The Influence Of Setting In Montana 1948

In the book Montana 1948, the last scene was Wesley and his family finding out that Uncle Frank had committed suicide. It can be seen that such a drastic measure could have been caused by how the setting was created. The setting of Montana 1948 was in Bentrock, Montana. The author explained this area as quiet and small, with less than two thousand people living there. As secrets about Uncle Frank unveiled, Wesley knew he had to do something about it before everyone found out. This resulted in Uncle Frank committing suicide in the basement because he did not want to ruin the family name. The setting influenced the character’s decisions because of the pressure of keeping the family name honored. One example to show how the setting affected the character’s …show more content…
The townspeople also would never think to accused a war hero like Uncle Frank of such an awful crime. Back in 1948, having a trusting and honorable family name was all that mattered. If people knew your family would do good, they would not expect someone to do something bad. On page 4, David continues to narrate about the town and what it is like. He says that people keep to themselves and do not want to cause trouble to such a small town. David states, “Life was simply too hard, and so much of your attention and energy went into keeping not only yourself but also your family, your crops, and your cattle alive, that nothing was left over for raising hell or making trouble.” From this quote, it is seen that people just keep to their own business and nobody shares the trouble they are going through so they do not ruin the family name. Since they are such a small town and everyone in the town has secrets, they decide not to start trouble and to just keep to themselves. To conclude, the setting of Montana 1948 directly affected the character’s decisions because of the pressure that was made on them to protect the family