Where It All Goes Down
Little House on the Prairie
Sarah, Plain and Tall takes place in the Midwest during the late 1800s. The setting plays into the story a lot because when Sarah comes to meet the Witting family, she's also coming to a completely new landscape that she's never encountered before. It's very different from her seaside Maine hometown:
Sarah turned and looked out over the plains.
"No," she said. "There is no sea here. But the land rolls a little like the sea." (3.43-44)
The new setting makes Sarah feel lonely and out of place. Making things even trickier for her is the fact that the area is populated with farmers who are settling the land, so each homestead is far away from any neighbors. For someone who's used to walking into town and seeing the sea every day, the change is pretty drastic. But as Sarah comes to know her new prairie home, she finds there are things that make it charming and wonderful, too. Heck, even the harsh winters have their charm:
"There is ice on the windows on winter mornings," I told Sarah. "We can draw sparkling pictures and we can see our breath in the air. Papa builds a warm fire, and we bake hot biscuits and put on hundreds of sweaters. And if the snow is too high, we stay home from school and make snow people." (6.18)
In the end, Sarah gets used to the plains of the Midwest and the cozy little home where the Wittings live. She comes to love and accept her new home, though she doesn't lose her love of the sea.