The Yearling

About The Yearling

The Yearling is a 1938 novel written by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. It won the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1939.

Rawlings's editor was Maxwell Perkins, who also worked with F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and other literary luminaries. She had submitted several projects to Perkins for his review, and he rejected them all. He instructed her to write about what she knew from her own life, and the result of her taking his advice was The Yearling.

A child named Jody Baxter lives with his parents, Ory and Penny Baxter, in the animal-filled Florida backwoods. The author paints a remarkable picture of life in central Florida at the turn of the century. His parents had three other children prior to Jody, but they died in infancy. He loves the outdoors and loves his family. He has wanted a pet for as long as he can remember, yet his mom (Ory) says that they only have enough food to feed themselves.