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A Literary Analysis Of Ha Songnan's 'Waxen Wings'

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Literary Analysis of “Waxen Wings” Failure is a grueling issue to consider even if it’s a natural way of life. Ha Songnan’s “Waxen Wings” expresses to never give up on your dreams because sometimes it takes failure to discover achievement. The nameless South Korean girl, “Birdie”, travels back to her childhood. As a child and even as an adult she has a brilliant imagination that consists of flying; yet, imagination is a ignominy in her culture. Having the imagination of flying leads Birdie to a plethora of failures. Throughout the story, Songnan utilizes cause and effect structure,second person point of view, and literary device of mythological allusion to contribute to the overall theme: failure is an evil necessity, which wouldn't make the story a tragedy. The structure of “Waxen Wings” is cause and effect because Birdie has …show more content…

In elementary, she has a desire to fly and enjoys swinging on the swing set at school so she was determined to make a bigger jump, performing a somersault; yet, her teacher isn’t happy because another child gets hurt mimicking Birdie. She warns Birdie, “ Only birds can fly. It’s impossible for people to fly”, (165). In middle school, Birdie pushes the thoughts of flying and is more focused on the force of gravity; she joins gymnastics and appeals to a star gymnast, Yunhui whom Birdie studies every move; but, Yunhui has a tragic accident that leaves her paralyzed from the neck down. The tragic cause affects her by encouraging her to skip practices for gymnastics and as a result, quitting. Birdie is now an

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