There is no such thing as being ‘the perfect family’. Every family is unique and different in their own ways. They have their troubles, struggles, and weaknesses in their lives. The novel, The Glass Castle: a memoir by Jeannette Walls share the theme of a dysfunctional family. Firstly, the parent of the main character, Rose Walls is not an ideal motherly figure to her children. Secondly, the Walls children are not being treated the way they should be for their age. Finally, the parent of the lead character, Rex Walls is not a role model of a fatherly figure to his kids. When the family acts in a dysfunctional way it affects each individual and the family negatively. Rose Walls is the opposite of how a mother should be to her children because …show more content…
And at times like these, self-esteem is even more vital than food’" (Walls 186). Rose Walls is indicating that she is a self-centered and selfish person who despises the idea of nurturing her children. The Walls children are the ones who found the diamond ring and they give it to their mother thinking they could use the ring to pay off the house and buy food. Instead Rose wears it as a replacement for her old wedding ring. Her decision to keep the diamond ring instead of helping her family, shows that her first priority is not the children, but herself. It affects the children because they cannot use the diamond ring to buy anything needed for themselves. On the first day of her job, the kids tried to get her out of …show more content…
On Christmas day, Jeannette’s "Dad... thrust the lighter into the Douglas fir. The dried-out needles caught fire immediately... [They] were able to put the fire out, but only by knocking down the tree, smashing most of the ornaments, and ruining all [their] presents" (115). Rex has a drinking problem and it affects his social behaviour towards his family members. The Walls children and their mother’s plan Christmas for weeks to be the best, but Rex ruins and wrecks everything and they couldn't celebrate Christmas together. His alcoholism often makes him incapable of holding his deals of sufficiency. He is a bitter rampaging drunk and threatens anyone who gets in his way. He destroys everything when he is upset and drunk. His drinking caused him to become violent and a cold person. He gets drunk every chance he gets and takes his weakness out of his family. Jeannette says "... why can't you act like a dad" (220). Jeanette despises her father because he does not support his family by earning money or going to work. The Walls children realize how their father is not like anyone else's. Rex is unable to and struggles to provide them with food and sometimes shelter. He is mostly jobless and does not have the cash. Rex goes out to gamble to get money and then spends it at bars to drink. He lacks responsibility and does not have a stable job to support his family. His
Every day the safety and well-being of many children are threatened by neglect. Each child deserves the comfort of having parents whom provide for their children. Throughout the memoir, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls explains the childhood from being born into the hands of parent who neglect their children. Many may argue that children need to grow with their parents; however, the removal of children is necessary if the parents disregard the kid’s needs and cannot provide a stable life for their children.
Throughout the Glass Castle there is a constant shift in Jeanettes tone through her use of diction. Her memoir is centered around her memories with her family, but mainly her father Rex Walls. Although it is obvious through the eyes of the reader that Rex is an unfit parent and takes no responsibility for his children, in her childhood years Jeanette continually portrays Rex as an intelligent and loving father, describing her younger memories with admiration in her tone. The capitalization of “Dad” reflects Jeannette’s overall admiration for her father and his exemplary valor. “Dad always fought harder, flew faster, and gambled smarter than everyone else in his stories”(Walls 24). Jeanette also uses simple diction to describe her father, by starting sentences with, “Dad said,” over and over. By choosing to use basic language instead of stronger verbs, she captures her experience in a pure and honest tone.
The Glass Castle is a memoir written by Jeannette Walls about her family. In this story she tells about her adventurous and dangerous childhood that shaped her to be the person she is today. Which is a strong, optimistic, responsible woman who knows how to roll with the burns and the punches literally. Brian, who is younger than Jeannette was her partner in crime in all her childhood memories. Maureen was the youngest she was not too close with the family and if I had one way to describe her it would be lost. Lori was oldest sibling and the total opposite. She was more reserved and very into her art. Which she took after their mother, RoseMary. RoseMary was a selfish woman, she would constantly put herself first. She was also, very weak and
An admirable parent is a parent who doesn’t expect perfection from either them or their children. The parents also shouldn’t fear occasional failures. In The memoir “The Glass Castle” which was written by Jeannette Walls, the memoir tells about the Walls family’s rough and tumble lifestyle. Jeannette’s father, Rex Walls tries to be a good parent, but he keeps slipping back to his alcohol addiction.
“: You hungry, Gabe? I was just fixing to cook Troy his breakfast,” (Wilson, 14). Rose understands her role in society as a woman. Rose also have another special talent as a woman, that many don’t have which is being powerful. Rose understands that some things she can’t change so she just maneuver herself to where she is comfortable so she won’t have to change her lifestyle. Many women today do not know how to be strong sp they just move on or stay in a place where they are stuck and unable to live their own life. “: I done tried to be everything a wife should be. Everything a wife could be. Been married eighteen years and I got to live to see the day you tell me you been seeing another woman and done fathered a child by her,”(Wilson, 33). The author wants us to understand the many things women at the time had to deal with whether it was racial or it was personal issues. Rose portrays the powerful women who won’t just stand for the
From being able to save up money to buy a car and move out to West Virginia and then leaving the responsibility of finances and income to her children, Rose Mary Wall’s helped put Jeanette and her siblings through a hard and tough childhood. Although, a debate could be made that with all the awful impacts that the mother had on her children, all she really did was actually positively influence them to be able to conquer any hardship that they may face in their life. In the end, Rose Mary Wall’s character of being independent, unreasonable, and stubborn did both positively and negatively impact her children’s lives through the hardships they all faced
In the book, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls there were many conflicts throughout the book, and the people in the situations made different decisions and actions depending on how they were involved in the conflict. The title of the book itself is a metaphor that signifies false promises and hopes. The author uses Mary literary devices to show adversity. The person that stood out the most in how he dealt with things was Rex Walls, since he’s the one who took different actions and decisions when a problem came their way. Jeannette Walls uses a lot of literary devices to show the adversity of building a family and how people’s actions and decisions depend on the conflict.
When Erma died, he spent four days in Junior’s Bar. Erma was his mother. The children were walking home from Erma’s funeral with their parents. Their father Rex was so distraught that he once again resorted to alcohol. When they were walking, Jeannette and her siblings noticed “He turned down the street to Junior’s bar. We all watched him go… Dad just kept walking” (Walls 181). Rex’s family is ashamed of him for drinking, but they rarely make an effort to help him stop. Alcoholism is a disease that is deadly for many people. It is not something that you can conclude without help. Rex took all of what money the Walls family did have and spent it on alcohol. This was a recurring event. This lead the young children to fend for themselves. They often had to go days without food but if they did have food, it was sometimes inedible. In many cases, they were pilfering through other people’s belongings. Substance abuse is dangerous in a sense that the substance itself causes many life threatening conditions. It can also be dangerous because people will do anything they can to be able to abuse again. This includes taking money that could be used on a week of groceries or to heat a home during
The novel The Glass Castle, written by Jeannette Walls, brings to the surface many of the the struggles and darker aspects of American life through the perspective of a growing girl who is raised in a family with difficulties financially and otherwise. This book is written as a memoir. Jeannette begins as what she remembers as her first memory and fills in important details of her life up to around the present time. She tells stories about her family life that at times can seem to be exaggerated but seemed normal enough to her at the time. Her parents are portrayed to have raised Jeannette and her three siblings in an unconventional manner. She touches on aspects of poverty, family dynamics, alcoholism, mental illness, and sexual abuse from
The Glass Castle is a memoir of the writer Jeannette Walls life. Her family consists of her father Rex Walls, her mother Rose Mary Walls, her older sister Lori Walls, her younger brother Brian Walls and her younger sister Maureen Walls. Jeannette Walls grew up with a lot of hardships with her dad being an alcoholic and they never seemed to have any money. Throughout Jeanette’s childhood, there are three things that symbolize something to Jeannette, they are fire, New York City and the Glass Castle, which shows that symbolism gives meanings to writing.
The Walls family consists of three daughters and a son. Out of all of the kids, Rex the father favors Jeannette who is the middle child only because he felt that they both understand each other. “ I swear, honey, there are times I think you’re the only one around who still has faith in me” (P;79). This shows how their trust in each other is compared to the rest of the family and it also shows their bond, their sense
...nd recover from sorrow and grief. Throughout the memoir, there have been lots of ups and downs in Jeannette’s family thanks to Rose Mary’s bipolar disorder. At first, I often blamed Rose Mary for bringing an unpleasant childhood to those four Walls children since Rex Walls does not behave appropriately due to his alcohol abuse, but Rose Mary is actually a victim and patient of bipolar disorder, whose conditions have not only been largely ignored in the memoir, but also greatly influenced her ways of thinking and behaving.
...life living with yet loving parents and siblings just to stay alive. Rosemary and Rex Walls had great intelligence, but did not use it very wisely. In the book The Glass Castle, author Jeanette Walls discovers the idea that a conservative education may possibly not always be the best education due to the fact that the Walls children were taught more from the experiences their parents gave them than any regular school or textbook could give them. In this novel readers are able to get an indication of how the parents Rex and Rosemary Walls, choose to educate and give life lessons to their children to see the better side of their daily struggles. Showing that it does not matter what life throws at us we can take it. Rosemary and Rex Walls may not have been the number one parents in the world however they were capable in turning their children into well-educated adults.
“When Dad went crazy, we all had our own ways of shutting down and closing off…” (Walls 115).In Jeannette Walls memoir, The Glass Castle, Walls enlightens the reader on what it’s like to grow up with a parent who is dependent on alcohol, Rex Walls, Jeannette’s father, was an alcoholic. Psychologically, having a parent who abuses alcohol is the worst thing for a child. The psychological state of these children can get of poorer quality as they grow up. Leaving the child with psychiatric disorders in the future and or being an alcoholic as well.
...ndurance of poverty, as we witness how Walls has turned her life around and told her inspiring story with the use of pathos, imagery, and narrative coherence to inspire others around her (that if she can do it, so can others). Jeannette made a huge impact to her life once she took matters into her own hands and left her parents to find out what life has in store for her and to prove to herself that she is a better individual and that anything is possible. Despite the harsh words and wrongful actions of Walls’ appalling parents who engage her through arduous experiences, she remained optimistic and made it through the most roughest and traumatic obstacles of her life at the age of three. Walls had always kept her head held high and survived the hardships God put upon her to get to where she is today; an author with a best selling novel to tell her bittersweet story.