Brother's Guilt: A Critical Analysis of 'The Scarlet Ibis'

In James Hurst’s short story, “the Scarlet Ibis”, the narrator is guilty of his brother, Doodle’s death. There are many pieces of evidence stacked against him. He never treated his brother right and obviously had something against him from the very start. Doodle had a lot of health problems. His weak heart made it difficult for him to do simple things like walking and standing up. His brother was absolutely mortified at the idea of the embarrassment he would endure if he was known as the kid with a brother who couldn’t walk.

`The first piece of evidence that can be held against the narrator is the fact that he made Doodle touch his own coffin. This has nothing to do with Doodle’s death but does show how the narrator looked at Doodle and shows how he thought he could treat him. When Doodle was a child, the whole family thought he was going to die because of his weak heart. Just crawling was putting too much stress on his heart. The family was so sure he was going to die that they even made him a coffin. But Doodle didn’t die at that point in time. The family hid the coffin away. The brother decided that he was going to threaten Doodle into touching it. SInce Doodle couldn’t walk, the brother took him up there and threatened to leave

him up there unless he touched the coffin. When he touched the coffin, something jumped out and scared Doodle so bad that he could have died right there from shock. This was an act of cruelty. The idea of your family thinking you were going to die must be terrifying enough. But the narrator was just throwing another reminder of it back in Doodle’s face.

The other thing that the narrator did to Doodle was perhaps the most evil one. When Doodle and his brother were outside, it started to storm. The brother, having already taught Doodle to walk, decided to see if Doodle could run. The brother took off, leaving Doodle to try and catch up. But Doodle’s heart couldn’t take the pressure of him running. Doodle stopped running and went to find shelter. But it was too late. His heart finally gave in and he died under a bush. The brother circled back to find Doodle lying dead. What the brother did here could be used for both sides of this argument. The problem with what the narrator did was he left Doodle to run on his own. When he taught him to walk, he was always there to supervise him. But he left Doodle to run on his own. If the brother had been there with him, maybe he could have seen the early signs of heart failure and would have stopped before the situation could escalate. The brother fully understood Doodle’s heart problems and completely ignored them.

There are two sides to this argument.

People could say that his brother taught him how to walk and move his body, therefore, he clearly loved Doodle and was innocent. And they are right. Doodle did get taught to move and be a more active human being by his brother. But his brother’s motives for doing it were different than a lot of people were thinking. His brother did not teach Doodle to move from the kindness of his heart. He taught him because he was embarrassed by him. He did not want to have a brother that couldn’t do something as simple as walking. He also considered him a burden. He was sick of pulling Doodle around in a wagon. The brother did feel pride for Doodle, but that does not change his motives for doing it the whole

time.

The narrator’s mindset changes a lot throughout this story. He should not be considered guilty because of his hate. Although he did resent Doodle in a lot of ways. But he should be considered guilty because of his absolute foolishness. He knew everything about his brother’s health problems. He knew that his brother could die at any moment and that he needed to be cared for and looked after and protected. But he completely ignored all of it because he thought to himself, “I have come this far, maybe I can do more!”. His pride in what he taught his brother to do ruined everything that he had worked for. And in the end, Doodle had to suffer the consequences for his brother’s careless mistake.