Death, Grief, and Redemption in The Lovely Bones

1592 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Mental health risk in children essay

Death is the unfortunate event in which the people on this Earth have to embrace as a part of life. Most can relate to death in some way whether it be by relating to someone who has died or being close to someone that has lived this eventual nightmare everyone can relate to death and grief in some type of way. According to the OED, grief is the “... act or fact of dying; the end of life; the final cessation of the vital functions of an individual.” Death and grief are forever in the lives of death’s victims, with no known cure, just nullified existence to help lessen the pain. As the grieving process becomes an essential element to families affected by death, a developing mentality can be forever shaped by the components of death, grief, and redemption.
Alice Sebold “boldly steps into the unimaginable territory [of]...death and murder…”(Woods) as she portrays the journey of Susie Salmon who was raped and murdered at the age of fourteen by the neighborhood question mark, George Harvey. The Sebold family slowly moves through the five categories of grief that include
1. denial- refusal to acknowledge existence of something :a refusal to believe in something or admit that something exists
2. anger- a strong feeling of grievance and displeasure
3. bargaining- an agreement between two parties that fixes the price of something
4. depression- a state of unhappiness and hopelessness
5. acceptance- willingness to believe that something is true
Sebold makes clear that these stages do not necessarily remain adamant, but that families coping with loss adhere to grief and loss in assorted ways. If readers confine their understanding of grief to coping and loss with death of a loved one, then the reader finds that they have trouble elucid...

... middle of paper ...

...." Times Literary Supplement 5229 (20 June 2003): 15. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Tom Burns and Jeffrey W. Hunter. Vol. 193. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.
Sebold, Alice. The Lovely Bones. Boston: Little, Brown, 2002. Print.
Simpson, J. A., and E. S. C. Weiner. The Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon, 1989. Print.
Womack, Kenneth. "'My Name Was Salmon, Like the Fish': Understanding Death, Grief, and Redemption in Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones." Contemporary Literary Criticism Select. Detroit: Gale, 2008. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 11 Feb. 2014.
Woods, Paula L. "Holding On and Letting Go." Los Angeles Times Book Review (7 July 2002): 7. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Tom Burns and Jeffrey W. Hunter. Vol. 193. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resource Center. Web. 25 Feb. 2014.

Show More
Related

  • Dealing With Grief In The Lovely Bones

    1807 Words  | 4 Pages

    The characters in Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones are faced with the difficult task of overcoming the loss of Susie, their daughter and sister. Jack, Abigail, Buckley, and Lindsey each deal with the loss differently. However, it is Susie who has the most difficulty accepting the loss of her own life. Several psychologists separate the grieving process into two main categories: intuitive and instrumental grievers. Intuitive grievers communicate their emotional distress and “experience, express, and adapt to grief on a very affective level” (Doka, par. 27). Instrumental grievers focus their attention towards an activity, whether it is into work or into a hobby, usually relating to the loss (Doka par. 28). Although each character deals with their grief differently, there is one common denominator: the reaction of one affects all.

    Read More

  • Understanding Death, Grief, And Redemption In 'The Lovely Bones'

    967 Words  | 2 Pages

    Lindsey Salmon is Susie Salmon’s younger sister who has more knowledge about Susie’s death and about Mr. Harvey. In the article, ‘’’My Name Was Salmon, Like the Fish: Understanding Death, Grief, and Redemption in Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones’’ literacy critic Kenneth Womack states that, ‘’ Lindsey attempts to lose herself in the business of living.

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Mr Harvey

    1957 Words  | 4 Pages

    The feelings of anger and guilt that Jack demonstrates causes him to reveal his desire to catch the murderer, Mr. Harvey. When Jack whispers to himself, “Bastard, You murderous bastard,” the author indicates the how the presence of Jack’s id foreshadows the drastic approaches he will take (137). This desire is his main goal and serves as a catalyst that motivates him throughout the novel. Simultaneously, he also possesses the fear that he might be endangering his second daughter, Lindsey: “... he could not feel anything but the knowledge in his brain. George Harvey had killed his last little girl” (137). This is connected to the fact that if he is unable to fulfill his desire, Lindsey’s life could be at jeopardy. In the same manner, Abigail’s immediate decision to not attend Susie’s memorial indicates that she is trying to escape the fear of feeling anguish and sorrow after her memorial: “I don’t believe she’s waiting for us out there. I don’t think lighting candles and doing all that stuff is honoring her memory” (206). She avoids these fears by creating her own reasons to why she should not attend Susie’s service. This becomes her main fear throughout the novel, as she constantly tries to avoid the reality of Susie’s death. However, when the narrator states, “She needed Len to drive the dead daughter out...being with him was the fastest way she knew

    Read More

  • Theme Analysis of Killings by Andre Dubus

    753 Words  | 2 Pages

    Meyer, Michael. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. Ed. 8th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008. 2189.

    Read More

  • Duality Of Color In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

    1446 Words  | 3 Pages

    Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, edited by Linda Pavlovski and Scott T. Darga, vol. 106, Gale, 2001. 20th Century Literature Criticism Online, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/KSZNPN102098467/LCO?u=schaumburg_hs&sid=LCO. Accessed 14 Dec. 2017. Originally published in CLA Journal, vol. 31, June 1988, pp.

    Read More

  • Death And Grieving By Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

    1953 Words  | 4 Pages

    Imagine that the person you love most in the world dies. How would you cope with the loss? Death and grieving is an agonizing and inevitable part of life. No one is immune from death’s insidious and frigid grip. Individuals vary in their emotional reactions to loss. There is no right or wrong way to grieve (Huffman, 2012, p.183), it is a melancholy ordeal, but a necessary one (Johnson, 2007). In the following: the five stages of grief, the symptoms of grief, coping with grief, and unusual customs of mourning with particular emphasis on mourning at its most extravagant, during the Victorian era, will all be discussed in this essay (Smith, 2014).

    Read More

  • Chapter Summary: The Lovely Bones

    1184 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Lovely Bones tells the story of Susie Salmon, a 14 year old who was murdered. After her death, Susie watches everyone she left behind from up in heaven. Susie struggled with being unable to help her family with their grief and being able to tell them who her killer was.

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Research Paper

    1274 Words  | 3 Pages

    She enjoys watching her family in the years following her death and one night, shortly after the confirmation of her death, Susie sees Lindsey creep into her room and find the photo of Abigail that she had hidden from the rest of the world. Similar to Susie, Lindsey is awestruck by her mother’s alternate persona, so much so that the photograph evokes a physical reaction. Susie observes, “A deep breath rushed out of her, and she sat down on the floor, her mouth still open and her hand still holding the picture” (Sebold 44). Although telling, Lindsey's attitude towards the photograph is not unprecedented, it is Jack Salmon’s reaction to the photograph that reveals the most. After Abigail leaves the family, Jack finds himself staring at the photos of her from the morning of Susie’s eleventh birthday. Slowly but surely, he falls back in love with her. Yet, as he sees the mask Abigail develops throughout the photos, he cannot help but think, “Did I do that to you?” (240). Instead of drowning in rage, Jack becomes engulfed in guilt, reaffirming his character as selfless, loving and painstakingly loyal. These character traits aid the reader in comprehending why he can love Abigail again and ultimately accept Susie’s

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Essay

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    After Susie’s death, Lindsey internally secludes herself from the society and has difficulty finding her own image in Susie’s shadow. When Principal Caden offers to help Lindsey with her loss, Lindsey replies, “I wasn’t aware I had lost anything (Sebold 31)”.

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Research Paper

    1656 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Lovely Bones is a well known fiction thrilling movie that has several themes that include love, grief, family, time, unity, mortality, and death, although out of all of those themes the theme of time connects the story of The Lovely Bones together. Life is so valuable and fragile and it makes us question what is the purpose of life and whether we live it to the fullest or not we must continue to live it like it’s our last. The passing of time affects every aspect of an individual’s life and it can make life seem so valuable and it makes us question if we have enough of it. Although, we should not dwell on that idea and continue living life to the fullest no matter what circumstance it’s under.

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Synopsis

    713 Words  | 2 Pages

    Take deep breaths and hold them. Try to stay still for longer and longer periods of time. Make yourself small and like a stone. Curl the edges of yourself up and fold them under where no one can see.” (Sebold 20). Lindsey becomes very isolated, but protective of her family.She bravely chooses to attend the last week of school before winter break. ““I wasn’t aware I had lost anything,” she said, and in a Herculean effort she made the motions of patting her shirt and checking her pockets.” (Sebold 21) when confronted by the principal, who offers his condolences for her loss. In school she deals with “... the Walking Dead Syndrome – when other people see the dead person and don’t see you.” (Sebold 39). Seeing as Susie is unable to communicate with her sister from in-between, Lindsey has to find out the truth like every other character - through personal experience. Later in the story, her father becomes convinced Mr. Harvey is Susie’s murderer but there is no evidence connecting Mr. Harvey to the murder. Lindsey breaks into Mr. Harvey’s house the next day, finding critical evidence that will connect Mr. Harvey and the murder. “Now she saw what I wanted her to

    Read More

  • The Lovely Bones Book Report

    280 Words  | 1 Pages

    The book The Lovely Bones was definitely a thrilling book, on what was going to happen next to what were the moods going to be like throughout the book. The mood throughout the whole book had you sitting at the edge of your seat. Making you want to read and imagine more than what the book has already covered. It made you want to write your own book like this but to make sure that there was some sort of justice with the murderer Mr. Harvey. That the Salmon family would have justice in known that the man that had taken their daughter/sister away could rot in prison for the rest of his life. But that’s not always how life goes. Some life an unjustified life while others have no problem with anyone, they have their life set. The significance with

    Read More

  • The Doppelgänger in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein

    1492 Words  | 3 Pages

    Century Literature Criticism. Ed. Jay Parini. Vol. 14. Detroit: Gale Research, 1987. Literature Resource Center. Web. 24 Jan. 2012.

    Read More

  • A Lacanian Study of Motherhood in the Poems of William Wordsworth

    1983 Words  | 4 Pages

    Bennett, Andrew, and Nicholas Royle. An introduction to literature, criticism and theory 4. ed. Harlow: Pearson Longman, 2009.

    Read More

  • Analysis of The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot

    1586 Words  | 4 Pages

    Bennett, Andrew, and Nicholas Royle. An Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory. Fourth Edition. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2009. Print.

    Read More

More about Death, Grief, and Redemption in The Lovely Bones

Open Document