Summer of the Monkeys

Fourteen-year-old Jay Berry Lee, the story’s protagonist, lives on a farm in the Oklahoma Ozarks in the late 1800s. The people in Jay Berry’s life are his immediate family members (Mama, Papa, and twin sister Daisy) and his grandparents. Jay Berry is especially close to his grandfather, who runs a general store and often make trades and deals with the Native people who live in the surrounding regions. Jay Berry has a bluetick hound named Rowdy with whom he is very close as well.

The novel is told in Jay Berry’s first-person point of view; he opens the narrative as an adult telling a story about a summer in his youth. He introduces the idea that he experienced a happy and contented boyhood but that the monkeys he encountered that summer “all but drove [him] out of [his] mind” (1). This bit of hyperbole announces the novel’s conflict immediately and offers an early taste of Jay Berry’s storytelling style. As Jay Berry’s story continues, readers piece together indirect details about Jay Berry: He loves his family and has a sincere respect for his hardworking parents. He loves his twin Daisy but is easily aggravated by her teasing. He counts on Grandpa’s advice throughout the novel, especially when the monkeys prove increasingly hard to catch. Jay Berry does his chores without complaint and shows initiative in completing them early to make time for catching the monkeys. His lifestyle is simple and humble; he wears Papa’s patched overalls and goes barefoot outside in the summer. He does not read widely, unlike Daisy, and does not mention school or friends from school. When he sees the university students in Tahlequah, he tells Grandpa, “That wouldn’t be a bad place to go to school […] Instead of having to stay in the schoolhouse to study, you could just go outside and sit under a tree. I think I'd like that” (155), indicating that traditional lessons in the schoolhouse were not favorable to him.

Jay Berry has two material goals: a pony and a .22 rifle. He is uncertain how to come by these possessions, as his work on the farm is an expected part of his responsibilities (he does not earn an allowance). When the opportunity arises to trap and return the monkeys for reward money, he shows tenacity and enthusiasm, always returning to the vision of his sought-after pony and rifle for motivation. On the occasions he cannot find the monkeys immediately in the river bottoms, he despairs for the loss of his much-wanted items, and when he feels he is close to catching the creatures, he exalts in how soon he will be able to lay hands on his prize. He is a spirited optimist. Despite being thwarted in his attempts to capture the monkeys, he doesn’t give up. Ultimately, his compassion for the monkeys and concern for their survival enable him to lure them home and receive his prize money.

While parts of Jay Berry’s character arc and coming-of-age experience are built on his willingness to learn perseverance, his bigger, more influential steps toward adulthood and maturity occur when he sacrifices his coveted pony. Earlier in the novel, Jay Berry saw his sister’s leg and operation as his family’s concern. Now, he realizes that he is the one who can—and must—help her. Just when he finally brings the perfect pony home, he realizes he will return her to help his sister. Jay Berry experiences his own altruistic act with a higher degree of fulfillment when, six weeks later, he sees the improvements in Daisy’s quality of life; then, recognition of his role in her life-changing surgery supersedes any residual sadness about the pony. Grandpa provides Jay Berry with his pony after all, illustrating that one’s moral coming of age should be rewarded.