Inot the Forest by Jean Hegland

Outline

Eva, eighteen, and Nell, seventeen are sisters, adolescents on the threshold of womanhood—and for them anything should be possible. But suddenly their lives are turned upside down, their dreams pushed into the shadows, as sickness and anarchy rage across a country on the brink of collapse. In a time of suspicion and superstition, of anger, hunger, and fear, Eva and Nell are left to forage through the future as pioneers and pilgrims—not only creatures of the new world, but creators of it. Gripping and unforgettable, Into the Forest is a passionate and poignant tale of stirring sensuality and profound inspiration—a novel that will move you and surprise you and touch you the core.

Nell uses encyclopedias as her way of survival and guidance through this troubling time. The two girls experience loss of their father who died trying to cut down trees for firewood and fatally hurt himself with a chainsaw. They both have a visitor for a while, Eli, who was Nell’s crush before everything started to go out and run out. Eli almost convinces Nell to run away with him because of a rumor that civilization is getting better someplace else, Eva decides not to go with them, partially because it’s about to be winter. Eva gets raped and gets pregnant. Nell learns how to shoot her father’s rifle for hunting and protection. After Eva gives birth she doesn’t want anything to do with the baby basically and so Nell starts breastfeeding it and taking care of it. This causes a rift between the sisters to the point that Nell leaves to live in her “stump” for a while and then returns to make up with her sister.

Obstacles they face; food shortage, gas shortage, rape, childbirth, death, and raising their baby.

Biography

Jean was born in 1956 and raised in Pullman, Washington, just eight miles from the Washington/Idaho border. Her mother taught high school and college level English, and was the Pullman High School librarian for many years, and her father was a professor of English at Washington State University. From them she learned to love books, reading, and writing. In addition, her father had a profound influence on her own teaching philosophy and style.Jean began college at Fairhaven College in Bellingham, Washington, and received her BA in Liberal Arts from Washington State University in 1979. In 1984, after working at a variety of jobs—from making stained glass windows for local businesses to housekeeping at a nursing home—she received a MA in Rhetoric and the Teaching of Composition from Eastern Washington University.

In the fall of 1984, she accepted a full-time job in the English Department at Santa Rosa Junior College, and moved to northern California. After the first of her three children was born in 1986, she began teaching part-time in order to devote more time to her family and her writing. Since then, the course she has taught most often at SRJC is Creative Writing, although she also teaches Introduction to Literature, Critical Thinking, and Composition courses.

Jean is a frequent speaker and instructor at writers’ conferences and workshops. She has taught for the Mediterranean Center for Arts and Sciences in Sicily for the German Studienshiftung program in northern Italy, and has been Writer in Residence at the College of York St. John in York, England.

Jean has three grown children, a beloved stepdaughter, and four granddaughters. She and her husband live in the forests of northern California, where her pastimes include beekeeping and reading poetry at a local Memory Care Facility. She is always at work on another book.

Rationale

Besides the fact that I love this book, I think that the characters facing so many obstacles could be relatable to some of the students. For a generation that has all this electricity and technology it would be interesting to see how the students would react to this book and see what they would do in that kind of situation.

Teaching Ideas

1.   Write an essay or story about what they would do to survive. How would this affect cities and rural areas? What resources do you have around you that would help you survive? What would you do with the gas that’s left over? Also, who would be there to help them? Family? Friends? How would that impact their survival?

2.    Do group research project on other places that might not have the resources we have. How do they live their life day to day? Compare and contrast the differences between how they live and we live.

3.    Have the students document the resources they use: gas, electricity, shopping, etc. and the time they use it. They can see how much they rely on these resources. Then try to challenge them to not use the resources for a whole day. They can document what they do and how long they lasted. 

Obstacles

Administration and Parents might have a problem with the rape and there is talk of sex in the book. There’s also an intimate moment between the sisters that has been argued as sisterly or romantically. The students might have a problem with the rape as well and it would be a discussion that would have to take place, monitored and want to provide a safe place for them to go to, so that they could gather their thoughts or feelings on the matter.