Mercy Watson to the Rescue — Chapter 11

About This Passage

Kate DiCamillo organizes the book's resolution around a single pun. 'Toast' has carried the book through every chapter, accumulating meanings: Mercy's favorite food, the Watsons' love-language, the household's daily ritual, and now the ceremonial honor offered at the breakfast table. The chapter completes the pun by making the word do all four jobs at once. Even Eugenia's complaint uses the word, which is the book's quiet claim that love claims even its hostile speakers.

Narration Prompt

Give a concise summary, then identify the most important moment and explain why it matters to the book.

Discussion Questions

1. The breakfast table is the book's resolution. In Plato's Symposium, in the wedding at Cana, in the supper at Emmaus, the shared meal is the most ancient form of resolution. Is Kate DiCamillo working in this tradition consciously, or is she stumbling into a form so old it cannot be avoided?
2. The book is organized around the pun on 'toast.' The word does double duty — food and honor — and this double duty exactly matches Mercy's relationship to the household. Where else have you seen a writer trust a pun with so much structural weight?

+ 2 more questions in the complete study guide