Fever 1793 Literary Elements

Historical fiction

The events take place in a time period from August of 1793 to December of 1793, Philadelphia, U.S.A.

First-person point of view. The story is told by Matilda Cook, the protagonist of the story.

Tone and mood in the story are changeable. The beginning of the novel is quite humorous and light, but soon enough, both tone and mood change. The tone becomes sorrowful, while the mood is tense and exhausted. At the end of the story, both the tone and mood become hopeful.

Matilda Cook is the protagonist of the story. Yellow fever is the antagonist of the story.

The major conflict in this story is person vs. nature. The novel depicts how helpless people become when their enemy is invisible and cannot be fought with the help of any modern weapon.

The story climaxes when the first frost arrives, and Mattie realizes she has survived the epidemic.

A mosquito and the heat, which are described in the very beginning of the novel, foreshadow events, for yellow fever is usually transmitted through mosquito bites and needs heat to become an epidemic.

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The characters of the story mention the American Revolutionary War, the Bible, Mr. Jefferson, and President Washington.

See the separate Imagery section of this ClassicNote.

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