49 pages • 1 hour read
Adele MyersThe Tobacco Wives
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Literary Devices
Vernacular
Myers utilizes vernacular to illustrate the Southern dialect of the characters in the novel and create a homespun atmosphere representative of small-town America. She employs colloquialisms to create realistic dialogue amongst characters and provide information about the setting. For example, her use of regional terms, phrases, and Southern grammar and syntax gives information about the rural towns where Maddie operates. Maddie describes Momma as “real alert when darkness came” (2) and calls her daydreams “highfalutin notions” (36). This type of speech also comes out in Maddie’s conversations with Anthony, like when he tells her, “[i]t didn’t make a lick of sense to me” (144), and Maddie describes him as someone who “talked your ear off” (152). Frances tells Maddie that she must follow instructions or Etta “will tan my hide” (159). Vernacular creates verisimilitude in a historical novel and situates readers in a specific region. Myers’s use of vernacular lends a specific tone to the novel and a distinct voice to the characters.
Setting
The fictional setting of Bright Leaf, North Carolina, draws on real-world locations in North Carolina like Durham and Winston-Salem and the more rural locales that boomed in the heyday of tobacco. The signature cigarette highlighted in the novel, MOMints, is described as “Made in North Carolina for North Carolina” (9), drawing the connection between product and place. Myers uses setting-specific historical references to portray the community of Bright Leaf; for example, the Summer Solstice mimics many similar large-scale gatherings in tobacco towns that saw thousands of attendees flocking to the location. Setting hence establishes the socioeconomic structures that govern the novel, from the industrial forces of tobacco to the social calendars of the wealthy.
