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The literary theme of loss
Suicide in literature essay
Suicide in literature essay
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Good bye Norma Jean
The death of an infant can modify one’s characteristic and psychological behavior to the point of suicide. In Bobbie Ann Mason’s "Shiloh" she leaves the ending of the story for her readers to draw their own conclusion of how Norma Jean leaves her husband Leroy. Most readers see her divorcing Leroy and starting a new life as an independent woman (Cooke 196 par.1). When in fact, this is a story about a bereaved mother who at the end, takes her own life due to the guilt over her child’s death.
There are many clues to lead to the fact she took her own life. I found it interesting Bobbie Ann Mason gave the character the name Norma Jean. Norma Jean was also the real name of Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn Monroe’s depression and inability to find lasting happiness resulted in psychological disorders with the end result of her taking her own life.
The character Norma Jean fits all the psychological characteristics of behavior change in mothers who are coping with life after losing their child to sudden infant death syndrome. The most common symptoms are anxiety and depression (Boyle 933 par.1). She is always trying to stay busy. First she decided to build her own body up. She goes to the gym or does exercises around the house whenever she is home. Second she decided to take night classes at her local community college. She comes home and writes essays of stories she has read. She never seems to be in a relaxed state of being. These are signs of anxiety. The definition of anxiety is uneasiness. She can’t decide what she wants to do with herself. There are many reasons for her depression. She is trying to cope with the death of her child, her empty marriage to Leroy and her less than supportive mother.
The death of her child occurred while she and Leroy were watching a movie at a drive in theater. Her child then four months old was in the back seat. Studies have shown the amount of guilt a parent places upon themselves leads to emotional, psychological, and social consequences (Boyle 933 par 5). The relationship between the two parents becomes difficult to manage and needs tremendous care and guidance to maintain (Boyle 933 par 10). Of all the deaths a person might encounter, the death of a child is very traumatic and likely to lead to most severe consequences. It is reasonable to anticipate that families who lose children from SI...
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... She told her husband she was going to leave him, not divorce him. "Everything was fine till Mama caught me smoking." "She won’t leave me alone- you won’t leave me alone. I feel eighteen again. I can’t face that all over again." "No, it wasn’t fine" (Charters 973 par 20 and 22). She is trying to tell him she has not been fine since the death of their baby. Norma Jean has reached the bluff, and she is looking out over the Tennessee River. Now she turns toward Leroy and waves her arms. Is she beckoning to him? She seems to be doing an exercise for her chest muscles. This is where she is waving her arms up in disgust. She has had enough and can not take anymore. Here is a woman who has been depressed since the death of her child. Living in a negative environment of a lifeless marriage and a critical mother. Here is where she plunges backwards into the Tennessee River to end all of her misery.
	In conclusion, I believe Bobbie Ann Mason’s character Norma Jean was not symbolizing the modern woman striving to find her identity and individuality, but a bereaved mother who’s depression and inability to accept life takes her own.
In the beginning of the story Norma Jean tries to conceal the emptiness that she
Some Like It Hot, Gentleman Prefer Blondes, and The Seven Year Itch are just a few of the movies that the actress Marilyn Monroe is known for. However the life of the movie star was cut short when she died at age 36 from an acute barbiturate poisoning. It was suspected that Marilyn took her own life, however she could have just as easily been taken out by the Kennedy family to prevent her from spilling all the dirty secrets she knew because of her alleged affairs with John and Robert Kennedy. Monroe was murdered by the Kennedy family in order to keep her from revealing government secrets that she gained knowledge of during the affairs she has with John and Robert Kennedy, which she threatened to make public after both
“Well, Alice, my father said, if it had to happen to one of you, I’m glad it was you and not your sister” (57). Even though Alice was the victim of the horrid crime, she had to stabilize her own emotions, so that she could help her sister cope with this tragedy. Throughout Alice’s childhood, Jane struggled with alcoholism and panic attacks. “I wished my mother were normal, like other moms, smiling and caring, seemingly, only for her family” (37).
The first conflict in this story is between Leroy and his distance from his wife for such a long time. Mrs. Moffitt has been trying to cope with her husbands’ absence by doing other activities such as: working out, going back to school, and visiting with her mother. Another conflict resides within Leroy himself. He has not been there for his wife and he is trying to make it up to her in any way he can. This couple has been through the loss of an infant child in addition to Leroy’s absence. This is another issue that is causing them to experience the conflicts they do. Mr. and Mrs. Moffitt do not speak of this lost child, which causes more conflict between their marriage together. Leroy, once being settled at home with nothing to do, began to work with his hands to construct or design objects. He wanted to build his wife a log cabin as he was making replicas out of toothpicks. I think him wanting to build this house is to prove to himself and his wife that he can still be productive and good for something. The relationship Leroy has with Norma Jean’s mother is quite different. Any time she comes around, he makes jokes instead of having real conversation with her. I think he makes the jokes to ease the tension and to not address real issues that are present. Leroy has also stated that all those years driving in the same neighborhood he did not take the time to notice how much it had changed.
... chapter in Norma Jean and Leroy's life now that they will be apart. There is nothing left in their marriage that can keep them together because according to Norma Jean it was over a long time ago.
...yle that is placed before her. She was rushed into a marriage just as fast as she decided she wanted out of it. With the pressure of expecting a child, and then coping with the absence of her husband for fifteen years, Norma Jean tried to make things work, working around Leroy. Finally, after awhile it seemed as though she was pushed to the limit, and she decided to do something for herself. Norma Jean probably did not have it in mind to grow apart from Leroy, but she had to find herself before she could completely love someone else. After she realized what she wanted, she understood that she could not find that in Leroy. Unfortunately for Leroy, he had found what he had been missing for all of those years, but it was too late for him to grasp it; the change had already taken place. Leroy pleads with Norma Jean to try to work things out and to start over again, but for Norma Jean, she had already begun to start over when he had left her alone for fifteen years. Looking back on the relationship, blame could never wholly be placed on one character. Over the years Norma Jean and Leroy had begun to go their separate ways by doing what was important to them; together they grew apart.
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.
This story reveals to the reader how distance and low communication can separate individuals from each other. Leroy, the narrator, is a person that has lived separated from his wife Norma Jean for a lot of time because of the job he has. This has created a gap between the two of them. After the accident when Leroy has to stay in the house to recuperate, they find out that they both really don't know each other. He is having a lot of time on his hands, so he decides to build a model of the house he promised Norma Jean when they got married. This only creates a problem since his wife doesn't want a log cabin. Leroy is finally noticing that everything has changed, that nothing is the same as before. He was to busy or hardly ever in town to realize all the changes that where happening around him. When he tries to get closer to Norma Jean, apparently it separates them more. During their trip to Shiloh, Norma realizes that everything is going back to the way it was before Leroy started his trucking job. This makes her feel eighteen again and she is not willing to do that again. This creates a confusing situation for Leroy because he does not understand why Norma is acting that way. Finally he realizes that all that time apart has created a relationship where Norma pre...
Due to Robert Kennedy being in town on the day that Marilyn died, suspicions arose that after one of Marilyn and Robert’s affair happened that night, Marilyn overdosed and was rushed to the hospital. In the ambulance ride, Marilyn passed away and Robert Kennedy took her back to her home and proceeded to cover it up as a suicide in order to hide the affair. In other words, “Summers claims Monroe accidentally OD’d, but died in an ambulance on the way to the hospital, so her body was returned to her home where Lawford, Kennedy, and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover staged her death as a suicide”
A beautiful body,empty pill bottles, phone in hand, an icon of remembrance, an influential leader, and a woman with a record of trying to commit suicide. How did Marilyn Monroe (aka Norma Jean) DIE? What ever happened to Marilyn Monroe? The most likely reason is murder. “An overwhelming amount of conspiracy theorists believes the Kennedy's murdered Monroe, or that the Kennedy's at least had a hand in her death.” stated by ibtimes.com.
Norma’s mother was a flapper so she was not one to hold to the social conventions of the times; however, because she was raised in a devout Mormon household, race would be the area where she would not budge. It was no surprise to me that Norma would also learn to snub her nose at those conventions that seemed ludicrous to her, such as whites not associating with blacks, but Norma’s decision to fraternize with a man of color in spite of her mother’s stance, would bring to the forefront what C. Wright Mills, in his article The Promise, coined as personal troubles and issues. For Norma, choosing to be involved with June’s father would bring up issues of character surrounding the social acceptability of a white girl consorting with a black man, especially when everywhere she looked; society, would shout unequivocally that it was not acceptable (1959). So, when she discovers that she is pregnant, she finds herself in quite the predicament. Norma is a walking contradiction in my opinion. Although there is no doubt in my mind that she loved her children, her desire for autonomy and a name, made it impossible for her to navigate the minefields of race, thanks to the Hollywood elite who would hang the framework through which Norma would
Marie, who is a product of an abusive family, is influenced by her past, as she perceives the relationship between Callie and her son, Bo. Saunders writes, describing Marie’s childhood experiences, “At least she’d [Marie] never locked on of them [her children] in a closet while entertaining a literal gravedigger in the parlor” (174). Marie’s mother did not embody the traditional traits of a maternal fig...
Looking back on the death of Larissa’s son, Zebedee Breeze, Lorraine examines Larissa’s response to the passing of her child. Lorraine says, “I never saw her cry that day or any other. She never mentioned her sons.” (Senior 311). This statement from Lorraine shows how even though Larissa was devastated by the news of her son’s passing, she had to keep going. Women in Larissa’s position did not have the luxury of stopping everything to grieve. While someone in Lorraine’s position could take time to grieve and recover from the loss of a loved one, Larissa was expected to keep working despite the grief she felt. One of the saddest things about Zebedee’s passing, was that Larissa had to leave him and was not able to stay with her family because she had to take care of other families. Not only did Larissa have the strength to move on and keep working after her son’s passing, Larissa and other women like her also had no choice but to leave their families in order to find a way to support them. As a child, Lorraine did not understand the strength Larissa must have had to leave her family to take care of someone else’s
Even though she has been deceased for more than fifty years, people today still are interested in Marilyn Monroe's childhood, love stories, and whether she died by suicide or not. ...
During the Great Depression, there was a massive migration from rural areas to more populated areas. During this era the Joad family decided to migrate from Oklahoma to California in search of work. As the Joad family traveled to California, the Grandfather dies. During this rough time, Ma helps comfort Grandma over her husband’s death. Ma knew that if Grandma was understanding and accepting of Grandpa’s death, the family would use that courage and her example to get through the mourning period faster. “She seemed to know, to accept, to welcome her position, the citadel of the family, the strong place that could not be taken. And since Tom and the children could not know hurt or fear unless she acknowledged hurt and fear, she has practiced denying them in herself. And since, when a joyful thing happened, they looked to see whether joy was on her, it was her habit to build up laughter out of inadequate materials” ( Steinbeck 48). The mourning period went by quickly because Ma showed strength in herself and in the family.