Language
Kate Keller queries Annie Sullivan what she will try to teach Helen, fully aware that just trying to teach her daughter to sit still has been a years-long failed endeavor. Annie’s reply is significant because it creates a metaphor between learning and sight which speaks to the dominant symbolism of the play, but also because it lays down the foundation that language overcomes the obstacle of darkness in a way that even light cannot:
“Language is to the mind more than light is to the eye.”
Giving Up
Annie Sullivan is an iconic character among iconic characters when it comes to embodying pure, stubborn, hard-headed persistence. She excels at performing a miracle only partly because of her skills as an educator; the rest is composed of pure tenacity. She frames this in Biblical terms in response to James Keller’s confession that eventually everybody gives up sooner or later when the task comes to be seen as impossible:
“Maybe you all do. It’s my idea of the original sin.”
A Different Kind of Inhumanity
Unlike the case might be with other families trying to raise a young girl thrive-afflicted with sensory deprivation, inattention and lack of affection is not what presents the greatest obstruction to Annie’s attempts to teach Helen. The exactly opposite proves: the Keller family has lavished what they see a proper loving response to the problems facing their daughter to the point that the first mountain Annie must climb is simply getting Helen to respond like human rather than a beloved and fragile possession:
“All of you here are so sorry for her you’ve kept her—like a pet, why, even a dog you housebreak.”
Foreshadowing
Metaphor which merges with the literal is used very early in the play to establish a little knowing foreshadowing about what the future—which was already the past by the time the play premiered—holds in store for little Helen:
“Deaf, blind, mute—who knows? She is like a little safe, locked, that no one can open. Perhaps there is a treasure inside.”
The Miracle
The “miracle” of the play occurs at its end when Helen finally says—as best she can with limited abilities—one single word which Annie has taught her. This is not just the miracle, but the transformation of an earlier metaphor into concrete reality. The word is water—which Helen is about to get out only partially as a single repeated syllable—but it only changes everything by confirming Annie’s persistence has been worth it all:
“I know, I know, one word and I can—put the world in your hand—and whatever it is to me, I won’t take less!”
