For example, in some situations the horrors of the plague do cause individuals to act abhorrently. Nevertheless, there are a number of instances where characters act out of a true sense of altruism and the need to maintain order and human dignity.
After defining key terms you now need to develop a contention that contains the defined key terms and responds to all parts of the essay topic.
An appropriate essay contention in this case might be:
Although the devastation and climate of fear brought about by the plague results in some abhorrent and repugnant human behaviour in Geraldine Brooks’ Year of Wonders, the novel also affirms humanity’s capacity for compassion, bravery and dignity during times of suffering and confusion.
Having written the contention for the essay, the next stage is to construct three to four supporting arguments that explore all aspects of your main argument.
Some appropriate supporting arguments here might be:
- The climate of uncertainty brought about by the plague results in some individuals directing their anger and misplaced fear against other villagers.
- The confusion and devastation caused by the pestilence allows some individuals to exploit others for their own selfish needs.
- Despite the great suffering resulting from the plague, many characters display great selflessness and compassion towards their fellow humans.
- Even though the plague decimates the village’s population, strong bonds of love and friendship survive.
The next thing to do is to briefly identify the relationships, events or quotes that you will use to develop each of your supporting arguments. Once you have done this you should have a sound essay plan to follow when writing your text response essay.
