The Shipping News

The Shipping News

by

Annie Proulx

Petal Bear is Quoyle’s wife and the mother of Bunny and Sunshine. She’s small, attractive, and a constant flirt. Quoyle mistakes her sexual appetite for love and within a month of meeting her, they’re married. But Petal continues to chase sexual experiences with any and every man she can. She often abandons Quoyle and runs off with a man to another state. She neglects Bunny and Sunshine. Ultimately, she sells Bunny and Sunshine to Bruce Cudd and tries to run to Florida with the money, but she dies in a fiery car crash on the road south.

Petal Bear Quotes in The Shipping News

The The Shipping News quotes below are all either spoken by Petal Bear or refer to Petal Bear . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Love and Family Theme Icon
).
Chapter 2: Love Knot Quotes

One night he […] heard Petal come in, heard the gutter of voices. Freezer door opened and closed, clink of the vodka bottle, sound of the television and, after a while, squeaking, squeaking, squeaking of the hide-a-bed in the living room and a stranger’s shout. […]

In the morning she glared at him but he said nothing, stumbled around the kitchen with the juice pitcher. […] He smelled her damp hair. Again the tears came. Wallowing in misery, she thought. Look at his eyes.

“Oh for God’s sake grow up,” said Petal. […]

Quoyle believed in silent suffering, did not see that it goaded. He struggled to deaden his feelings, to behave well. A test of love. The sharper the pain, the greater the proof. If he could endure now, if he could take it, in the end it would be all right. It would certainly be all right.

Related Characters: Petal Bear (speaker), Quoyle , Wavey Prowse
Page Number: 16-17
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7: The Gammy Bird Quotes

“Now, what I want you to do. I want you cover local car wrecks, write the story, take pictures. We run a front-page photo of a car wreck every week, whether we have a wreck or not. […]

“And the shipping news. Get it from the harbormaster. What ships come into Killick-Claw, what ones goes out. There’s more every year. I got a hunch about this. We’re going to play it by ear. See what you can do.”

“Like I said on the phone,” said Quoyle, “I haven’t had much experience with ships.” Car wrecks! Stunned with the probabilities of blood and dying people.

“Well, you can tell your readers that or work like hell to learn something. Boats is in your family blood. You work on it. And fill in where Tert Card tells you.”

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), Jack Buggit (speaker), Petal Bear , Tert Card, Ed Punch
Page Number: 69
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13: The Dutch Cringle Quotes

“Oh. Kay. Keep happiness in the fucking family. We were moored at Whate Crow Harbor north of Bar Harbor. That’s in Maine you know, in the United States. Way up the coast from Portland. Actually there are two Portlands, but the other is on the West Coast. Down below British Columbia. Well, Tough Baby sort of slipped her moorings at the height of this incredible storm. The sea absolutely went mad. You’ve seen how Tough Baby is built. Utterly massive. Utterly heavy. Utterly built for punishment. Well! She smashed seventeen boats to matchsticks. Seventeen.”

The woman leaned her head back and cawed.

“Didn’t stop there. You’ve seen she’s flat bottomed. […] After she absolutely made kindling out of White Crow’s finest afloat, the waves kept shoving her on the beach. […] In she’d come. Wham!”

“Wham!” said the woman. The bathrobe gaped. Quoyle saw bruises on the flesh above her knees.

Related Characters: Bayonet Melville (speaker), Silver Melville (speaker), Quoyle , Petal Bear , Billy Pretty , Guy Quoyle , Dick Quoyle , Herold Prowse
Page Number: 119-120
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 27: Newsroom  Quotes

“I get to cover the wretched sexual assaults. And with each one I relive my own childhood. I was assaulted at school for three years […] To this day I cannot sleep without wrapping up like a mummy in five or six blankets. And what I don’t know is if Jack understands what he’s doing, if the pain is supposed to ease and dull through repetitive confrontation, or if it just persists, as fresh as on the day of the first personal event. I’d say it persists.”

“Doesn’t he do the same thing to himself? Going out on the sea that claimed his father and grandfather, two brothers, the oldest son and nearly got the younger? It dulls it, the pain I mean. It dulls it because you see your condition is not unique, that other people suffer as you suffer. There must be some kind of truth in the old saying, misery loves company.”

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), B. Beaufield Nutbeem (speaker), Petal Bear , Jack Buggit , Dennis Buggit , Jesson Buggit
Page Number: 221
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 38: The Sled Dog Driver’s Dream  Quotes

Quoyle let himself be dragged through the company, eyes catching Wavey’s eyes, catching Wavey’s smile, oh, aimed only at him, and upstairs to Bunny’s room. On the stairs an image came to him. Was love then like a bag of assorted sweets passed around from which one might choose more than once? Some might sting the tongue, some invoke night perfume. Some had centers as bitter as gall, some blended honey and poison, some were quickly swallowed. And among the common bull’s-eyes and peppermints, a few rare ones; one or two with deadly needles at the heart, another that brought calm and gentle pleasure. Were his fingers closing on that one?

Related Characters: Quoyle , Bunny Quoyle , Sunshine Quoyle, Petal Bear , Wavey Prowse , Guy Quoyle , Dick Quoyle
Page Number: 315
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 39: Shining Hubcaps  Quotes

Well, said Quoyle, they were children. Children should be protected from knowledge of death. And what about Bunny’s nightmares? Might get worse.

“But, m’dear, if they don’t know what death is how can they understand the deep part of life? The seasons and nature and creation—”

He didn’t want her to get going toward God and religion. As she sometimes did.

“Maybe,” said Wavey, “she has those nightmares because she’s afraid if she sleeps she won’t wake up—like Petal and Warren and her grandparents. Besides, if you look at the departed, you’ll never be troubled by the memory. It’s well-known.”

And so Quoyle agreed. And promised not to say that Jack was sleeping. And he would come along and get them all in the station wagon. In about fifteen minutes.

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), Wavey Prowse (speaker), Bunny Quoyle , Petal Bear , Jack Buggit , Billy Pretty , William Ankle, Guy Quoyle , Jesson Buggit, Herold Prowse
Page Number: 331-332
Explanation and Analysis:

Quoyle experienced moments in all colors, uttered brilliancies, paid attention to the rich sound of waves counting stones, he laughed and wept, noticed sunsets, heard music in rain, said I do. A row of shining hubcaps on sticks appeared in the front yard of the Burkes’ house. A wedding present from the bride’s father.

For if Jack Buggit could escape from a pickle jar, if a bird with a broken neck could fly away, what else might be possible? Water may be older than light, diamonds crack in hot goat’s blood, mountaintops give off cold fire, forests appear in midocean, it may happen that a crab is caught with the shadow of the hand on its back, that the wind be imprisoned in a bit of knotted string. And it may be that love sometimes occurs without pain or misery.

Related Characters: Quoyle , Petal Bear , Wavey Prowse , Jack Buggit , Archie
Page Number: 336-37
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire The Shipping News LitChart as a printable PDF.
The Shipping News PDF

Petal Bear Quotes in The Shipping News

The The Shipping News quotes below are all either spoken by Petal Bear or refer to Petal Bear . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Love and Family Theme Icon
).
Chapter 2: Love Knot Quotes

One night he […] heard Petal come in, heard the gutter of voices. Freezer door opened and closed, clink of the vodka bottle, sound of the television and, after a while, squeaking, squeaking, squeaking of the hide-a-bed in the living room and a stranger’s shout. […]

In the morning she glared at him but he said nothing, stumbled around the kitchen with the juice pitcher. […] He smelled her damp hair. Again the tears came. Wallowing in misery, she thought. Look at his eyes.

“Oh for God’s sake grow up,” said Petal. […]

Quoyle believed in silent suffering, did not see that it goaded. He struggled to deaden his feelings, to behave well. A test of love. The sharper the pain, the greater the proof. If he could endure now, if he could take it, in the end it would be all right. It would certainly be all right.

Related Characters: Petal Bear (speaker), Quoyle , Wavey Prowse
Page Number: 16-17
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7: The Gammy Bird Quotes

“Now, what I want you to do. I want you cover local car wrecks, write the story, take pictures. We run a front-page photo of a car wreck every week, whether we have a wreck or not. […]

“And the shipping news. Get it from the harbormaster. What ships come into Killick-Claw, what ones goes out. There’s more every year. I got a hunch about this. We’re going to play it by ear. See what you can do.”

“Like I said on the phone,” said Quoyle, “I haven’t had much experience with ships.” Car wrecks! Stunned with the probabilities of blood and dying people.

“Well, you can tell your readers that or work like hell to learn something. Boats is in your family blood. You work on it. And fill in where Tert Card tells you.”

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), Jack Buggit (speaker), Petal Bear , Tert Card, Ed Punch
Page Number: 69
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13: The Dutch Cringle Quotes

“Oh. Kay. Keep happiness in the fucking family. We were moored at Whate Crow Harbor north of Bar Harbor. That’s in Maine you know, in the United States. Way up the coast from Portland. Actually there are two Portlands, but the other is on the West Coast. Down below British Columbia. Well, Tough Baby sort of slipped her moorings at the height of this incredible storm. The sea absolutely went mad. You’ve seen how Tough Baby is built. Utterly massive. Utterly heavy. Utterly built for punishment. Well! She smashed seventeen boats to matchsticks. Seventeen.”

The woman leaned her head back and cawed.

“Didn’t stop there. You’ve seen she’s flat bottomed. […] After she absolutely made kindling out of White Crow’s finest afloat, the waves kept shoving her on the beach. […] In she’d come. Wham!”

“Wham!” said the woman. The bathrobe gaped. Quoyle saw bruises on the flesh above her knees.

Related Characters: Bayonet Melville (speaker), Silver Melville (speaker), Quoyle , Petal Bear , Billy Pretty , Guy Quoyle , Dick Quoyle , Herold Prowse
Page Number: 119-120
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 27: Newsroom  Quotes

“I get to cover the wretched sexual assaults. And with each one I relive my own childhood. I was assaulted at school for three years […] To this day I cannot sleep without wrapping up like a mummy in five or six blankets. And what I don’t know is if Jack understands what he’s doing, if the pain is supposed to ease and dull through repetitive confrontation, or if it just persists, as fresh as on the day of the first personal event. I’d say it persists.”

“Doesn’t he do the same thing to himself? Going out on the sea that claimed his father and grandfather, two brothers, the oldest son and nearly got the younger? It dulls it, the pain I mean. It dulls it because you see your condition is not unique, that other people suffer as you suffer. There must be some kind of truth in the old saying, misery loves company.”

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), B. Beaufield Nutbeem (speaker), Petal Bear , Jack Buggit , Dennis Buggit , Jesson Buggit
Page Number: 221
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 38: The Sled Dog Driver’s Dream  Quotes

Quoyle let himself be dragged through the company, eyes catching Wavey’s eyes, catching Wavey’s smile, oh, aimed only at him, and upstairs to Bunny’s room. On the stairs an image came to him. Was love then like a bag of assorted sweets passed around from which one might choose more than once? Some might sting the tongue, some invoke night perfume. Some had centers as bitter as gall, some blended honey and poison, some were quickly swallowed. And among the common bull’s-eyes and peppermints, a few rare ones; one or two with deadly needles at the heart, another that brought calm and gentle pleasure. Were his fingers closing on that one?

Related Characters: Quoyle , Bunny Quoyle , Sunshine Quoyle, Petal Bear , Wavey Prowse , Guy Quoyle , Dick Quoyle
Page Number: 315
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 39: Shining Hubcaps  Quotes

Well, said Quoyle, they were children. Children should be protected from knowledge of death. And what about Bunny’s nightmares? Might get worse.

“But, m’dear, if they don’t know what death is how can they understand the deep part of life? The seasons and nature and creation—”

He didn’t want her to get going toward God and religion. As she sometimes did.

“Maybe,” said Wavey, “she has those nightmares because she’s afraid if she sleeps she won’t wake up—like Petal and Warren and her grandparents. Besides, if you look at the departed, you’ll never be troubled by the memory. It’s well-known.”

And so Quoyle agreed. And promised not to say that Jack was sleeping. And he would come along and get them all in the station wagon. In about fifteen minutes.

Related Characters: Quoyle (speaker), Wavey Prowse (speaker), Bunny Quoyle , Petal Bear , Jack Buggit , Billy Pretty , William Ankle, Guy Quoyle , Jesson Buggit, Herold Prowse
Page Number: 331-332
Explanation and Analysis:

Quoyle experienced moments in all colors, uttered brilliancies, paid attention to the rich sound of waves counting stones, he laughed and wept, noticed sunsets, heard music in rain, said I do. A row of shining hubcaps on sticks appeared in the front yard of the Burkes’ house. A wedding present from the bride’s father.

For if Jack Buggit could escape from a pickle jar, if a bird with a broken neck could fly away, what else might be possible? Water may be older than light, diamonds crack in hot goat’s blood, mountaintops give off cold fire, forests appear in midocean, it may happen that a crab is caught with the shadow of the hand on its back, that the wind be imprisoned in a bit of knotted string. And it may be that love sometimes occurs without pain or misery.

Related Characters: Quoyle , Petal Bear , Wavey Prowse , Jack Buggit , Archie
Page Number: 336-37
Explanation and Analysis: