Motherhood in The Glass Menagerie and A Raisin in the Sun
I have read the two plays, "The Glass Menagerie" by Tennessee Williams and "A Raisin in the Sun" by Lorraine Hansberry, both of have a big impact on me. The two plays circle around the family values that convey the character of motherhood where mothers have to have a responsibility to raise, to provide their best and to sacrifice for their children. In these two plays, even expressing differently, mothers all show love to their children; they all want their children to have a happy life. Somehow, each mother treats their children different way, but they have only one purpose: to show love to their children. As I experience throughout the two plays: Amanda, Tom and Laura in "The Glass menagerie", and Mrs. Younger, Walter Younger and Beneatha Younger in "A Raisin in The Sun", I see there are differences and similarities between mothers and their children.
Introducing first, Amanda Winged, a middle age Southerner is the mother of Tom and Tom's younger sister Laura in the "The Glass menagerie". Most of us are familiar with the term of God born women to love their children, since Amanda is a woman. Unfortunately she does not treat her children the way mothers suppose to. I understand Amanda, she is a straight old-traditional, and just want her children to be what she desire. Tom and Laura do not have a choice; they have suffered from their mother and become victims. Amanda has thought that her children will be fine at the way she plans but it turns out to be not. Since she is completely dependent on Tom for financial security instead of working to support Tom. On top of that, she is spending too much time to reminiscing about her past, and recalling herself of how many gen...
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...th and dreams of a medical-school. For instance, when she talks to her mother about Joseph Asagai she speaks down to her mom who treats her like a little child. She feels school and learning her heritage to Africa is the most important thing in her life. The next way Beneatha's pride gets in the way of respecting her mother's intelligence is when she asks her mom not to "ask any ignorant questions about Africa..." This insults Mama while making Beneatha look well-educated and pompous.
After all, even just for one purpose, the love, mother have to do every thing for their children. Mothers need to find the pride to make the families stay together, that is a strongest bond. From the two plays I learn that, family values are the most important for one's life, because it is how a man hood is built from. Mothers are the ones who give us the roots and feather to be men.
No matter what actions or words a mother chooses, to a child his or her mother is on the highest pedestal. A mother is very important to a child because of the nourishing and love the child receives from his or her mother but not every child experiences the mother’s love or even having a mother. Bragg’s mother was something out of the ordinary because of all that she did for her children growing up, but no one is perfect in this world. Bragg’s mother’s flaw was always taking back her drunken husband and thinking that he could have changed since the last time he...
In conclusion, both Faulkner and Morrison show how a mother's actions and expression of love can affect how their children will grow up to be and act.
The definition of the word “mother” according to the dictionary is “a female parent,” (“Mother,” 2011) but the way society views a mother is more. A mother isn’t simply a woman who gave birth to a child, but a woman who can raise, comfort, and care for their child. A mother’s job changes depending on what social standing they are in and what time they live in. Because of the different social classes and time periods of Daisy and Ma live in, their roles as the mother in the novels The Great Gatsby and The Grapes of Wrath greatly differ in their responsibility in their family, their treatment of their children, and their family morals, with Ma outshining Daisy as a true mother.
Beneatha wants women to have the same rights and the same expectations that men have. In the setting of A Raisin in the Sun, women are not expected to go to medical school and to become a doctor. If anything, they are “supposed to” become a nurse, or be a stay-at-home mom. Beneatha’s dreams to be a doctor often contradict what other people expect her to do with her life, but she doesn’t care what they say. She identifies as an anti-assimilationist, showed in A Raisin in the Sun when she says, “(Wheeling, passionately, sharply) I am not an assimilationist!”. She is accused of being an assimilationist by Asagai and passionately denies it. She thinks that being an African-American assimilationist would be an insult to her culture and thinks that African Americans should embrace their native culture. Her position on this matter often get in the way of her relationships with other people. This is shown in A Raisin in the Sun when George says “Oh dear, dear, dear! Here we go! A lecture on the African past! On our Great West African Heritage! In one second we will hear all about the great Ashanti sculpture of Bénin - and then some poetry in the Bantu - and the whole monologue will end with the word heritage! Let’s face it, baby, your heritage is nothing but a bunch of raggedy-assed spirituals and some grass huts!”. George wants Beneatha to leave behind her heritage and embrace what Americans are doing. He wants her to abandon her family history and be an assimilationist. Beneatha is willing to fight against this mindset and this shows that she is willing to fight for what is right. Beneatha would much rather prefer to embrace her heritage and be proud that she is African rather than submit herself to American culture and leave behind her
In Williams, Tennessee’s play The Glass Menagerie, Amanda’s image of the southern lady is a very impressive. Facing the cruel reality, she depends on ever memories of the past as a powerful spiritual to look forward to the future, although her glory and beautiful time had become the past, she was the victim of the social change and the Great Depression, but she was a faithful of wife and a great mother’s image cannot be denied.
They loved them so much even though the parents didn’t deserve it most of the time. That is unconditional love. They grew up very poor and were often forgotten about. There dad was an alcoholic who disappeared for days at a time, and bouncing from job to job. When he was home and drinking he “turned into an angry-eyed stranger who threw around furniture and threatened to beat up [their] mom or anyone who got in his way”(23). Most of her memories of her dad are him being drunk, which turns him abusive and rude. They don’t have much money so she looks at is as good opportunity for her father to stop drinking. Jeannette never only sees her dad as an alcoholic like she should, she still cherishes his love. Along with her father’s drinking problem, her mother’s lack of rules and parental skills are out of the norm. She believes "people worry.... “people worry too much about their children. Suffering when they are young is good for them”(28). Her mother believes that they can learn on their own, showing that she does not care about the hardships her children are constantly dealing with in their environment. With this negligence the children are often forgotten about as well. Jeannette was put in many situations where she thought her parents “might not come back for her or they might not notice she was missing”(30). That is not how a child is suppose to feel about her parents yet she constantly
Every member of a family fulfills a specific role that allows the group to function as a cohesive unit. In most families, these roles involve traditional genders, where the father plays the role of the “provider”, bringing in money to the family, and the mother is the “nurturer”, keeping the children healthy and content while maintaining an orderly household. When these roles are left unfilled, a family can fall apart almost instantly. In Jeannette Walls’ chilling memoir The Glass Castle, Jeannette’s recollection of her childhood involves a large amount of familial dysfunction due to the lack of fulfillment of these roles. Jeannette and her siblings Maureen, Brian, and Lori grow up with their parents Rex and Rose Mary Walls. Rex and Rose Mary
Beneatha is Mama’s daughter. She wants to become a doctor when she gets out of college. She also wants to save her race from ignorance.
She seems to want to be in control of their lives but she also has a sweetness and caring aspect for her children. Amanda’s problem is not that she is over protective but she is an anachronistic figure who is cut off from society and its changes. She shapes illusion into an appearance of what she wishes the truth to be and clings to another time and place. In Delma Presley’s The Glass Menagerie: An American Memory, she says that “Joseph Wood Krutch summarizes that Amanda is a heroine although “an absurd and pathetic widow” who is “defeated by a crude and pushing modernity which neither understands nor respects her dream of gentility.”” (Presley 36-37). Amanda comes from the deep south and a time of old traditions. One of those traditions being that a woman have a true gentleman caller. She has many fond childhood memories which she appreciates and relives over and over again with her children. She was a typical southern belle. The lifestyle she lived is the one she envisions for Laura. She becomes so desperate for Laura to be married to a man whom can take care of her that she begs Tom to bring home a nice young man to ask Laura out. “Find one that’s clean-living—doesn’t drink—and ask him out for sister!” (Williams
The unlikely pair of “The Glass Menagerie” by Tennessee Williams and “A Doll House” by Henrik Ibsen do share multiple similarities in their domestic situations and in the things they chose to do. . When comparing these two plays you also have to keep in mind about how that both the plays were done in different time periods. Therefore things are going to be different when it comes to the roles of the women. With the “The Glass Menagerie” and “A Doll House” all the characters have flaws, lived in different time period, felt like they were trapped in ways, and reacted to things differently.
What does an ideal mother do? In the novel A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini, the ideal of mother is described. In the story two mothers, Nana and Mariam, are showed as the model of a perfect mother. Through Nana and Mariam, Hosseini shows that an ideal mother must be willing to sacrifice, must do her best to ensure their children’s survival, and be able to utilize tough love. Throughout the book both moms are constantly sacrificing to make their children’s life better.
Amanda is also well characterized by the glass menagerie. The glass sits in a case, open for display and inspection for all. Amanda try’s to portray herself as a loving mother, doing everything she can for her children, and caring nothing for herself, when in fact, she is quite selfish and demanding. Amanda claims that she devotes her life to her children, and that she would do anything for them, but is very suspicious of Tom’s activities, and continually pressures Tom, trying to force him in finding a gentleman caller for Laura, believing that Laura is lonely and needs a companion, perhaps to get married. Like the glass, her schemes are very transparent, and people can see straight through them to the other side, where ...
Beneatha is Mama's youngest child. She aspires to become a doctor. Mama wants Beneatha to become what she wants so she decided to put aside some of the insurance money for Beneatha's schooling. Beneatha struggles as a young independent woman who has yet to find her identity. She finds herself trying new hobbies and dating two very different men. During a conversation with one of those men, Asagai, Beneatha is forced by Asagai to realize that she is not very independent at all. In fact she has been depending on the insurance money to get her through school. After this realization, Beneatha gains thoughts on how to achieve her dream of becoming a doctor (Kohorn). She presents her mother with her decision of getting married and how she "plans to find her roots in Africa" with Asagai (Silver).
The rifts between mothers and daughters continue to separate them, but as the daughters get older they become more tolerant of their mothers. They learn they do not know everything about their mothers, and the courage their mothers showed during their lives is astounding. As they get older they learn they do not know everything, and that their mothers can still teach them much about life. They grow closer to their mothers and learn to be proud of their heritage and their culture. They acquire the wisdom of understanding, and that is the finest feeling to have in the world.
At first glance, Amanda Wingfield from Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie seems like a selfish women stuck in her past. In some ways this observation is correct; however, she is much more than that. Her kind and caring nature, and her insatiable love for her children has been overshadowed by her brash and insensitive dialogue. Her character is extremely complex and each one her actions reveals more of her overwhelming personality. Amanda loves her children and tries her best to make sure they do not follow in her path to downfall. Unfortunately, while she is trying to push her children toward her ideals of success; she is also pushing them away. Amanda Wingfield is a kind women stuck the wrong place and time; she