Under The Lion's Paw Analysis

Hamlin Garland was born in West Salem, Wisconsin in 1860, and published his collection of short stories in Main Traveled Roads in 1891. His publication was during the Realism time period, which was focused around literature with attention to detail, in an attempt to replicate the true nature of reality. Throughout his stories, Garland portrays the hardships of farm life to his intended audience, which was the middle- to upper-class people in northern United States in the late 1800s. Many farmers in this time period experienced debt caused by either the Panic of 1873 or intense industrialization (Malandra). The Populist Party, founded in 1891, was focused on improving the conditions for farmers and agrarian workers, in response to the Panic of 1873, which put …show more content…
In “Under the Lion’s Paw,” Garland shows that the Haskins’ actions are motivated by the fear of not having land. After losing their land, the Haskins begs to a fellow farmer, Mr. Council, “’we’d like t’ git in f’r the night. We’ve tried every house f’r the last two miles, but they hadn’t any room f’r us. My wife’s jest about sick, ‘n’ the children are cold and hungry— ‘” (Garland 131). After staying with the Councils for a couple of nights and making the deal with Jim Butler for land, the Haskins family begins working hard on fixing the property. “It was the memory of this homelessness, and the fear of its coming again, that spurred Timothy Haskins and Nettie, his wife, to such ferocious labor during that first year” (Garland 141). All of the Haskins family’s actions throughout the story were motivated by their fear of being landless again. Without land to grow crops to sell, their family would not survive. Garland portrays their need of land in order to show the importance that landownership is to the farmers for food, shelter, and an income, and to help promote the Populist Party, whose goals included helping farmers recover from