Audrey Petty uses “Late Night Chitlins with Momma” to express her own close bond with her mother and how it shaped her identity; this is expressed through the narrative style, the diction and syntax, the use of food as a metaphor, and the short story’s structure. Narratively this piece does an incredible job of making the reader feel personally invested in the story. The way Audrey Petty does this is through a multitude of techniques. The point of view is a first person omnipotent, allowing for a closer read to the narrator themselves; the narrative flow is akin to being told the story verbally instead of the traditional 3rd person omnipotence. The narrative is told through indirect narration as well, preventing the style from being to direct. This allows the reader to go at their own pace with a more passive mood. Lastly, the speech.
“’I’ll cook them next Saturday,’ Momma would say, suddenly matter-of-fact. Daddy would plan
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One generally invites one’s friends to dinner, unless one is trying to get on the good side of enemies or employers. We’re quite particular about those with whom we break bread.” (Foster, 9)
Through the breaking of bread, or in this case the laborious cleaning, cooking, and finally the eating of chitlins is representative of a communion, between the almost sacred bonds between a mother and her daughter. Throughout the exposition of the short story, we constantly see that the other members of her family reject the chitlins for being “country” or smelling strange.
“My mother would tell my father she was considering fixing chitlins for the holidays. My father would groan, twist his mouth, and protest in vain.
‘Why you got to be cooking them?’
My two sisters backed him up with exaggerated whimpers, calls for gas masks, threats to run away from
A common riot for food between father and son is able to be displayed with, “I’m your father... you’re hurting me... you’re killing me... you’re killing your father... I’ve got some bread for you too!”
The sisters had lived through a lot of terror before escaping to Ireland, and they felt like strangers in a new land. Their production of food helped them connect more greatly with the Irish people who would visit their shop, and it was clear that those who purchased their food enjoyed it. Despite the trouble the sisters had faced in the past, this new life gave them a new purpose to be alive and keep pushing forward despite the small amount of adversity they faced at the hands of Thomas McGuire. McGuire is jealous of the sisters because he had wished to purchase their shop for a different purpose, and made his jealously abundantly clear. Overall, this demonstrates the value that food held for these individuals.
In Laura Esquirel’s novel, Like Water for Chocolate, the character Tita’s acceptance and conformance to the to the strict traditions that define her conflicts directly with her desires to find love and individuality. In society, tradition prevents fulfillment and progress. It limits choices by creating social and behavioral bounds. During the Mexican Revolution strict traditions were common. Specifically traditions of recipes and marriages are evident within the De La Garza family.
After reading Jeannette Walls book, The Glass Castle I can say with honesty that it is one of the best books I have ever read and will always be one of my favorite books. Three particular elements of the work stood out to me- the honesty of her writing style, the stories she shared, and the incredible character development. Throughout the book, in each and every story Walls tells the stories with complete honesty, not adding or detracting details to make the stories better. The writing is easy to understand and therefore it is easy to get caught up in the book and really enjoy it.
One good example of this is when Pedro is preparing to marry her sister, while making food for the ceremony Tita is overwhelmed with emotion and begins to weep. A singular tear falls into the batter of the wedding cake, Tita rush's outside and is sick into a bush. Later the meal is nearing completion and the cake is handed out, after eating happily for a few moments the guests all spontaneously start to cry, a few moments later entire congregation moves rapidly to the river bank and begin regurgitating violently. Another such time occurs after the marriage when; Pedro gifts Tita a rose in secret which whips her into a passionate lustful state while cooking dinner for the ranch later that night so much so that when she uses the rose petals in her recipe for quail in rose petal sauce the result is her sister Gertrudis becoming so lustful that she rushes into the sunset in the arms of a revolutionary soldier before turning up in a whorehouse. These examples show how very important food, cooking, and emotion are to the
Similar to “The Story of an Hour”, the marriage in “In The Evenings” by Melissa Checker causes those involved to feel trapped; however, instead of feeling trapped in the structure of marriage, the family feels trapped by it instead; the marriage is not the direct source of the conflict in the story, but rather prevents the characters from solving or escaping the main conflict of the story, the mother’s short temper and verbal abuse. While the story begins innocently, describing a mother and her daughters going to the mall to run errands, the use of the word “heavy” represents the buildup of pressure that foreshadows the mother’s rageful outburst: “On summer nights, when it's light until after the fireflies arrive, the air is heavy and moist” (Checker #).
The short story written by Mary Berg, provided the tactful ways within a communist society. Taking from the (title) it featured the story of a Cuban mother diligently planning to host a birthday celebration for her young son. Having limited access to common resources, Cubans actively relied on the barter system to live a traditional lifestyle. Beginning with providing food and cake for the guest, she had no guarantee that a cake would be given due to inadequate resources of eggs and other cake supplies. She reviewed her list and affirmed her efforts to obtain her son’s cake.
“IT WAS A QUEER, SULTRY SUMMER, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York.” This is the first sentence of The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. This autobiographical book follows the life of Esther Greenwood, she wins a junior editor on a magazine and goes to New York for a month and works for a woman named Jay Cee. She doesn’t know why she is in New York because she is not having the fun she should be. Her along with eleven other girls are living in a woman’s hotel.
In the "Night Waitress by Lynda Hull, the narrator has a lot of concern about her life that she expresses by describing her night at work and the people she encounters while she is there at work. She explores feelings about her appearance, her desires, and her loneliness. The speaker daydreams her way through another monotonous working shift, which reflects on her lower-caste and a disgrace to her employment. Hull analyzes the waitress' performance as disheartening which leads to her desire in a relationship and a materialistic world in which she gets delighted.
Without support from her family, Hamilton has always longed for a sense of family in her life—even just a glimpse. Due to this longing, “[Hamilton] spend[s] a lot of energy in [her] restaurant trying to create an atmosphere in which [she] wish [she] had grown up” (“Gabrielle Hamilton”). By owning Prune, Hamilton fulfills the missing part of her life that consists of one thing: family. The staff at Prune has become an indispensable part of Hamilton’s family—more than her blood related family. This creates a welcoming environment for all; which is why “…the food at Prune is often described as comfort food” (“Gabrielle Hamilton”).
New recipes for hibachi, fondue, quiche, crepes and the most recent addition salsas, were added to her mother’s recipe box. These foods indicate how far she has come from the traditions of her southern hometown. Additionally, she describes how cooking isn’t solely controlled by women but to men as well in the 21st century. The chapter provides a stark between the conventional housewife and the new aged husband who shares the responsibility of cooking. The starts the comparison by describing the image of her mother waiting for her father to come home from work every day.
The short and brief sentences give no description and only state the food she is prepared. The passage would be descriptive if the occurrence is more appalling. Passage two is much shorter in length than passage 1 due to the lack of explanation. The sentence structure of passage two reveals the underlying attitude of resentment, gratefulness, and
“As a divorced African-American woman with two children, Annie Johnson found herself in need of a job”(pg.119). Since Annie didn’t have a job, she did not have money to feed her children. She was already in a tough situation, with her being divorced. “Johnson devised an elaborate plan to cook meals for local mill and factory workers. Johnson’s job was hard.
Madeleine Thien’s “Simple Recipes” is not mainly about the father cooking food and his treatment towards his son, instead, the author uses food to symbolize the struggles her immigrated family experienced in Canada. While it is possible to only look at the narratives that food symbolizes, the idea is fully expressed when the father is compared with the food. The theme of food and the recipes are able to convey the overall troubles the narrator’s family encountered. Although, food is usually a fulfilling necessity in life, however, Thien uses food to illustrate the struggle, tensions, and downfall of the family. Yet, each food does represent different themes, but the food, fish, is the most intriguing because of the different environment
At the end of the book, Sara is able to become college educated and she’s a successful teacher working at a public school. However, all of Sara’s sister are not as lucky and end up being ruined by their controlling father. The Bread Givers gives the reader a vivid insight into the inner workings of an immigrant family struggling in poverty during the 1920s, and the burden placed on the women in the story to continue to provide for the family. In the house, the opposing generations constantly clashed between Old World Ideas of misogyny and women’s proper role vs. the ideas of the New World like independence and love. In the end, The Bread Givers shows an alternate view of the booming wealth and flapper dresses constantly associated with the