Character Analysis
Mrs. Bergson belongs to the beginning of O Pioneers!, when things are looking pretty bad for the Bergson family, and well, for everyone else, too.
After a few descriptions of her character, we don't see her doing all that much. She survives the death of her husband and witnesses her children debating whether to stay on the Divide. She's terrified of moving away. And by the start of Part 2, she's lying next to John in the local graveyard.
Mrs. Bergson doesn't like the idea of abandoning the Divide, and it's clear why. She's built up a whole life there in an effort to keep the memory of the Old World alive. That conservatism seems to come across even in her initial character descriptions. In Part 1, the narrator hones right in on her "love of comfort," describing her as a person with whom "habit was very strong" (1.2.22).
But let's not forget the whole issue of class and social standing. The narrator states outright that Mrs. Bergson is low class, or at least of a lower social standing than her husband (Part 1, Chapter 2). As a result, or so we could be led to believe, Mrs. Bergson clings to her new, higher social status once she's arrive in the New World. Check it out:
She disapproved of all her neighbors because of their slovenly housekeeping, and the women thought her very proud. Once when Mrs. Bergson, on her way to Norway Creek, stopped to see old Mrs. Lee, the old woman hid in the haymow "for fear Mis' Bergson would catch her barefoot." (1.2.23)
Mrs. Bergson's character reminds us that Old World social and class differences still find their way to the frontier, at least in the conservative attitudes of certain people. Maybe the "New World" isn't as new as it seems…