House By Madeleine Thien Analysis

Mama, a “big boned woman with rough, man-working hands,” awaits her daughter’s (Dee) return in the literary piece Everyday Use (70). When returning home, Dee’s only mission was to ask for two specific quilts with hopes of hanging her heritage on display. Ordinarily Maggie, Dee’s sister, was once a bright, generous, young girl with abundant potential. Explicitly, one day, Maggie was damaged significantly in a fire in which transformed her entire life. The fire turned a once intelligent, social undeveloped girl into a terrified, hopeless juvenile, along with the failed assistance of her family.

As a result of maturing and learning new things, perspectives on people usually change. This is what happened with Jeanette Walls in her novel, The Glass Castle. Her initial attitude towards her father, Rex Walls, is loving, supportive, and faithful. However, when she is able to process how many times her father has let her down, her tone in the book changes to being very critical and clinical.

In the short story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, Maggie changes drastically from the beginning to the end. Although she is not the main focus throughout the entire story, I consider Maggie a major in the story by her actions of evolving into a completely contrasting person.

“Mary Moon and the stars” written by Janice Galloway is a short story in which the main character Mary is who we “........................” This is due to the techniques the writer has used these include character, setting, language and symbolism. The author has used the appropriate techniques which results in her success.

Joan Crawford is a true successful Hollywood actress that had her life completely figure out except she was unable to have children. She decided to adopt her daughter Christina and later her son Christopher to fill her life with happiness. Christina is a very healthy young lady, but is treated with little dignity and love by her mommie dearest. Her mother’s issues with men, alcohol, and show business got in the way of her being with her children. Joan became mentally ill and abusive to her children. To her everything needed to be perfect, but even perfect was not great enough for her. Joan’s disorders impacted Christina not only at a young age as well as an adult. Joan’s disorders impacted her own life by being too strict and getting everything

The role of a mother is crucial in shaping the foundation of the household. In the novella, Mad Shadows by Marie-Claire Blais, two women, Isabelle-Marie and Louise play the important role of the ironic mother as they shape Patrice. Whilst both Isabelle-Marie and Louise play the role of the ironic mother, they essentially destroy Patrice physically, mentally, and emotionally. Isabelle Marie physically tortures him whilst Louise continuously favors him destroying him mentally. However, as Patrice begins to show his ugly side, both of the women choose to neglect him therefore emotionally destroying him.

Marie-Claire Blais’s Mad Shadows explores the complex relationships within the dysfunctional family of Louise, her son Patrice, and her daughter Isabelle-Marie. Louise’s obsession with Patrice’s beauty causes Isabelle-Marie to be an outsider in her own family, which she cannot escape even as she gets married and has her own child, Anne, who strongly resembles Isabelle-Marie in circumstance and appearance. Mad Shadows incorporates a cycle of familial violence spurred on by jealousy and neglect; despite Isabelle-Marie’s attempts to break the cycle of violence in the final scene of the novel, her actions and destructive urges are already apparent in Anne, ensuring the continuation of violence in the family.

I admire how strong and fearless Jeannette is and was as a child. Her earliest memory at three years old is making hot dogs and catching on fire. Even though she screamed out of fear, like any three-year-old would, when she was told she’d be alright she responded “I know…but if I’m not, that’s okay, too”. It is baffling to me for a three-year-old child to be alright with not being physically “okay”. This was the moment that my admiration for Jeannette developed. Most kids would develop a fear of fire after an incident like that but instead she becomes fascinated with it and finds every excuse just to use fire. Her parents are to thank for this because they are the ones who drove her to be fearless and to have

The hippie movement is arguably one of the most famous culture movements from the twentieth century, made widely famous in pop-culture involving romanticized images of overly friendly people clothed in bell-bottom pants and flower-print button down shirts. The romanticization of this movement allowed for a widely accepted and skewed view of the true events that happened during this time. The reality is much darker than publicized to the ignorant generations that followed. It can be maintained by many that personal experience and firsthand knowledge provides the most accurate depiction of the true happenings of the time period. Through vivid imagery and impersonal diction, Joan Didion offers a critical unveiling the mayhem that she witnessed during her various firsthand immersions in the developing culture of the 1960s.

Rejection can make one feel alone, helpless, and out of place, and it’s a feeling that can make someone feel like they are no good, or that they aren’t worthy of a good life. All throughout the story, we are given examples of how the young girl is shamed and rejected. She was never accepted for who she was and this made her do things, sometimes extreme to help out her family. She knew she would never fit in, and her actions proved just that.

Henry Beston was born in 1888 in Quincy, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston, to Irish-American doctor Joseph Sheahan and Marie Louise (Maurice) Beston (henrybeston.com). Beston grew, went to school and returned to Harvard, the school where he received his M.A., to work in the English department as an assistant. After this, he served in the armed forces during the First World War. It was here that his life would change and he would see the things that set him on his path to reconstruct himself in Cape Cod, a place he thought of as beautiful and enriching from its environment.

At first glance, the opening scene to Margaret Laurence's A Bird in the House provides descriptive insight into the home Vanessa will view as her safe haven. However, through analysis of Laurence’s use of imagery, symbolism, and foreshadowing, the Brick House is not as impenetrable of a shelter as it had been known to represent.

In Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” demonstrates the personal growth of the dynamic protagonist Louise Mallard, after hearing news of her husband’s death. The third-person narrator telling the story uses deep insight into Mrs. Mallard’s thoughts and emotions as she sorts through her feelings after her sister informs her of her husband’s death. During a Character analysis of Louise Mallard, a reader will understand that the delicate Mrs. Mallard transforms her grief into excitement over her newly discovered freedom that leads to her death. As Mrs. Mallard sorts through her grief she realizes the importance of this freedom and the strength that she will be able to do it alone.

The topic I chose to conduct my research on is the short story “The Story of an Hour”, by Kate Chopin. While reading this story the deeper meaning may not be initially apparent, but after some careful analyzation it is clear what led to Mrs. Mallard’s demise. I have chosen to conduct my research on “The Story of an Hour” because I previously studied it in my Intro to Fiction course last semester and it’s impactful message stood out. The deeper message being communicated through “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin is how oppression by patriarchal forces hinders female independence.

In Katherine Mansfield’s “The Doll’s House” there is a much bigger story then what is being told. There is a lesson that can be learned by reading this story. Being prejudice isn’t always about people who are different colors or of different races, it can also be about people who are rich and people who are poor. People who have more money can be negative towards people who are not as well off, and people who have finer things and more money can have a negative personality, also Kezia appears to be a young girl with a still pure soul.