Chapter summaries Elphie Gregory Maguire

Chapter 7: 5 – Summary and Analysis

Spoiler Notice: This page analyzes Chapter 7 (“5”) of Gregory Maguire’s Elphie and contains full plot spoilers.

Summary

While the family camp bustles with adult routines, a stool is brought to Nanny. Boozy fusses in the kitchen tent, Nanny disappears to remove a splinter, and Severin and Snapper play down by the river. Elphie, left with her baby sister Nessarose hanging motionless in a tree hammock, grows restless. She first prods the inert infant with a ladle, but the baby barely reacts. Frustrated by Nessa’s silence and the adults’ hovering attention, Elphie steals her father’s heavy book, balances it on her head, and carries it to the stool. Stacking the book on the stool gives her just enough height to tip Nessa out of the netting. She catches the baby, who gurgles without smiling, and scuttles downslope with Nessa tucked under one arm, head drooping and tiny legs kicking upward. The chapter ends as Elphie, determined and heedless, wonders where to put her prize.

Key Events

  • A breakfast bowl and a stool are given to Nanny; Boozy works in the kitchen tent.
  • Elphie takes the stool after Nanny leaves.
  • Using a ladle, Elphie pokes her baby sister, who hangs in a hammock, but Nessa barely reacts.
  • Elphie reflects that Nessa can do nothing for herself and that the family’s low expectations may keep her from developing.
  • Elphie steals her father’s heavy oratory book, carries it on her head, and places it atop the stool to gain height.
  • She lifts Nessa out of the hammock, catches her, and descends the slope carrying the infant with her head down and legs up.
  • The chapter closes with Elphie scampering away, still deciding where to put Nessa.

Character Development

Elphie: Her determination overtakes any scruple; stealing the stool and book, then uprooting her helpless sister, reveals a bold, rule-defying streak. She notices Nessa’s babbling as an attempt to communicate—a hint of perception beneath the mischief—and shows no guilt even as she handles the baby roughly. The episode sets her apart as a child who will act on impulse and use whatever tools are at hand, including a book that literally gives her a lift.

Nessarose (Nessa): The baby remains an immobile, passive presence. Tied to her hammock with a sugar tit on a cord, she cannot roll, reach, or support herself. Her condition is named as “failure to thrive”; the family expects no change. She does not smile for Elphie, underscoring a strained sibling bond that may fester.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

  • Height and Power: Elphie uses the stool and the book as a literal stepping stone to reach something otherwise out of her grasp—a physical enactment of using knowledge and tools to gain agency.
  • Objectification of Nessa: The baby is suspended in the hammock like an object, poked with a ladle, then transported head-down as if a captured treasure. The sugar tit tied to her ankle symbolizes her complete passivity and the family’s tendency to treat her as a thing to be managed.
  • Family Expectations: Adults hope Elphie’s green skin may bleach in the sun, yet no one imagines Nessa will ever walk or grow strong. This contrast highlights how early labels shape the girls’ fates.
  • Mischief as Communication: Elphie interprets Nessa’s babble as urgent syllables, a private language others dismiss. Her rough handling, while misguided, is a form of engagement in a family where the baby is otherwise coddled but dismissed.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter cements Elphie’s character as a child who seizes opportunities without permission, bound by an internal drive rather than external rules. It foreshadows the complex, often painful dynamic between the two sisters: Elphie’s willingness to take Nessa—literally and figuratively—while the family’s low expectations for Nessa become a self-fulfilling prophecy. The book, used as a platform, hints at the power of knowledge that will later define Elphie. The river mist and the adults’ distraction add an ominous edge, suggesting that the sisters’ relationship is already unmoored from the safety of caregivers.

Study Questions and Answers

  1. Why does Elphie go to so much trouble to reach Nessa? What does her method reveal about her?
    Elphie is driven by a mix of curiosity, frustration, and a desire to interact with a sibling who can’t respond. She sees Nessa as a puzzle—an immobile baby whose babbling she believes holds meaning. Her method of stacking a stool and a heavy book shows resourcefulness and a disregard for propriety; she will steal and repurpose objects to achieve her goal. It also demonstrates that she already understands the value of learning (the book) as a tool of empowerment, even if only in a literal physical sense.

  2. How does the chapter illustrate the family’s attitude toward Nessarose’s disability?
    The baby is kept in a hammock and provided with a pacifier tied to her ankle because she cannot reach for it or roll herself. The adults constantly hold her because she is immobile, but they never speak of her improving. Elphie notes that for her own green skin they discuss outgrowing it, but “of the infant they never suggest such a miracle.” This contrast reveals low expectations, a resigned acceptance that Nessa will never thrive, and a subtle neglect hidden under constant physical care.

  3. What might the stolen book symbolize, and how does Elphie’s use of it foreshadow later story elements?
    The book is her father’s volume of orations, heavy with words and authority. By using it as a step stool, Elphie literally raises herself up through knowledge owned by others—an act that mirrors how she will later seize learning and power in unconventional ways. It foreshadows her relationship with formal learning, her comfort with bending rules, and the notion that intellectual tools can be repurposed for goals far beyond their intended scope.