Beauty In Katherine Anne Porter's Old Mortality

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Does Amy’s beauty and mystique represent something deeper? In Katherine Anne Porter’s “Old Mortality,” there is an obvious obsession amongst most of the novella’s characters with Amy’s beauty. Most of the female characters throughout the novella are often compared to Amy by her family’s elders. These characters are often described as coming close to embodying Amy’s beauty (or not at all), but it is generally recognized that no one will ever be able to be quite as beautiful as Amy was. While there are a few descriptions of Amy’s physical appearance throughout the novella, there seems to be more of a focus on her careless behavior. Many of the novella’s central figures identify this kind of behavior as something that contributed to her charm …show more content…

While a handful of the female characters are considered attractive in the novella, they will never reach the same level of attractiveness as Amy due to the fact that they cling to gender norms too much.
Literature is often a reflection of the times in which it was written, and tends to express some of the commonly held beliefs during its inception. Literature is also a vehicle for change, and the spreading of new ideas. Porter seems to grab hold of both of these ideas in her writing of “Old Mortality.” “Old Mortality” takes place during part of the Women’s Suffrage Movement. While women’s suffrage was not necessarily a widely accepted idea throughout the United States, it began to gain more traction, especially through the progression of this novella. During this time period, women were beginning to recognize that their abilities and value went beyond the home, their husbands, and their children. Throughout the anecdotes told about Amy, the reader learns that Amy never really wanted a marriage. She would have been perfectly happy by herself. While Amy does end up marrying, she becomes the more dominant partner in the marriage, while was certainly uncharacteristic for many women during this time

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