How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Title.Paragraph)
Quote #4
And Weaver gave Miss Wilcox my composition book without even telling me. And she read my stories and told me I had a gift.
"A true gift, Mattie," she'd said. "A rare one."
And ever since, because of the two of them, Weaver and Miss Wilcox both, I am wanting things I have no business wanting, and what they call a gift seems to me more like a burden. (3.abecedarian.96-98)
Sometime the people around us can inspire us to dreams that we might not have otherwise had, and in this case, Weaver and Miss Wilcox have inspired Mattie to hope for college. But even so, Mattie knows that to make a dream a reality requires making difficult choices. Also interesting is Mattie's phrase "things I have no business wanting." Why might she believe that it's not okay for her to want her dream? What pressures does she feel about her dreams?
Quote #5
As soon as she said it, as soon as she talked about my dream like that and brought it out in the light and made it real, I saw only the impossibility of it all. I had a pa who would never let me go. I had no money and no prospect of getting any. And I had made a promise—one that would keep me here even if I had all the money in the world. (6.somniferous.37)
And the winner is… reality. Crushing Mattie's dream before she has even begun to think about it. Poverty crushes dreams (anyone who's tried to go to college with no money can relate to this); family pressures can crush dreams. But what's important for Mattie is not just the reality she knows, but also how she strives to change that reality to realize her dreams.
Quote #6
Forty-five cents was a good deal of money, but I didn't want the ones for fifteen cents, not after I'd seen the others. I had more ideas. Tons of them. For stories and poems. I chewed the inside of my cheek, deliberating. I knew I would have to write a lot when I went to Barnard—if I went to Barnard—and it might be a good idea to get a head start. […] Guilt gnawed at my insides. (7.unman.15)
Mattie is trying to decide how to spend money she earned picking fiddleheads: on something for her future as a writer or on food for her family. And man, she feels some massive guilt for choosing the notebook over her family. Should she feel guilty? Why or why not?