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Coming Of Age In Sandra Cisneros's Short Story Eleven

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One major theme in Sandra Cisneros's short story “Eleven” is the coming of age. Cisneros opens the short story with our narrator's observations on aging. Rachel has already noticed that birthdays are symbolic, but do not literally represent emotional evolution. Rachel has noticed that her mother cries and gently reminds readers that it's okay for adults to cry. She reminds the readers that no matter the age all human beings can feel vulnerability and pain. She goes on to talk about how people can feel different from their age, such as adults can “feel three”. This short story mostly revolves around this idea that as you get older the more the world changes around you and the more you notice things about other.On the other hand, "Eleven" is an anti-coming-of-age story, too, one that challenges the genre and questions whether one ever truly "comes of age." Traditionally the genre centers on moving from one stage in life to another stage of life as though the two are exclusive life phases. The title to this story has really no other function other than letting the reader …show more content…

Written from the view of the grieving narrator, this story is in documentary type story and revolves around the funeral parlor representative and how the word cremains offends them and how the company made up that word. It focuses on a lesser issue than the one presented to us in the story. The story focuses on how the narrator/writer is upset about how a representative used the word cremains more than the fact that his father died. Davis seems to intentionally lead the reader to focus mainly the narrator's problem rather than the disastrous event that has taken place. So in a way it is a bit of satire because the reader is intentionally focused on a irrelavant subject to lighten the gloomy mood.“Porta Potti or pooper-scooper” words like this are used to lighten the mood and gives the story a less gloomier

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