Style Elements

Wintergirls is a story which clearly speaks. Laurie Halse Anderson is a genius with voice. Her style and experimentation with writing techniques ensure that Lia is heard and understood properly by readers. It takes no stretch of the imagination to get into Lia’s head; Anderson places us there immediately, and in the tumultuous throes of her mind we remain, hearing even the thoughts that she unsuccessfully attempts to hide from herself.

Each unique detail included in Wintergirls is done with a very deliberate purpose and in order to accomplish a specific goal.

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Because Lia is struggling with anorexia, Anderson makes sure that readers dwell on numbers in at least a slightly similar way. Each chapter is numbered with three digits, a decimal, and two more digits – the way that weight is displayed on a scale. This is a slight detail, but the choice to begin each section that way is a constant reminder of Lia’s condition. The repetition of seeing numbers displayed that way is a small parallel to the way that Lia obsesses over the numbers that she sees on the scale. Repetition of numbers take on another meaning as well because Lia is forced to dwell on the fact that she ignored the 33 calls that Cassie made to her phone the night before she died. Occasionally throughout the text, the numbers 1-33 are written out, just to remind the readers that this is a fact that is constantly on her mind; we require no other explanation. The numbers become enough, and simply seeing them in a row effectively evokes feelings of empathy in the reader.

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…the words shrink in size and are aligned to the left when there is something going on in Lia’s mind that she refuses to address but is being plagued by… This separation gives readers the feeling the subconscious mind at work. Many of the phrases that are seen between ellipses are repeated throughout the text (thirty-three calls) and the content is most often her dark fleeting thoughts about the death of her best friend, Cassie.

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Occasionally, words, phrases, or whole lines are written with a line through the middle. The words that are crossed through are the ones that Lia believes to be the real truth, but are never the details which she shares with anyone – they exist solely within the recesses of her mind. The truth is always subjective, and by seeing what Lia believes to be true right alongside of what she thinks is the more acceptable truth is a fascinating juxtaposition which effectively invites readers to a deeper understanding of Lia.

Included in these struck through lines are the ways in which she truly thinks of the people in her life. “My stepmother Jennifer;” “my stepsister Emma;” “my mother Dr. Marrigan;” “the guard dog Nurse Melissa.” In these examples, the crossed out lines are who these people actually are, but following is how Lia addresses them either verbally or in her mind. The difference between the ways that she thinks about her mother is particularly significant. This small detail is enough to convey to readers that Lia feels as though Dr. Marrigan puts her duties as a doctor over her duties as a mother. Through the context of the story, readers learn more about their fractured relationship, and this detail supplements those effectively.

There are other places where strikethrough is used to express her famish and desire to enjoy food again. The strikethrough in those situations represents Lia literally striking these thoughts from her mind. She does not let herself even fully realize these thoughts or desires that she has; they must be crossed out as soon as they even briefly flit across her mind. “I am so hungry that I could gnaw off my right hand.” “My traitor fingers want that fudge…They want to squish the marshmallows and stuff them into my mouth.” “The doughnutbagels smell heavenly plus sugar and I know what one taste would do.” These thoughts are weakness to Lia, and she refuses to let them linger in her mind. Her struggle is evident and is yet another piece that Anderson includes in order to draws readers into her world.

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::Anderson/gives/readers/access to yet another level of Lia’s mind by occasionally providing negative mantras that play over and over in her head. The same one is repeated often. “::Stupid/ugly/stupid/bitch/stupid/fat/stupid/baby/stupid/loser/stupid/lost::” These moments appear when Lia is feeling or acting particularly self-destructive. These strings of words, put together with slashes rather than spaces, evoke a feeling of entrapment. They are listed in a cycle. Lia is stuck between the words that she dwells on, and while they continue to circle around her mind, she has no way to escape. To put that emotion into words would be a less effective strategy; by providing this list for readers in lieu of bogged down definitions of depression, readers feel what Lia is feeling from the very center of her mind, rather than looking in on it from afar.

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In addition to playing with form in order to more fully convey Lia’s experience to readers, Anderson also includes powerful symbols and metaphors which blanket the whole novel with the same feeling of hopelessness and entrapment that the above elements convey. Anderson plays with the ideas of cold and warm throughout the book in intriguing ways. Lia is always cold and can never seem to get warm enough. While this is a realistic symptom of anorexia, it serves a deeper purpose within this novel. Being cold becomes symbolic of being sick, dead, broken. After getting a call from Elijah saying that he had a message from Cassie, Lia says, “I put on one of Dad’s extra-large sweatshirts because I can’t stop shaking” (54). Being cold becomes synonymous with feeling pain. After hearing the specifics of the way that Cassie died, Lia thinks, “I am an iceberg drifting towards the edge of the mapIf Lia finds warmth, she feels as though she will be well again. While she does not actually make deliberate efforts to get over her anorexia, rather, makes drastic attempts to apparently throw herself further into the throes of it, her other actions reflect a deep desire to be well once again. While she remains cold, remains a wintergirl, Lia cannot move on with her life. Cassie and Lia stayed cold together. “We turned us into wintergirls, and when she tried to leave, I pulled her back into the snow because I was afraid to be alone” (99).

Lia knits. Knitting is one of the only hobbies that Lia seems to still participate in, and often she uses her knitting as a way to attempt to fix parts of her life. “I knit the afternoon away. I knit reasons for Elijah to come back. I knit apologies for Emma. I knit angry knots and slipped stiches for every mistake that I ever made, and I knit wet, swollen stiches that look awful. I knit the sun down” (263).  She initially intends to make a simple scarf, but as her condition worsens, she simply continues to crochet, and her creation grows and grows, but is never big enough to keep her warm. Seeking warmth is equivalent to seeking wellness.

When Lia attends Cassie’s funeral, she does not feel cold yet, but this is because she has yet to be visited by her ghost.  “For the first time in weeks, I am almost warm…The closer I get to the coffin, the hotter it is” (88). She feels as though she may be close to breaking free of the anorexic trap that they have been in, but this is clearly not the case when she begins to be almost constantly tormented by the dead Cassie. She is plagued by the ghost, and it is Cassie’s spirit that Lia feels is forcing her to remain within the horrors of her sickness. Passages where Cassie is mentioned are often followed by references to the cold that Lia feels. “We are here to share our feelings and discuss a memorial to Cassie’s memory…The room is freezing” (77).