The Devil and Daniel Webster

“It’s a story they tell in the border country, where Massachusetts joins Vermont and New Hampshire.”

The story’s opening line establishes its New England setting and introduces the framing device that Benét uses to depict both the story itself and the character of Daniel Webster as legendary. Calling the narrative “a story they tell” not only gives the story the characteristics of a tall tale or fairy tale but also suggests that the events are far removed in time, which casts doubt on their truth.

“You see, for a while, he was the biggest man in the country. He never got to be President, but he was the biggest man. There were thousands that trusted in him right next to God.”

Benét continues to establish the legendary figure of Daniel Webster in this passage. While Webster looms large in American history, Benét’s narrator transforms the lawyer into a larger-than-life character. Suggesting that Webster is second only to God not only cements his almost superhuman presence in the story but also foreshadows his defeat of the Devil in the end. At the same time, the hyperbole contributes to the story’s irony by signaling that its claims about Webster are not to be taken literally; clearly, fish did not “jump out of the streams right into [Webster’s] pockets” (1), as the legend suggests.