The Witch of Blackbird Pond

Kit goes through an amazing amount of transformation over the course of The Witch of Blackbird Pond. When readers are first introduced to Kit, she is a bit self-centered and entitled. Neither of...

The ever-judgmental Judith is never shy when it comes to expressing her opinions. One evening, just before everyone's about to go to bed, she expresses her frustration at having a female cousin...

The plotline between Kit and Nat is one of those classic love stories when the characters initially don't like each other, but later grow fond and eventually marry. Kit first meets Nathaniel Eaton...

The red ear of corn mentioned Chapter 13 signifies a colonial tradition. As described in Chapter 13, just like they had barn raisings and house raisings in which they turned difficult labor into a...

Reverend Bulkeley is a staunch loyalist who believes that the colonists should give their total allegiance to the Crown and its appointee, Governor Andros. He gets into a heated argument with...

Kit is surprised that people didn’t think she would be able to swim and annoyed at Nat for jumping in after her. When Prudence Cruff drops her doll in the water, Kit thinks nothing of jumping in...

Matthew Wood and Reverend Gershom have polar opposite feelings about King James and his ruling decisions regarding the colony. Chapter 6 has a great scene in which these two men heatedly face off....

I think the main external conflict in the book is the conflict that exists between Kit and the Puritan society in general. Kit comes to Connecticut from Barbados where she was used to a certain...

Hannah says she first met both Nat and Kit crying in the meadow. Kit and Nathaniel Eaton are both good friends of Hannah Tupper, the supposed witch of Blackbird Pond. They do not realize this at...

Kit considers marrying William so she can fit in, because he is rich. William Ashby was originally interested in Judith, Kit’s cousin. However, when Kit comes to town he seems to become interested...

The reference to this question can be found in Chapter Four. We are not actually given the name of the elderly man that offered to marry Kit back in Barbados. We are merely told the following...

In The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare, Katherine Tyler, known as Kit, leaves Barbados in 1687 to live with her aunt in Puritan Connecticut. When her boat, the Dolphin, docks...

Kit has come to realize that her Uncle Matthew is a good and sincere man who possesses "a sort of magnificence about him, even without the fine uniform that made Governor Andros so...

The central conflict of this story is Kit's conflict against herself. She is the protagonist of the story, so it is her tale. Her problem is that she doesn't know how to fit into her new society....

The husking bee is usually a community event. It begins with work (the husking of corn) and is then followed by a time of feasting, merry-making, and dancing. In the novel, the young people attend...

I take it you are referring to when Kit arrives at her Aunt and Uncle's house without informing them that she was planning on staying with them for good. The answer to your question can be found in...

Katharine Tyler, or "Kit," is the sixteen year-old heroine of Elizabeth George Speare's The Witch of Blackbird Pond. She is best described as fiercely independent, intelligent, and curious......

While Kit is trying to save Hanna from the mob the people in the community go to Hanna's home and Kit sees it burning. Kit gets Hanna safely on the boat and she returns home to find that her...

If you are looking for metaphors and other examples of figurative language, a great place to start is the description provided of the changing seasons in America. The author uses a number of...

At the time of the story, 1687, both Barbados and the Connecticut Colony, where Weathersfield is located, are under British rule. Aside from that, there appear to be more differences than...

Kit traveled to Wethersfield, Connecticut to flee an impending marriage. In the story, Kit confesses to Mercy that she had another reason to leave Barbados after her grandfather's death. She...

In Chapter 15, the historical incident involving the disappearance of the Connecticut Charter is described. The Charter was a document obtained from England by the Connecticut Colony which...

When Kit arrives in Wethersfield, Connecticut, to live with her Puritan family (Uncle Matthew, Aunt Rachel, Mercy, and Judith), she only has the clothes she brought with her from her previous...

Kit grew up where slaves were a way of life, but she is repulsed by the thought of slave ships. Growing up in Barbados as a member of the upper class, Kit is used to having slaves around to care...

Prudence follows Kit to the dame school and leaves bunches of flowers, "buttercups and wild geraniums", on the doorstep. The third time she does this, Kit catches "a sudden motion" at the open...

In The Witch of Blackbird Pond, Nat is, in fact, actually punished in Chapter 16, well before the aforementioned threatened punishment (Chapter 19). He is one of "a rowdy band of rivermen from a...

At the story's end, Kit and Nathaniel are reunited. Although the story ends before they are actually wed, there is no doubt that their marriage is imminent.Nat had asked Kit to go with him before,...

When Kit meets William Ashby, she is surprised that he does not regard her with the suspicion everyone else does. Instead, he seems pleasingly intrigued by her, and she smiles at him, making him...

Readers can learn about the governor and the charter in Chapter 15. We actually learn about the event after it occurred. William comes to tell Uncle Matthew that the charter is safe. The charter...

With simple kindness and a listening ear, Hannah Tupper calms Kit's troubled soul and helps her find the answer to her problems within her own heart. After the disaster at the dame school, Kit,...

After Kit helps Hannah to Nat's ship, the people of Wethersfield burn down Hannah's house as they have judged her to be a witch. We, the reading audience know and understand that this is not true....

Three most important events of Witch Blackbird Pond. Kit’s arrival in New England would the first, and this even would include her reactions to the place, meeting her new family, trying to share...

One of the key themes of this exciting novel is the rising sense of opposition to the crown and how this is enacted through the opposition of the townspeople to the new decree of Governor Andros...

Kit is strong-willed, independent, and used to getting attention. She becomes jealous when she feels that someone else is receiving attention that she expected to obtain for herself, particularly...

Judith has a tendency towards vanity. She shows this when, after trying on one of Kit's beautiful and stylish dresses, she exclaims, "Just wait till I walk into Meeting in this on Sunday...

Nathaniel Eaton in The Witch of the Blackbird Pond is often referred to as simply "Nat" and is a very important secondary character in regards to the varied plot of the story. Nathaniel Eaton is...

The people of Weathersfield are afraid of Hannah Tupper because they are extremely superstitious people, and Hannah Tupper is different. In general, I think the people are afraid of Hannah Tupper...

A simile is a figure of speech. Specifically it makes a comparison between two different items in order to highlight some similarity between the two items. The last piece of a simile is that the...

John Holbrook leaves at the very end of chapter 16. Kit is shocked to hear this, because she can't believe that John would leave to go and fight as a soldier. She then learns that John went with...

In Chapter 2, Kit unwittingly offends Nat by calling the Dolphin a "filthy ship". The incident takes place not long after Kit and Nat first meet. They come from completely different backgrounds,...

John Holbrook and Kit Tyler of The Witch of Blackbird Pond both travel to Wethersfield on the Dolphin. John is about the same age as Kit, and he is a Puritan interested in making a life for himself...

The broad overall charge brought against Kit in chapter 19 of The Witch of Blackbird Pond is witchcraft and consorting with the devil. "Katherine Tyler, thou art here accused that not having the...

There are at least two reasons for Nat's mocking and angry attitude. First, Nat thinks that Kit is engaged to William Ashby, and this makes him feel jealous. In turn, his jealousy makes him...

In a word, Kit is shocked at her uncle's announcement that William Ashby has asked to call on her. She has actually only seen him once, "for a moment after Meeting", although her uncle...

When Kit arrives in Connecticut, she immediately sets herself apart in more ways than one. She is not used to the hard work and the plain clothes, so she is a bit of an oddity. She also makes many...

On All Saints' Day, which the Puritans regard as a pagan feast, according to Matthew, Nat places lanterns in the windows of William Ashby's house. The windows do not yet have panes, and Nat and two...

Judith is a pretty girl who is smitten with a wealthy young man who is building a house for the girl he will marry (as yet an undisclosed female). She seeks his attention within the confines of the...

Nat and his friends illuminated William’s house with jack-o-lanterns because he was jealous. Kit’s uncle tells her that William has been the victim of an “insulting prank.” He tells her that...

Kit Tyler, the protagonist of The Witch of Blackbird Pond, begins her journey with the passage from Barbados to Wethersfield in Connecticut Colony. Kit has grown up on the island of Barbados, where...

The answer to this question can be found in Chapter Four of this great story and the secret concerns Kit's true reason for coming to New England and leaving sunny Barbados so far behind. Kit tells...