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Ma Shouying
Charlotte is Winston Ma’s wife and the mother of Mimi, Carmen, and Amelia. She is a white American woman who is a “scion of a fallen southern planting family” from Virginia. Over the course of many years, Charlotte slips slowly into dementia, becoming obsessed with Latin and then refusing to believe that Winston is really dead after his suicide.
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Charlotte Ma Character Timeline in The Overstory
The timeline below shows where the character Charlotte Ma appears in The Overstory. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Part 1: Roots—Mimi Ma
...Hsuin becomes “Winston Ma.” He attends school in Pittsburgh, marries a Southern white woman named Charlotte, and moves to Wheaton, Illinois. In the backyard of their new house Winston plants a...
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...stay. The girls practice their instruments in the car but mostly fight with each other. Charlotte doesn’t try to stop them, and the narrator notes that she is already beginning to...
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...the scrolls. Later, as the family is picnicking, a bear suddenly wanders into their camp. Charlotte grabs Amelia and runs into the lake, and Mimi and Carmen quickly climb a tree....
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...Mimi tries to cheer him up, as she has never heard him sound so depressed. Charlotte picks up the phone and starts speaking in Latin. Then Winston returns, asking Mimi, “What...
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That fall, Winston dies by suicide. One day, while Charlotte is in the basement studying Latin, Winston sits under the dying mulberry and shoots himself...
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Mimi returns home, where Charlotte is slipping into dementia and won’t accept that Winston is dead. The body and gun...
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...about the phone call, and in response, Amelia comforts her while Carmen blames her. Meanwhile, Charlotte keeps speaking about Winston in the present tense, claiming that she’ll see him again.
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...sudden death. Mimi tells the others that they need to divide Winston’s belongings, and that Charlotte can’t take care of herself anymore. She and Carmen argue, while Amelia tries to keep...
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