The boy, whose name we are not told, has a best friend named Edmund Jenkins. The boy obviously has a great deal of respect for his friend, as he seems to be more mature and wise about things. The boy finds Edmund rather amusing. “Edmund was very brave” indicates his fascination. When, at breaktime, the boy is unsure of the filling his mother has provided for inside his sandwiches, he asks Edmund to take a bite and to inform him of the contents. Edmund tells him, “It’s only bacon”, but “the boy was incredulous”. He appears to have more of an innocent sense of wonder than his more mature friend. Again, the boy is in awe of Edmund for having simply seen a snowdrop before and actually witnessed its appearance. “I’ve seen some already, growing in my aunt’s garden”, Edmund tells him.
The reader is aware that the teacher, Miss Webster, copes with physical pain when she traps her finger in a cupboard but does not cry, as noticed by the children – or certainly the boy narrating. The reader realizes that she has stopped herself from showing she was hurt, which is why it was startling that she was wearing a bandage on her wound. When the Merediths’ son dies, however, she is faced with such great emotional pain that she cannot hide it as easily as she could a wounded finger. As with the physical pain, she attempts to hide her suffering from the class but they notice she is upset when she watches the funeral procession and begins to cry. She has tried to keep both kinds of pain under wraps but is unable to stifle the unhappiness she feels at the death of the Meredith boy – symbolically she can use a bandage to cover the physical pain but there is nothing to hide emotional wounds. However, the boy still sees her as a strong and brave person who is to be relied on and who can be learnt from. This is a strong indication of the differing world of adults and children, as the boy sees his teacher as a courageous and fearless person – she has lived in the world for longer and can therefore be trusted. This is, of course, the reason why it is such a shock to see her so obviously upset by the funeral procession, later in the story. The boy still thinks that Miss Webster did not cry when she hurt her finger because she did not feel pain…in the world of childhood, pain is not a prominent factor of life.
Later in the day, as Norris describes, Miss Webster sets her children some artwork to do – she simply instructs them to “draw whatever they liked”. An older individual would be puzzled by the simple task set, but unbeknown to the children; their teacher is grieving and is feeling too desperately unhappy to teach the class physically. She is described to be “sitting at her desk, her head in her hands”. This is of course not the behaviour of a content person; rather the actions of someone who is mourning and seriously agonized. Still, in order to carry on with the day of teaching, Miss Webster reads her class a story. She “from time to time turned her head to look at the big clock in the hall”. None of the children realize that this repeated movement would be in order to become aware of the time of the funeral procession. The teacher’s voice “seemed to be hoarser than usual” but the boy does not think to analyze this and therefore cannot come to the realization that his teacher is struggling to conceal her anguish. In the adult world such grievances have to be dealt with alone in order to protect younger generations. The only comment that the boy makes about his teacher’s change in style of voice is that it was “fine when she read the dragon’s bits, but not good for the knight nor the princess”. He simply sees beyond the pain in Miss Webster’s voice and concentrates instead upon the story.
Miss Webster then “shut her book with a snap and stood up”. The alliteration used here is to show the reader her decisive resolution to go and see the snowdrops at this very moment, just as she promised the children. The children are not aware that she has stopped reading at this point in the story in order to get out of the classroom in time to catch the funeral procession on their way past the schoolyard to the cemetery.
Whilst Miss Webster and such other adults struggling with their bereavement after losing the Meredith boy attempt to ensconce their sadness, the boy feels a “sudden lightening of the heart”. He had been so excited at seeing the snowdrops and was worried that Miss Webster may have forgotten.
At last the children reach the garden where they are to view the snowdrops for the first time. Initially, the boy feels “a slow, sad disappointment” at the simplicity of the flowers, but then is described “willing them to turn marvellous in front of his eyes”. He sees the snowdrops “blow in a sudden gust of the cold March wind, shake, and straighten gallantly”, and begins to appreciate them for what they really are. The snowdrops are white and young, having only come out in Spring. This links in with the innocence of the boy and the white colour of the flower symbolizes his youth and purity, as the snowdrops are something that he knows very little about.
As the boy “squats down” to look at the snowdrops, Miss Webster stands at the iron gate of the schoolyard, “her back was as hard as a stone”. The boy knows, despite his naivety, that he cannot approach her and ask her about the snowdrops – she clearly needs to be alone.
As the children are still out looking at the snowdrops, the funeral procession passes on its way to the cemetery. The initial appearance of the snowdrops is that they are fragile, but when the wind blows they stand up tall and strong. The children are described as being “frightened”, which emphasizes the difference in worlds between the adults and the children – the children are distressed at seeing their teacher cry. She is someone they have always looked up to and respected; subconsciously neglecting to associate her with sadness or pain. As she cries, the boy in the story appears to learn a lot about the adult world from the snowdrops themselves.
The initial appearance of the snowdrops is that they are fragile, but when the wind blows they stand up tall and strong. This is similar to Miss Webster and her crying when she sees the people attending the funeral. It seems as though she is weak and fragile but the reader is aware that as adults the people involved in the story will need to be strong to overcome such circumstances as deaths of those close to them. The way in which the petals of the snowdrops’ petals fall forward look like the bowed heads of the mourners at the funeral.
Overall, the two worlds of adults and childhood are clearly both presented to us in the story. The boy’s father would clearly have liked to go to the Meredith boy’s funeral, but cannot because of work commitments. This is the same for Miss Webster, who as the boy’s girlfriend should have been at the funeral; but knew that her class would be disappointed as she had promised to take them to see the snowdrops. She could not afford to break down in front of her class for fear of upsetting them as well as herself. In the adult world, the men and women have to fight with their pain and their needs, in order to protect the children. For the children, even though there are many different things going on around them, they are innocent and protected, and so do not notice that anything is wrong. Adults are faced with the harsh reality of deaths and sacrifices for others, but the children are not yet knowledgeable enough to understand.
