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Mr. Martin Merrick
Annie Merrick is Harvey’s mother, depicted as a violent force of nature. Cather flips gender stereotypes by placing Harvey’s mother in the more dominant position over her husband, Martin, in the Merrick household. Mrs. Merrick displays a surface-level grief for her son, her face so “coarsened by fiercer passions that grief seemed never to have laid a gentle finger there.” She is a large woman, domineering and capable of extreme violence as is demonstrated by her abuse of their servant, Roxy, during the funeral with guests present. Laird tells Steavens about the “hell” Harvey’s mother put him through as child, making his homecoming in death all the more complicated. His tough childhood did not prevent him from becoming a great sculptor, but it was something Harvey had to flee from in order to become successful.
Mrs. Annie Merrick Quotes in The Sculptor’s Funeral
The The Sculptor’s Funeral quotes below are all either spoken by Mrs. Annie Merrick or refer to Mrs. Annie Merrick. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Sculptor’s Funeral
Quotes
There was a kind of power about her face—a kind of brutal handsomeness, even; but it was scarred and furrowed by violence, and so coloured and coarsened by fiercer passions that grief seemed never to have laid a gentle finger there. The long nose was distended and knobbed at the end, and there were deep lines on either side of it; her heavy, black brows almost met across her forehead, her teeth were large and square, and set far apart—teeth that could tear. She filled the room; the men were obliterated, seemed tossed about like twigs in an angry water, and even Steavens felt himself being drawn into the whirlpool.
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Feeble steps were heard on the stairs, and an old man, tall and frail, odorous of pipe smoke, with shaggy, unkept gray hair and a dingy beard, tobacco-stained about the mouth, entered uncertainly. He went slowly up to the coffin and stood rolling a blue cotton handkerchief between his hands, seeming so pained and embarrassed by his wife's orgy of grief that he had no consciousness of anything else.
"There, there, Annie, dear, don't take on so," he quavered timidly, putting out a shaking hand and awkwardly patting her elbow. She turned and sank upon his shoulder with such violence that he tottered a little. He did not even glance toward the coffin, but continued to look at her with a dull, frightened, appealing expression, as a spaniel looks at the whip. His sunken cheeks slowly reddened and burned with miserable shame.
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Mrs. Annie Merrick Quotes in The Sculptor’s Funeral
The The Sculptor’s Funeral quotes below are all either spoken by Mrs. Annie Merrick or refer to Mrs. Annie Merrick. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Sculptor’s Funeral
Quotes
There was a kind of power about her face—a kind of brutal handsomeness, even; but it was scarred and furrowed by violence, and so coloured and coarsened by fiercer passions that grief seemed never to have laid a gentle finger there. The long nose was distended and knobbed at the end, and there were deep lines on either side of it; her heavy, black brows almost met across her forehead, her teeth were large and square, and set far apart—teeth that could tear. She filled the room; the men were obliterated, seemed tossed about like twigs in an angry water, and even Steavens felt himself being drawn into the whirlpool.
Related Characters:
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Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Feeble steps were heard on the stairs, and an old man, tall and frail, odorous of pipe smoke, with shaggy, unkept gray hair and a dingy beard, tobacco-stained about the mouth, entered uncertainly. He went slowly up to the coffin and stood rolling a blue cotton handkerchief between his hands, seeming so pained and embarrassed by his wife's orgy of grief that he had no consciousness of anything else.
"There, there, Annie, dear, don't take on so," he quavered timidly, putting out a shaking hand and awkwardly patting her elbow. She turned and sank upon his shoulder with such violence that he tottered a little. He did not even glance toward the coffin, but continued to look at her with a dull, frightened, appealing expression, as a spaniel looks at the whip. His sunken cheeks slowly reddened and burned with miserable shame.
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