ipl-logo

What Does Norton Symbolize In The Lame Shall Enter First

811 Words4 Pages

Flannery O’Connor’s The Lame Shall Enter First at first seems to be about a neglectful father to a child who is grieving the loss his mother. Digging farther in, the story line is so much more complicated and complex. Norton, the ten-year-old son, commits suicide in hopes of being with his mother. With Norton’s father Sheppard being an atheist, Norton was never given the advantage of learning that there could be a different fate for his mother than the one that’s perceived by his father. Therefore, Norton was not able to understand or gain peace of mind of the situation. Sheppard allows doing good and helping other to take presents over the well being of his son. The story serves as a reminder that absence of compassion and the attainment …show more content…

Sheppard is used to represent the misconception of good works alone being sufficient, and Rufus is used to symbolize the evil in the world. The way Rufus carries himself and acts, brings Sheppard to his senses and makes him realize that he has to have compassion for his son. Sheppard then begins loving Norton and giving him the affection and attention that he needs. Sheppard always saw his son Norton as “lame” because he felt that he was incapable of understanding anything to the ability that Sheppard felt necessary. O’Connor is always portraying Sheppard as being lame as well because he is so self-righteous that it gets in the way of his understanding that Norton needs him. When in fact it was Rufus who was actually lame because he had a clubfoot. O’Connor is thus using symbolism and irony together. Something else O’Connor symbolizes in the story is the use of eyes and specific looks. She is suggesting that by looking into someone’s eyes the message of good works or faith can be found. She says in several instances when Sheppard is talking to Norton and when Rufus is talking to Norton about Heaven the dramatic “stares, gazes, and looks” that Norton is getting. Norton tells Rufus that he wants to be a space man when he grows up, that is symbolizing that he feel his mother is somewhere up in space and he wants to find

Show More
Related

  • Evil In Young Goodman Brown

    940 Words  | 4 Pages

    Ominous settings symbolize the evil within characters and suggest that more darkness exists in the world than they predict. In “Young Goodman Brown,” Brown embraces his internal evil in an evil setting. Brown walks toward a “red light… with the instinct that guides a mortal man to evil” (page) on his way to the evil ceremony. Goodman Brown follows a red light that may represent evil since red is often associated with the devil. He follows this evil light out of “instinct,” which suggests that an inner evil guides him.

    Read More

  • A Brief Summary Of A Separate Piece By John Knowles

    513 Words  | 3 Pages

    A Separate Piece is a very unique novel in which it states how conflict can affect the friendship of two friends. This book is written as a flashback and takes place during WW II, at a private school Devon. John Knowles describes the experience between the two friends (Finny) and (Gene). He describes what they experience at the school during the war. The author emphasises the power of imagery, symbolism, and conflict.

    Read More

  • Where Are You Going Where Have You Been Arnold Friend Character Analysis

    702 Words  | 3 Pages

    "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" is a short story filled with ideas of vanity and judgment through references of music and the Bible. The main character, Connie, is a vain teenage girl in the 1960s who spends her days exploiting her beauty to fulfill her personal desires. Joyce Carol Oates uses the symbols of Arnold Friend, music, and the deceit of appearances to develop the allegory of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. Oates uses several symbols through her characters, such as Arnold Friend, to create a religious allegory about the temptation of the devil.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Cathedral And A Good Man Is Hard To Find

    1375 Words  | 6 Pages

    In both short stories, “Cathedral” written by Raymond Carver and “A Good Man is Hard to Find” written by Flannery O’Connor, we encounter characters that have a limited perspective on life. We find that the unnamed narrator in “Cathedral” has a bias mindset towards the blind man, Robert before he even meets and gets to know him. While in “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” the grandmother is ignorant of her surroundings while being oblivious to her own flaws. Both stories demonstrate the overcoming of blindness through prejudice and vanity to end up seeing something greater than themselves through the use of characterization, symbolism, and epiphanies. In “Cathedral,” the narrator’s wife invites her blind friend, Robert, to stay in their home

    Read More

  • Good Country People Hulga Character Analysis

    1322 Words  | 6 Pages

    In Flannery O’Connor’s “Good Country People”, O’Connor utilizes the relationship of Mrs. Hopewell and her daughter, Joy, or Hulga, as a representation and critique of the lack of self-awareness in society. To do so, O’Connor presents the sense of superiority each character possesses over the other, resulting them to not question their own self. In doing so, O’Connor challenges the common perceptions of society in never questioning one’s self, leading hypocrisy to become rapid amongst individuals. Through examining the relationship between the characters of Mrs. Hopewell and Hulga in regards to: both characters viewing themselves to be dissimilar, their sense of superiority over the other, the ironic similarity they share, and their hypocrisy,

    Read More

  • Hard To Find By Flannery O Connor

    970 Words  | 4 Pages

    Flannery O'Connor (1925-1965) is one of the most influential Southern Gothic writers in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Verde). She draws readers time after time through her grotesque and haunting short stories. Two of her most acclaimed stories, "A Good Man is Hard to Find," and "The Lame Shall Enter First" focus on the same theme; good versus evil. As well as using theme to convey her message, she utilizes irony to shock and mystify the readers. The internal struggle between a person's will power and humanity is highlighted often through her many complicated characters.

    Read More

  • Flannery O Connor's Effect In Her Writing

    2427 Words  | 10 Pages

    Flannery O’Connor’s Effect in Her Writing Flannery O’Connor is a well-known southern writer in American literature who died at the age of 39 from lupus, an illness she long fought for. Her style of writing is very unique as it focuses on the South. She is popular for writing stories concerning religion. She, being a Catholic, believes there is good and evil in this world and that faith is something everybody believes in, views that most of her characters do not share. When discussing her stories, O’Connor claims, “All my stories are about the action of grace on a character who is not very willing to support it, but most people think of these stories as hard, hopeless and brutal.”

    Read More

  • Theme Of Wise Blood By Flannery O Connor

    747 Words  | 3 Pages

    Wise Blood, a novel written by Flannery O’Connor, was a classic of twentieth century American literature. Published in 1952, the novel followed Hazel Motes, a man who attempted to leave behind his belief in Christ only to inevitably return to his faith. Wise Blood possessed a theme of the redemption of man by Jesus Christ, one that was common in most of O’Connor’s work. Critiques have called attention to O’Connor’s use of material prosperity and characters’ symbolism that delivered her theme of the salvation of man; however, her novel’s underlying purpose has been misinterpreted by some critics. Written by Daniel Littlefield, Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood: 'Unparalleled Prosperity' Spiritual Chaos it was pointed out that material prosperity’s

    Read More

  • Biblical Allegory, And Symbolism O Connor

    427 Words  | 2 Pages

    Through biblical allusion, religious analogy, and symbolism O 'Connor expresses the need for god and a savior. She writes the perspective of a young child named Harry who lives in a household without religion. The young man is given the mentality and ideology of Christianity and the value of baptism. He grows for a need to belong to something from his small world and gives his life to Christ.

    Read More

  • The Benefits Of Southern Gothic Writing: Flannery O Connor

    2214 Words  | 9 Pages

    The Benefit of Believing Southern Gothic writing has been around since the 18th century. Many have written under this genre, but writers such as Flannery O’Connor have perfected it and made it popular. In Flannery O’Conner’s literary works, she gives both the characters and various events a grotesque persona in order to give an exaggerated point of view of life. She over stresses in order to show how life can be horrible if you don’t put your faith into something.

    Read More

  • Flannery The Lame Analysis

    340 Words  | 2 Pages

    Flannery spins a tale about human deficiencies and the pedestrian approach human beings take to various issues that make them look lame. In the short story, the author demonstrates how various actions by individuals make them appear lame. In medical terminologies, lame refers to a condition in which a person to be unable to walk properly. The inability to walk properly impairs the performance of some duties by a person.

    Read More

  • Adversity In The Story Of John Purcell

    605 Words  | 3 Pages

    John Purcell was a man who faced a tremendous amount of adversities throughout his lifetime. As we can see as this short story these adversities prove to be to great and send him down path filled with neglectful parenting and alcoholism. The Father depicts countless times where John is unable to connect with or understand other characters in this book. We are shown this with his family and friends numerous times. John repeatedly allows adversity craft his identity throughout his lifetime.

    Read More

  • Distortion In A Good Man Is Hard To Find

    1466 Words  | 6 Pages

    The short story “A Good Man is Hard to Find” is revolved around many distortions that the author O’Connor creates to build meaning within the story. The novel presents characters that are characterized through many different symbols that result in an uncanny feeling for the reader. O’Connor’s “place” is the distortion in the story that causes conflict, creating the uncanny feeling in the story. O’Connor’s “place” also represents a different variety of symbols, creating the necessary meaning of the psychological realism. O’Connor utilizes distortion to create meaning in the story within her characters who represent the conflicts within the Catholic Church and dramatizes it with a complicated sense of humor.

    Read More

  • Imagery In Hawthorne's Young Goodman Brown

    467 Words  | 2 Pages

    In his short story “Young Goodman Brown” Nathaniel Hawthorne uses symbolism and imagery to show the concept of good versus evil. Symbolism is essential to literature because it helps create meaning and emotion in a story. Imagery is crucial to literature because it helps create a vivid experience for the reader. Hawthorne uses both to draw the reader in.

    Read More

  • Flannery O Connor's A Good Man Is Hard To Find

    1142 Words  | 5 Pages

    Flannery O’Connor is a renowned Southern author, noted for her gothic works and heavily Catholic themes. She focuses predominantly on racial tensions, morality, and divine grace. The religious and moral themes of her short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find, converge on the character of the grandmother. Despite the self-proclamations of fulfilling what it means to be a Southern lady, Grandmother holds a superficial grasp of her religion. Throughout the story, the Grandmother never truly changed, only her ostensible actions did.

    Read More

More about What Does Norton Symbolize In The Lame Shall Enter First

Open Document