Chapter Summaries (cont.)
*summaries obtained from: http://thebestnotes.com/booknotes/Hatchet_Paulsen/Hatchet_Study_Guide04.html
Chapters 11-19
Chapter Eleven
Summary
Brian’s day now consists of all the work he must do. He has to rebury the eggs near his shelter, add wood to the fire, and clean up the camp area. This helps keep his depression at bay, the depression about not being found that he had suppressed. He decides to always have enough wood for three days, and that is a staggering amount of work. As he is gathering it all, he notices, too, that his body is changing. He has lost all the baby fat that hung around his middle, and his stomach has caved in from his hunger. His sunburn is turning to tan, and the smoke from his fire has made his face look leathery. But the greatest change concerns who he is becoming. First, he hears differently, knowing what a sound is even before he realizes he has heard it. He truly sees things as well - all parts of the object rather than just its whole. These two things - his body and his mind - have made a connection that he doesn’t quite understand yet, but which he knows has occurred.
This day, Brian also decides to prepare his signal fire, so if he hears an engine, he can run up with a burning limb and set it off. When he climbs up the ledge, he sees the lake for the first time from above as he had seen it just before the crash. It brings a moment of fear, but this is soon followed by the sense of the incredible beauty that lies below him. At this moment, he also sees the fish jumping in the water below, and he recognizes another source of food. The birds are diving and grabbing up the smaller fish, and Brian is dumbfounded that he never thought to look inside the water for food. It is literally packed with life - fish, clams, and even tiny crayfish. When he stands in the water a few minutes later, the fish dart away, but they soon come back as if curious about him. Brian knows that he can use this curiosity against them and catch them for food by perhaps making a small spear. Now tomorrow will bring him even more work to keep himself safe.
Notes
At this point in Brian’s new existence, he comes to some new conclusions about his life - he has changed, and he values different things now. His survival instincts have kicked in, and he recognizes the value of work. His body has changed from being outdoors and working to find food and build a shelter and a fire. However, it’s his thinking process that has changed the most. Self-pity is gone and determination has taken its place. He is fast becoming a man and his time in the wilderness will be invaluable because of the change it has created in him. The reader hopes at this point and all through the book that Brian will be found, but there is a sense that even if he is there for a long time, he will be alright, just because he is growing up.
Chapter Twelve
Summary
Brian’s first spear doesn’t work, because the fish are just too fast. So he makes another with two prongs, but that doesn’t work either. He realizes that somehow he is telegraphing his motion before he thrusts the spear. The fish see it and flash away. Then it occurs to him that he needs something to spring the spear forward faster, so he decides to “invent” a bow and arrow. He momentarily stops to eat a few raspberries, but they don’t fill him, and he realizes he has a hunger that makes him want to hunt.
As Brian is searching for just the right materials to create his bow and arrow, he sees a little bird that reminds him of a very small chicken, which he very nearly steps on before it takes flight away from him. That, too, becomes a possible source for food.
Then, as he is chopping and shaping his bow, Brian hears the persistent whine of a plane engine, and he drops everything to race to the bluff where he has built his signal fire. He very nearly has it going when the sound moves away abruptly as if the plane had turned. He begs the pilot to look back and see the signal fire, but it doesn’t happen. Then, Brian feels the crushing thought that the searchers are not going to return, not now, not ever. He feels the tears begin to fall and thinks all the work he has done is silly, just a game. He knows he cannot play this game without hope and now hope seems to have died.
Notes
The most poignant aspect of this chapter is beyond the maturity that Brian exhibits as he “invents” the tools he needs to hunt. It is his feeling that his family and everyone that means anything to him have left him behind, and he is more alone than he has ever been.
Chapter Thirteen
Summary
The chapter begins with Brian in the water, standing quietly, hoping to make the kill. It is then, at the moment when he most needs the help, that he has another encounter: he has been looking for the little birds to perhaps kill one when he hears a sound before he even knows he’s heard it. There, two steps ahead, is a mother bear, and had he taken those steps, he would have been between her and her two cubs. He stands there patiently and waits for her to leave just as he did with the other bear and once again, it works. Then, he sees a wolf, up and away from the lake. The size of this animal and its yellow eyes momentarily freeze him, but he soon comes to the realization that it, like the bears, are just another part of the woods as he is now, and the fear leaves him. He nods to it and the three that follow it and smiles at each. They quietly trot away, and once again, Brian realizes that he is completely changed now. In the forty-seven days since he has crashed in the lake, he has died and been re-born. He is reminded of the awful night when the plane had turned and left him behind and how he had laid on the rocky ledge all night with a feeling he called clouddown, a feeling when made him want to take the hatchet and end it all. He had even taken his hatchet and made many cuts on his arm as if to test his ability to kill himself. However, the blood he sees at first light makes him hate what he thinks of as the old Brian - the weak Brian - and at that moment, two thoughts come into his mind. First, he is not the same, and second, he will not die, and he will not let death in again. He is new.
So, Brian takes on the new task of making the perfect bow. He uses the lace from his tennis shoe to make the bow string and he makes the bow itself several times until it is more flexible. Then, he realizes that he is not hitting the fish, because he has forgotten that water refracts - bends light - and that the fish are not where they appear to be. He needs to aim just under them. Finally, he makes his first hit, and it is a golden moment for him. He has found a way to live. Using a green willow stick, he roasts the fish over his fire, eats the tender, moist meat inside, and finally begins to satiate his hunger. When he takes the scraps and inedible parts of the fish back to the lake to get rid of them, he sees hundreds of other fish swarm around them to clean them up. Now he sees that he has bait. It is a day of great pride for Brian, because he has lost hope that he will ever be found, but he has gained new hope that his knowledge will let him survive. He thinks he is full of “tough hope.”
Notes
The most important ideas presented in this chapter concern how Brian has changed. He has become a part of the wilderness where he now is living. He is a creature of the woods just like the bears and the wolves. He has also overcome his despair at the rescue plane leaving him behind, and he has built within himself a new hope that he will survive even though he no longer believes that he’ll ever be found. His “tough hope” has been formed from despair, but if creates a new and even more fascinating individual who is truly now a man.
Chapter Fourteen
Summary
In the previous chapter, Brian had thought to himself that all the mistakes he had made in becoming his new self needed to be noted in his mental journal so he could tell his father how he had learned from each one. Now in this chapter, it occurs to him how much more different little mistakes are in this wilderness than they would be in the city. If he got hurt in the city, he could go to the emergency room for help, and if he ran out of food, he could buy groceries at a grocery store, but here, a sprained ankle could mean death and illness could mean starvation. He has also learned that the most vital knowledge of all, the knowledge that drives all creatures of the forest, is food, and food is everything.
The way Brian learns that food is all nearly kills him. One night, he hears the sound of something digging at his egg supply. It is a skunk, and he grabs a handful of sand and throws it at the animal. Immediately, the little animal lifts its tail and sprays Brian with a direct shot of scent less than four feet away. The effects within his little shelter are devastating. He stumbles outside, blinded by the scent in his eyes, screaming from the burning sensation, and throws himself into the water. He is completely blind for almost two hours and the pain that results lasts for nearly two weeks. Even a month later, the scent is still in his hair and clothes. He realizes he is paying the consequences of not protecting his food.
So Brian sets about making his shelter better by weaving the outer walls tighter and making a door that only a bear could break down when it is closed. Then, he has to figure out a way to store food that is high and safe. There is a place up above the ledge that overhangs his shelter that is inaccessible to wild animals, but it is also inaccessible to him. So, then, he must build a ladder. He finds a dead pine with many branches sticking out which proves perfect. He can climb it with ease even though it rolls a little from side to side as he climbs. He even creates a door, woven from the green willow branches, to cover his supply from sight. Again, he himself allows a small moment of pride. The only problem now is that there is no way to store fish. He doesn’t have refrigeration to keep it, and it would soon begin to smell and go bad. Then, Brian has another moment of brilliance. After having woven the door for his storage place on the rock face above him, he thinks it would be the perfect solution at the lake. He can make a holding pen in the lake for live fish. He creates a small enclosure along the bank and lures live fish into it with the scraps from fish he has already killed. He has once again found a way to overcome his mistakes.
Notes
This chapter presents the danger that Brian faces in the wilderness. He makes the mistake of forgetting that a skunk fights back with a scent that nearly blinds him. But every mistake he makes brings him greater knowledge about how to deal with these dangers and leads him to prepare for the future. Knowing that food is everything will help him prepare for any illness that may make him incapable of finding food when he needs it. His maturity keeps growing and growing.
Chapter Fifteen
Summary
The time in the wilderness passes with one day folding into another. Brian marks each day in the stone near the door to his shelter, but he measures real time in events, such as the day of First Meat. Even though he has plenty of fish now, he has begun to crave real meat. He knows there are many small animals around him - squirrels, rabbits and the little birds he calls foolbirds. However, they are making a fool out of him, because he hunts them, but can’t figure out how to locate them. They stand so perfectly still and blend so well into their surroundings that he just can’t see them. So he sets out one day, determined to find and spear one.
As he scares them out of their shelter, Brian notices that the birds can be seen as a shape rather than feathers or colors. He has to look for the outline of the bird instead. That becomes the key to his First Meat day. He makes many attempts and just misses hitting them with his bow and arrow. So he tries his fish spear by moving carefully at an angle, side to side, back and forth, until he comes close enough to finally spear one. Then, he learns how to clean the bird. He saves the tail feathers for his arrows, and then after finding a forked stick and sliding the gutted bird on a cooking stick, he finds a proper method to roast it. He tries to eat it before it’s completely cooked inside, and this reminds him once again that everything in the wilderness is about patience - waiting and thinking and doing things right. Finally, however, his patience is rewarded, and Brian eats his First Meat. Not even the best hamburger, all the fries in the world, the best malts - none of this tastes as good as his First Meat.
Notes
The evolution of the new Brian continues. He finds a way to adapt to his environment and kill the food he craves - meat. It is yet another step in his maturation.
Chapter Sixteen
Summary
After this, Brian has many First Days. There is the First Arrow Day in which he made an arrow that has added feathers to fly more accurately. There is First Rabbit Day when he kills one of the large rabbits and thinks to himself that he is like the predators of the wilderness - he is always hungry, but he can get food. It makes him more than what he was before. He can even catch one of the little birds in his bare hands, because he has perfected his technique.
That is also the day when he is nearly killed. After he kills the bird and skins it, he puts his weapon down and starts to wash the blood off his hands. Later, he doesn’t know what makes him run, but he does just a brown wall of fur detaches itself from the forest behind him. He just has time to see that it’s a moose - a female who, fortunately for Brian, has no horns - which then violently drives him into the water. Every time, Brian rises to the surface, she is on him again and soon, he knows he is hurt, that his ribs may be broken and he can only think, “Insane, just insane.” Eventually, Brian stays hunched over, playing dead, until he is able to slowly pull himself out of the water to shore while the moose eats contentedly behind him. He finds the weapons he lost and, incredibly, even the bird he had killed. Now he is grateful for all the precautions he had taken to have three days supply of wood and the fish pond he has created in the lake. Mostly, he is grateful he is alive, because his ribs make it difficult for him to breathe, and his shoulder is wrenched somehow. He finally falls asleep, exhausted, in his shelter.
Later that night, Brian is awakened by a low, roaring sound from the wind. The mystery sound turns out to be a tornado, and it is too late for Brian to do anything. It is the same insanity as the moose. He is whipped against the front wall of the shelter like a rag doll, ripping a new pain into his already damaged ribs. Then, he is hammered into the sand while the wind picks up everything in his shelter and the shelter as well and throws it all into the lake. He holds onto the rock wall, praying that he survives this newest danger of the wilderness. Eventually, the wind moves into the lake, and Brian realizes he’s back to nothing, just the same as he was after the crash. All he has left is the hatchet on his belt. He thinks, “A flip of some giant coin and I am the loser.”
Soon, Brian comes to remember, however, that he is different now. He may have been hit, but he’s not down, because he knows how to rebuild what he has lost and he still has the hatchet which is all he had in the first place. Before he falls asleep, he thinks that there is something else new - a cold snap - driving the mosquitoes back into the grass. His last thought is that he hopes the tornado hit the moose.
In the morning, Brian leaves the overhanging ledge to see if he can salvage anything from the storm. He finds his bow, broken but with the precious string still intact. He looks down the shoreline for anything else when he suddenly sees it - the tail of the plane. The tornado had somehow, when crossing the lake, changed the position of the plane and raised the tail. It makes him think again of the pilot, and he now feels a massive sadness and wants to say something appropriate even though he doesn’t know the right religious words. He ends up just saying, “Have rest. Have rest forever.”
Notes
In this chapter, Brian is hit with two major dangers and survives - the moose and the tornado. This is reinforcement for the fact that life in the wilderness can change at any moment, and even though he has matured and learned, he is not exempt from the whims of nature. The difference, however, is a big one: he knows now how to rebuild. He also has changed in that he finally has a realization of the sadness of the pilot’s death and forgets himself for a moment to pray for the man who had died on the plane.
Chapter Seventeen
Summary
Brian turns his back on the plane’s wreckage and begins to repair the damage to his home. He first gets the fire going again. He finds some of the woven wall still intact and adds to it to re-create his shelter. He finds enough downed pine boughs to make a new bed and decides in his pain and exhaustion that he’ll find more food the next day. As he sits in front of his new fire, nearly asleep, a picture comes into his head of the plane’s tail sticking out of the water, and he remembers the survival pack inside. He knows it has food, knives, and matches as well as a sleeping bag. It might even have fishing gear. He thinks to himself that he would be so rich if he could just get to it, and he decides all that will be a part of tomorrow.
In the morning, Brian is impatient to get into the plane, but reminds himself that he needs food first. There are fish to be caught, and there might not be anything in the plane. So, he makes a new spear and easily catches three fish. He makes a new fish board to cook them on, and they give him the strength he will need to search the plane.
He has decided that he will need to make a raft and push-paddle it to the plane’s tail. Then, he will have to tie it there while he finds a way to get inside. He has a hard time building the raft, because even though he has the right-sized logs, he’s unsure how to hold them together. Soon, he realizes that if he finds logs with limbs sticking out, he can weave them together as he had done with his wall and the fish gate. By late afternoon, Brushpile I, as he calls it, is done. He realizes that he can’t stand on it, but will have to swim alongside it. He uses his tattered windbreaker as a rope to tie it to the plane.
It proves to be much harder than he thought to get the raft to the plane, and he knows he won’t get the raft to the plane before dark. So Brian makes himself be patient and watches the sun set in the west. It brings him thoughts of his father who he knows is toward the west, and then he turns to the south where his mother is. He wonders what they are doing at that exact moment, and then turns himself again to the sunset. He wonders, should he ever get out of this predicament, if he will ever be sitting in his living room and think of this very sunset. He falls asleep with this thought in his head.
The next day, Brian begins his journey to the plane’s tail. It takes him over two hours to push and pull the raft to the plane’s tail. He finds a gap on the elevator hinges and ties it there. Somehow he has to get inside the plane, but he can find no openings, and he’s afraid to try coming up from the front of the plane, which is still under water, in case he gets trapped. So he finds himself blocked.
Notes
Once again, Brian must work out a problem which must be solved as part of his survival. He makes himself be patient and get his strength back before he attempts to get to the plane. He also takes time to thinks of those he may be missing him at home and to appreciate the beauty of the sunset. Both of these are signs of his new maturity. He works out the mechanics of the raft and how to tie it to the plane, but now he must figure out how to get inside the tail. The lack of openings blocks his creative juices at least for the moment. However, the reader senses that just like all the other problems Brian solved, this one will be resolved in some fashion.
Chapter Eighteen
Summary
Brian works his way around the tail again and again, but there is simply no way in. In his frustration, he slams his fist against the body of the plane and is surprised to see that the aluminum covering easily gives way to his blow. He realizes that the hatchet would once again be the tool that makes the difference by allowing him to break through the plane’s skin.
The hatchet works, but just as Brian is bending a piece of aluminum away from the braces holding it, he drops the hatchet in the lake. He is devastated and can’t believe that he has done it. He can’t survive without the hatchet. It has been the tool that has helped him build everything. But he also knows that self-pity doesn’t work, and he must find a way to get the hatchet back. The lake is deep, and he tries several times, never having quite enough air to make it. Finally, after pulling in as much air as his chest can hold, he dives again. Just he thinks he’ll have to surface, defeated one more time, he sees the handle sticking out of the mud. He grabs the rubber grip and, in one motion, shoots himself off the bottom and heads for the surface. He hangs for a moment on the side of the raft, drawing in new air. Once his strength returns, Brian turns once again to the plane.
He finally chops a hole big enough to allow his head and shoulders to pass through. However, it is too dark to see anything, and he knows he’ll need to make the hole bigger so he can poke around inside. He chops more and more away, saving every piece, believing now that he might be able to use them somehow in the future. In the wilderness, he can never take anything for granted, and so he can never throw anything away. Finally, he creates a hole big enough to allow him to wriggle inside. Again, he holds his breath and swims through the wreckage. He feels something made of nylon and believes it must be the bag. He surfaces, takes in more air, and tries again. He grabs the survival bag and tugs until it pulls loose. At that moment, he sees the pilot, still strapped into his seat in the front of the plane. The fish had been nibbling at his head all this time, and all that remained was a not quite clean skull wobbling loosely on the pilot’s neck. Brian’s mind screams in horror, and he could have ended up there with the pilot, because he takes in water, but his instincts kick in again. Brian swims for the surface through all the cables and broken parts of the tail and finally ends up hanging on a bracket at the back. But then peace comes to him, and he settles his breathing. He has the bag. He just has to get it out of the plane, onto the raft, and back to shore.
By the time Brian finally gets the bag out of the plane and onto the raft, it is nearly dark. He is bone tired and he still has to get the raft to shore. Many times, as he pushes and pulls, he thinks he isn’t going to make it, and by the time he comes to shore, he is exhausted and unable to stand. Eventually, however, he drags the bag back to his shelter. Once again, he has done it!
Notes
This is perhaps Brian’s greatest feat - finding the survival bag and bringing it back to his shelter. He has used his intelligence and his logic. He has been patient and waited until he had the strength to do it. And he has survived even the horror of the pilot’s fish eaten skull to do it. It is a moment of great pride and the ultimate example of the new, more mature Brian.
Chapter Nineteen
Summary
The survival bag is just like buried treasure for Brian. Inside, he finds a sleeping bag which he hangs to dry on the outside of his shelter. He also finds a foam sleeping pad, an aluminum cookset, a waterproof container with matches and two small butane lighters, a sheath knife with a compass in its handle, a first-aid kit, a ball-cap with the words Cessna on the front, and a fishing kit. It is incredible wealth and reminds him of all the holidays when he would unwrap his gifts and turn them and examine them in the light. He even finds a .22 survival rifle that is broken down and can be put back together, along with a box of fifty shells. After Brian puts it together, he senses that it removes him from the wilderness and he’s not sure if he likes the change very much.
At the bottom of the pack, Brian finds a small electronic device encased in a plastic bag. He comes to realize that it’s an Emergency Transmitter. He turns its switch back and forth a few times, but when he hears nothing, not even static, he sets it aside, believing it’s been ruined in the crash. Finally, he finds two bars of soap and the freeze-dried food. Package after package of food will last him a very long time if he’s careful. He tries one of the dinners, an orange drink, and a peach dessert and thinks that the moment is just fine.
At that exact moment, as he savors the food, he hears another plane. It glides over him, turns around and lands on its floats on the lake. Brian just stares at the plane, not quite understanding that his ordeal is finally over. The pilot steps out and studies Brian for a moment until he says, “. . . You’re him, aren’t you? You’re that kid. They quit looking a month, no almost two months ago. . .” Brian can only respond by saying, “My name is Brian Robeson. Would you like something to eat?”
Notes
This chapter is filled with ironies. Brian finally finds the survival kit even though he has learned on his own how to survive. He finds a rifle which makes him unsettled, because its power and mastery seem to separate him from the wilderness that has become his home and he doesn’t like the feeling. And just as he is savoring his new-found wealth that nearly killed him to recover, his ordeal ends with the arrival of a plane. It is reminiscent of a “deux ex machina,” an almost supernatural device used by a writer to save his hero. No matter, though, what device Gary Paulsen uses, Brian is finally found, knowing that really, in the end, he has saved himself.
Epilogue (not included in all publications of the novel)
Summary
The pilot who landed in the lake is a fur buyer who was mapping Cree trapping camps for future buying runs. He has been drawn to Brian through the Emergency Transmitter which Brian had unwittingly turned on. Brian has been alone in the woods for fifty-four days, and he has lost seventeen percent of his body weight. It will make him lean and wiry for several years afterwards. The changes he has experienced will prove to be permanent: he has gained immensely in his ability to observe what is happening around him and react to it. He has also become more thoughtful, and from that time on, he will think slowly about something before speaking.
Food never loses its wonder for Brian. He will find himself staring in grocery stores years afterwards. He will also do research to answer the questions he bri8ngs home with him. For example, he will find out the gut cherries are actually called choke cherries, and the foolbirds are called ruffled grouse. He also has many dreams in the years to follow, especially of the pilot whose body is recovered by the Canadian government. The dreams are often triggered by the pictures the reporters and TV stations take, but they are not nightmares, because the experience would never be bad for him. Fortunately, he has been rescued before the winter came on, because he discovers in his research that he might not have survived that experience.
As for Brian’s parents, they are, of course, excited and happy that he’s alive, and for a time, it seems as if they might get back together. However, within a week after his return, things get back to normal. His father returns to the oil fields, and his mother stays in the city and continues to see the man in the station wagon. As for the Secret, Brian tries several times to tell his father, but in the end cannot bring himself to say a word about the man kissing his mother.
Notes
The epilogue gives the reader the results of Brian’s return to the real world. He is a different young man and will remain so for years afterward. He is grown in body and in mind and exhibits his maturity in the way he now deals with life. He even has the maturity to keep the Secret exactly that, a secret. The information can only hurt, and because he has known a worst scenario than divorce, he is able to keep it to himself and recover from the pain it caused him.
Summary
Brian’s day now consists of all the work he must do. He has to rebury the eggs near his shelter, add wood to the fire, and clean up the camp area. This helps keep his depression at bay, the depression about not being found that he had suppressed. He decides to always have enough wood for three days, and that is a staggering amount of work. As he is gathering it all, he notices, too, that his body is changing. He has lost all the baby fat that hung around his middle, and his stomach has caved in from his hunger. His sunburn is turning to tan, and the smoke from his fire has made his face look leathery. But the greatest change concerns who he is becoming. First, he hears differently, knowing what a sound is even before he realizes he has heard it. He truly sees things as well - all parts of the object rather than just its whole. These two things - his body and his mind - have made a connection that he doesn’t quite understand yet, but which he knows has occurred.
This day, Brian also decides to prepare his signal fire, so if he hears an engine, he can run up with a burning limb and set it off. When he climbs up the ledge, he sees the lake for the first time from above as he had seen it just before the crash. It brings a moment of fear, but this is soon followed by the sense of the incredible beauty that lies below him. At this moment, he also sees the fish jumping in the water below, and he recognizes another source of food. The birds are diving and grabbing up the smaller fish, and Brian is dumbfounded that he never thought to look inside the water for food. It is literally packed with life - fish, clams, and even tiny crayfish. When he stands in the water a few minutes later, the fish dart away, but they soon come back as if curious about him. Brian knows that he can use this curiosity against them and catch them for food by perhaps making a small spear. Now tomorrow will bring him even more work to keep himself safe.
Notes
At this point in Brian’s new existence, he comes to some new conclusions about his life - he has changed, and he values different things now. His survival instincts have kicked in, and he recognizes the value of work. His body has changed from being outdoors and working to find food and build a shelter and a fire. However, it’s his thinking process that has changed the most. Self-pity is gone and determination has taken its place. He is fast becoming a man and his time in the wilderness will be invaluable because of the change it has created in him. The reader hopes at this point and all through the book that Brian will be found, but there is a sense that even if he is there for a long time, he will be alright, just because he is growing up.
Chapter Twelve
Summary
Brian’s first spear doesn’t work, because the fish are just too fast. So he makes another with two prongs, but that doesn’t work either. He realizes that somehow he is telegraphing his motion before he thrusts the spear. The fish see it and flash away. Then it occurs to him that he needs something to spring the spear forward faster, so he decides to “invent” a bow and arrow. He momentarily stops to eat a few raspberries, but they don’t fill him, and he realizes he has a hunger that makes him want to hunt.
As Brian is searching for just the right materials to create his bow and arrow, he sees a little bird that reminds him of a very small chicken, which he very nearly steps on before it takes flight away from him. That, too, becomes a possible source for food.
Then, as he is chopping and shaping his bow, Brian hears the persistent whine of a plane engine, and he drops everything to race to the bluff where he has built his signal fire. He very nearly has it going when the sound moves away abruptly as if the plane had turned. He begs the pilot to look back and see the signal fire, but it doesn’t happen. Then, Brian feels the crushing thought that the searchers are not going to return, not now, not ever. He feels the tears begin to fall and thinks all the work he has done is silly, just a game. He knows he cannot play this game without hope and now hope seems to have died.
Notes
The most poignant aspect of this chapter is beyond the maturity that Brian exhibits as he “invents” the tools he needs to hunt. It is his feeling that his family and everyone that means anything to him have left him behind, and he is more alone than he has ever been.
Chapter Thirteen
Summary
The chapter begins with Brian in the water, standing quietly, hoping to make the kill. It is then, at the moment when he most needs the help, that he has another encounter: he has been looking for the little birds to perhaps kill one when he hears a sound before he even knows he’s heard it. There, two steps ahead, is a mother bear, and had he taken those steps, he would have been between her and her two cubs. He stands there patiently and waits for her to leave just as he did with the other bear and once again, it works. Then, he sees a wolf, up and away from the lake. The size of this animal and its yellow eyes momentarily freeze him, but he soon comes to the realization that it, like the bears, are just another part of the woods as he is now, and the fear leaves him. He nods to it and the three that follow it and smiles at each. They quietly trot away, and once again, Brian realizes that he is completely changed now. In the forty-seven days since he has crashed in the lake, he has died and been re-born. He is reminded of the awful night when the plane had turned and left him behind and how he had laid on the rocky ledge all night with a feeling he called clouddown, a feeling when made him want to take the hatchet and end it all. He had even taken his hatchet and made many cuts on his arm as if to test his ability to kill himself. However, the blood he sees at first light makes him hate what he thinks of as the old Brian - the weak Brian - and at that moment, two thoughts come into his mind. First, he is not the same, and second, he will not die, and he will not let death in again. He is new.
So, Brian takes on the new task of making the perfect bow. He uses the lace from his tennis shoe to make the bow string and he makes the bow itself several times until it is more flexible. Then, he realizes that he is not hitting the fish, because he has forgotten that water refracts - bends light - and that the fish are not where they appear to be. He needs to aim just under them. Finally, he makes his first hit, and it is a golden moment for him. He has found a way to live. Using a green willow stick, he roasts the fish over his fire, eats the tender, moist meat inside, and finally begins to satiate his hunger. When he takes the scraps and inedible parts of the fish back to the lake to get rid of them, he sees hundreds of other fish swarm around them to clean them up. Now he sees that he has bait. It is a day of great pride for Brian, because he has lost hope that he will ever be found, but he has gained new hope that his knowledge will let him survive. He thinks he is full of “tough hope.”
Notes
The most important ideas presented in this chapter concern how Brian has changed. He has become a part of the wilderness where he now is living. He is a creature of the woods just like the bears and the wolves. He has also overcome his despair at the rescue plane leaving him behind, and he has built within himself a new hope that he will survive even though he no longer believes that he’ll ever be found. His “tough hope” has been formed from despair, but if creates a new and even more fascinating individual who is truly now a man.
Chapter Fourteen
Summary
In the previous chapter, Brian had thought to himself that all the mistakes he had made in becoming his new self needed to be noted in his mental journal so he could tell his father how he had learned from each one. Now in this chapter, it occurs to him how much more different little mistakes are in this wilderness than they would be in the city. If he got hurt in the city, he could go to the emergency room for help, and if he ran out of food, he could buy groceries at a grocery store, but here, a sprained ankle could mean death and illness could mean starvation. He has also learned that the most vital knowledge of all, the knowledge that drives all creatures of the forest, is food, and food is everything.
The way Brian learns that food is all nearly kills him. One night, he hears the sound of something digging at his egg supply. It is a skunk, and he grabs a handful of sand and throws it at the animal. Immediately, the little animal lifts its tail and sprays Brian with a direct shot of scent less than four feet away. The effects within his little shelter are devastating. He stumbles outside, blinded by the scent in his eyes, screaming from the burning sensation, and throws himself into the water. He is completely blind for almost two hours and the pain that results lasts for nearly two weeks. Even a month later, the scent is still in his hair and clothes. He realizes he is paying the consequences of not protecting his food.
So Brian sets about making his shelter better by weaving the outer walls tighter and making a door that only a bear could break down when it is closed. Then, he has to figure out a way to store food that is high and safe. There is a place up above the ledge that overhangs his shelter that is inaccessible to wild animals, but it is also inaccessible to him. So, then, he must build a ladder. He finds a dead pine with many branches sticking out which proves perfect. He can climb it with ease even though it rolls a little from side to side as he climbs. He even creates a door, woven from the green willow branches, to cover his supply from sight. Again, he himself allows a small moment of pride. The only problem now is that there is no way to store fish. He doesn’t have refrigeration to keep it, and it would soon begin to smell and go bad. Then, Brian has another moment of brilliance. After having woven the door for his storage place on the rock face above him, he thinks it would be the perfect solution at the lake. He can make a holding pen in the lake for live fish. He creates a small enclosure along the bank and lures live fish into it with the scraps from fish he has already killed. He has once again found a way to overcome his mistakes.
Notes
This chapter presents the danger that Brian faces in the wilderness. He makes the mistake of forgetting that a skunk fights back with a scent that nearly blinds him. But every mistake he makes brings him greater knowledge about how to deal with these dangers and leads him to prepare for the future. Knowing that food is everything will help him prepare for any illness that may make him incapable of finding food when he needs it. His maturity keeps growing and growing.
Chapter Fifteen
Summary
The time in the wilderness passes with one day folding into another. Brian marks each day in the stone near the door to his shelter, but he measures real time in events, such as the day of First Meat. Even though he has plenty of fish now, he has begun to crave real meat. He knows there are many small animals around him - squirrels, rabbits and the little birds he calls foolbirds. However, they are making a fool out of him, because he hunts them, but can’t figure out how to locate them. They stand so perfectly still and blend so well into their surroundings that he just can’t see them. So he sets out one day, determined to find and spear one.
As he scares them out of their shelter, Brian notices that the birds can be seen as a shape rather than feathers or colors. He has to look for the outline of the bird instead. That becomes the key to his First Meat day. He makes many attempts and just misses hitting them with his bow and arrow. So he tries his fish spear by moving carefully at an angle, side to side, back and forth, until he comes close enough to finally spear one. Then, he learns how to clean the bird. He saves the tail feathers for his arrows, and then after finding a forked stick and sliding the gutted bird on a cooking stick, he finds a proper method to roast it. He tries to eat it before it’s completely cooked inside, and this reminds him once again that everything in the wilderness is about patience - waiting and thinking and doing things right. Finally, however, his patience is rewarded, and Brian eats his First Meat. Not even the best hamburger, all the fries in the world, the best malts - none of this tastes as good as his First Meat.
Notes
The evolution of the new Brian continues. He finds a way to adapt to his environment and kill the food he craves - meat. It is yet another step in his maturation.
Chapter Sixteen
Summary
After this, Brian has many First Days. There is the First Arrow Day in which he made an arrow that has added feathers to fly more accurately. There is First Rabbit Day when he kills one of the large rabbits and thinks to himself that he is like the predators of the wilderness - he is always hungry, but he can get food. It makes him more than what he was before. He can even catch one of the little birds in his bare hands, because he has perfected his technique.
That is also the day when he is nearly killed. After he kills the bird and skins it, he puts his weapon down and starts to wash the blood off his hands. Later, he doesn’t know what makes him run, but he does just a brown wall of fur detaches itself from the forest behind him. He just has time to see that it’s a moose - a female who, fortunately for Brian, has no horns - which then violently drives him into the water. Every time, Brian rises to the surface, she is on him again and soon, he knows he is hurt, that his ribs may be broken and he can only think, “Insane, just insane.” Eventually, Brian stays hunched over, playing dead, until he is able to slowly pull himself out of the water to shore while the moose eats contentedly behind him. He finds the weapons he lost and, incredibly, even the bird he had killed. Now he is grateful for all the precautions he had taken to have three days supply of wood and the fish pond he has created in the lake. Mostly, he is grateful he is alive, because his ribs make it difficult for him to breathe, and his shoulder is wrenched somehow. He finally falls asleep, exhausted, in his shelter.
Later that night, Brian is awakened by a low, roaring sound from the wind. The mystery sound turns out to be a tornado, and it is too late for Brian to do anything. It is the same insanity as the moose. He is whipped against the front wall of the shelter like a rag doll, ripping a new pain into his already damaged ribs. Then, he is hammered into the sand while the wind picks up everything in his shelter and the shelter as well and throws it all into the lake. He holds onto the rock wall, praying that he survives this newest danger of the wilderness. Eventually, the wind moves into the lake, and Brian realizes he’s back to nothing, just the same as he was after the crash. All he has left is the hatchet on his belt. He thinks, “A flip of some giant coin and I am the loser.”
Soon, Brian comes to remember, however, that he is different now. He may have been hit, but he’s not down, because he knows how to rebuild what he has lost and he still has the hatchet which is all he had in the first place. Before he falls asleep, he thinks that there is something else new - a cold snap - driving the mosquitoes back into the grass. His last thought is that he hopes the tornado hit the moose.
In the morning, Brian leaves the overhanging ledge to see if he can salvage anything from the storm. He finds his bow, broken but with the precious string still intact. He looks down the shoreline for anything else when he suddenly sees it - the tail of the plane. The tornado had somehow, when crossing the lake, changed the position of the plane and raised the tail. It makes him think again of the pilot, and he now feels a massive sadness and wants to say something appropriate even though he doesn’t know the right religious words. He ends up just saying, “Have rest. Have rest forever.”
Notes
In this chapter, Brian is hit with two major dangers and survives - the moose and the tornado. This is reinforcement for the fact that life in the wilderness can change at any moment, and even though he has matured and learned, he is not exempt from the whims of nature. The difference, however, is a big one: he knows now how to rebuild. He also has changed in that he finally has a realization of the sadness of the pilot’s death and forgets himself for a moment to pray for the man who had died on the plane.
Chapter Seventeen
Summary
Brian turns his back on the plane’s wreckage and begins to repair the damage to his home. He first gets the fire going again. He finds some of the woven wall still intact and adds to it to re-create his shelter. He finds enough downed pine boughs to make a new bed and decides in his pain and exhaustion that he’ll find more food the next day. As he sits in front of his new fire, nearly asleep, a picture comes into his head of the plane’s tail sticking out of the water, and he remembers the survival pack inside. He knows it has food, knives, and matches as well as a sleeping bag. It might even have fishing gear. He thinks to himself that he would be so rich if he could just get to it, and he decides all that will be a part of tomorrow.
In the morning, Brian is impatient to get into the plane, but reminds himself that he needs food first. There are fish to be caught, and there might not be anything in the plane. So, he makes a new spear and easily catches three fish. He makes a new fish board to cook them on, and they give him the strength he will need to search the plane.
He has decided that he will need to make a raft and push-paddle it to the plane’s tail. Then, he will have to tie it there while he finds a way to get inside. He has a hard time building the raft, because even though he has the right-sized logs, he’s unsure how to hold them together. Soon, he realizes that if he finds logs with limbs sticking out, he can weave them together as he had done with his wall and the fish gate. By late afternoon, Brushpile I, as he calls it, is done. He realizes that he can’t stand on it, but will have to swim alongside it. He uses his tattered windbreaker as a rope to tie it to the plane.
It proves to be much harder than he thought to get the raft to the plane, and he knows he won’t get the raft to the plane before dark. So Brian makes himself be patient and watches the sun set in the west. It brings him thoughts of his father who he knows is toward the west, and then he turns to the south where his mother is. He wonders what they are doing at that exact moment, and then turns himself again to the sunset. He wonders, should he ever get out of this predicament, if he will ever be sitting in his living room and think of this very sunset. He falls asleep with this thought in his head.
The next day, Brian begins his journey to the plane’s tail. It takes him over two hours to push and pull the raft to the plane’s tail. He finds a gap on the elevator hinges and ties it there. Somehow he has to get inside the plane, but he can find no openings, and he’s afraid to try coming up from the front of the plane, which is still under water, in case he gets trapped. So he finds himself blocked.
Notes
Once again, Brian must work out a problem which must be solved as part of his survival. He makes himself be patient and get his strength back before he attempts to get to the plane. He also takes time to thinks of those he may be missing him at home and to appreciate the beauty of the sunset. Both of these are signs of his new maturity. He works out the mechanics of the raft and how to tie it to the plane, but now he must figure out how to get inside the tail. The lack of openings blocks his creative juices at least for the moment. However, the reader senses that just like all the other problems Brian solved, this one will be resolved in some fashion.
Chapter Eighteen
Summary
Brian works his way around the tail again and again, but there is simply no way in. In his frustration, he slams his fist against the body of the plane and is surprised to see that the aluminum covering easily gives way to his blow. He realizes that the hatchet would once again be the tool that makes the difference by allowing him to break through the plane’s skin.
The hatchet works, but just as Brian is bending a piece of aluminum away from the braces holding it, he drops the hatchet in the lake. He is devastated and can’t believe that he has done it. He can’t survive without the hatchet. It has been the tool that has helped him build everything. But he also knows that self-pity doesn’t work, and he must find a way to get the hatchet back. The lake is deep, and he tries several times, never having quite enough air to make it. Finally, after pulling in as much air as his chest can hold, he dives again. Just he thinks he’ll have to surface, defeated one more time, he sees the handle sticking out of the mud. He grabs the rubber grip and, in one motion, shoots himself off the bottom and heads for the surface. He hangs for a moment on the side of the raft, drawing in new air. Once his strength returns, Brian turns once again to the plane.
He finally chops a hole big enough to allow his head and shoulders to pass through. However, it is too dark to see anything, and he knows he’ll need to make the hole bigger so he can poke around inside. He chops more and more away, saving every piece, believing now that he might be able to use them somehow in the future. In the wilderness, he can never take anything for granted, and so he can never throw anything away. Finally, he creates a hole big enough to allow him to wriggle inside. Again, he holds his breath and swims through the wreckage. He feels something made of nylon and believes it must be the bag. He surfaces, takes in more air, and tries again. He grabs the survival bag and tugs until it pulls loose. At that moment, he sees the pilot, still strapped into his seat in the front of the plane. The fish had been nibbling at his head all this time, and all that remained was a not quite clean skull wobbling loosely on the pilot’s neck. Brian’s mind screams in horror, and he could have ended up there with the pilot, because he takes in water, but his instincts kick in again. Brian swims for the surface through all the cables and broken parts of the tail and finally ends up hanging on a bracket at the back. But then peace comes to him, and he settles his breathing. He has the bag. He just has to get it out of the plane, onto the raft, and back to shore.
By the time Brian finally gets the bag out of the plane and onto the raft, it is nearly dark. He is bone tired and he still has to get the raft to shore. Many times, as he pushes and pulls, he thinks he isn’t going to make it, and by the time he comes to shore, he is exhausted and unable to stand. Eventually, however, he drags the bag back to his shelter. Once again, he has done it!
Notes
This is perhaps Brian’s greatest feat - finding the survival bag and bringing it back to his shelter. He has used his intelligence and his logic. He has been patient and waited until he had the strength to do it. And he has survived even the horror of the pilot’s fish eaten skull to do it. It is a moment of great pride and the ultimate example of the new, more mature Brian.
Chapter Nineteen
Summary
The survival bag is just like buried treasure for Brian. Inside, he finds a sleeping bag which he hangs to dry on the outside of his shelter. He also finds a foam sleeping pad, an aluminum cookset, a waterproof container with matches and two small butane lighters, a sheath knife with a compass in its handle, a first-aid kit, a ball-cap with the words Cessna on the front, and a fishing kit. It is incredible wealth and reminds him of all the holidays when he would unwrap his gifts and turn them and examine them in the light. He even finds a .22 survival rifle that is broken down and can be put back together, along with a box of fifty shells. After Brian puts it together, he senses that it removes him from the wilderness and he’s not sure if he likes the change very much.
At the bottom of the pack, Brian finds a small electronic device encased in a plastic bag. He comes to realize that it’s an Emergency Transmitter. He turns its switch back and forth a few times, but when he hears nothing, not even static, he sets it aside, believing it’s been ruined in the crash. Finally, he finds two bars of soap and the freeze-dried food. Package after package of food will last him a very long time if he’s careful. He tries one of the dinners, an orange drink, and a peach dessert and thinks that the moment is just fine.
At that exact moment, as he savors the food, he hears another plane. It glides over him, turns around and lands on its floats on the lake. Brian just stares at the plane, not quite understanding that his ordeal is finally over. The pilot steps out and studies Brian for a moment until he says, “. . . You’re him, aren’t you? You’re that kid. They quit looking a month, no almost two months ago. . .” Brian can only respond by saying, “My name is Brian Robeson. Would you like something to eat?”
Notes
This chapter is filled with ironies. Brian finally finds the survival kit even though he has learned on his own how to survive. He finds a rifle which makes him unsettled, because its power and mastery seem to separate him from the wilderness that has become his home and he doesn’t like the feeling. And just as he is savoring his new-found wealth that nearly killed him to recover, his ordeal ends with the arrival of a plane. It is reminiscent of a “deux ex machina,” an almost supernatural device used by a writer to save his hero. No matter, though, what device Gary Paulsen uses, Brian is finally found, knowing that really, in the end, he has saved himself.
Epilogue (not included in all publications of the novel)
Summary
The pilot who landed in the lake is a fur buyer who was mapping Cree trapping camps for future buying runs. He has been drawn to Brian through the Emergency Transmitter which Brian had unwittingly turned on. Brian has been alone in the woods for fifty-four days, and he has lost seventeen percent of his body weight. It will make him lean and wiry for several years afterwards. The changes he has experienced will prove to be permanent: he has gained immensely in his ability to observe what is happening around him and react to it. He has also become more thoughtful, and from that time on, he will think slowly about something before speaking.
Food never loses its wonder for Brian. He will find himself staring in grocery stores years afterwards. He will also do research to answer the questions he bri8ngs home with him. For example, he will find out the gut cherries are actually called choke cherries, and the foolbirds are called ruffled grouse. He also has many dreams in the years to follow, especially of the pilot whose body is recovered by the Canadian government. The dreams are often triggered by the pictures the reporters and TV stations take, but they are not nightmares, because the experience would never be bad for him. Fortunately, he has been rescued before the winter came on, because he discovers in his research that he might not have survived that experience.
As for Brian’s parents, they are, of course, excited and happy that he’s alive, and for a time, it seems as if they might get back together. However, within a week after his return, things get back to normal. His father returns to the oil fields, and his mother stays in the city and continues to see the man in the station wagon. As for the Secret, Brian tries several times to tell his father, but in the end cannot bring himself to say a word about the man kissing his mother.
Notes
The epilogue gives the reader the results of Brian’s return to the real world. He is a different young man and will remain so for years afterward. He is grown in body and in mind and exhibits his maturity in the way he now deals with life. He even has the maturity to keep the Secret exactly that, a secret. The information can only hurt, and because he has known a worst scenario than divorce, he is able to keep it to himself and recover from the pain it caused him.