Tuck Everlasting

“The road that led to Treegap had been trod out long before by a herd of cows who were, to say the least, relaxed. It wandered along in curves and easy angles, swayed off and up in a pleasant tangent to the top of a small hill, ambled down again between fringes of bee-hung clover, and then cut sidewise across a meadow. Here its edges blurred. It widened and seemed to pause, suggesting tranquil bovine picnics: slow chewing and thoughtful contemplation of the infinite. And then it went on again and came at last to the wood. But on reaching the shadows of the first trees, it veered sharply, swung out in a wide arc as if, for the first time, it had reason to think where it was going, and passed around.”

These lines open the main story of the novel. The road is a motif throughout Tuck Everlasting, and it is personified here, walking and thinking. The description sets the tone as the story begins at an amble and suddenly becomes conscious of its direction. The way the road avoids the trees symbolizes the danger the spring’s existence brings to the characters and could bring to the world if its secret were spread.

“The ownership of land is an odd thing when you come to think of it. How deep, after all, can it go? If a person owns a piece of land, does he own it all the way down, in ever narrowing dimensions, till it meets all other pieces at the center of the earth? Or does ownership consist only of a thin crust under which the friendly worms have never heard of trespassing?”

Winnie’s family owns the wood where the spring is located. The question arises as to whether land can truly be owned and, if so, what part of it belongs to someone. This passage foreshadows the impending interest of the land on which the spring sits, sought after by the man in the yellow suit. His desire for the land and the spring leads to his attempt to exchange Winnie, circling back to the question of what land ownership means and how far ownership of it will motivate some people.