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Analysis of the short story Birthday Party by Katherine Brush
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Marriage is a big point of many people’s lives but even if you see a perfect couple every marriage has its ups and downs. Katharine Brush wrote a short story called Birthday Party to show the relationship between a husband and wife going through a decision of divorce. Katharine Brush uses imagery, symbolism, and tone to show the major conflict between the couple.
Brush uses imagery to show the wife and husband’s love. “Crying quietly and heartbrokenly and hopelessly, all to herself, under the gay big brim of her best hat.” The imagery of the wife crying hopelessly shows that the she still loves her husband and even wore her best hat for the occasion, but is rejected and not given a second chance to make things better. The crying shows
that she feels helpless and sad causing the reader to feel sad for her. “I saw him say something under his breath—some punishing thing, quick, curt and unkind.” The husband was embarrassed by having attention from everyone in the restaurant looking at him and we do not know what he said to his wife but it was cruel enough to make her cry. The imagery in this quote can be pictured and it helps you understand the situation. Brush uses symbolism to show the couples love. “It arrived, in the form of a small but glossy birthday cake, with one pink candle burning in the center.” The candle is pink while it is a man’s birthday. The color of the candle could represent their love because pink is often used during Valentine’s Day and represents love. The candle is burning which a burning candle does not last forever. The burning could represent the end of the marriage while it is still burning the husband plans to blow it out and end the relationship. The candle is in the center because it shows that their marriage is a major concern to the couple. Brush uses tone to show her opinion on the relationship. “You looked at him and saw this and you thought, “Oh, now, don’t be like that!” Brush narrates the story as an actual event taking place and it is easy for the readers to put themselves in her shoes. Brush uses a sarcastic and surprised tone. The author uses these tones to show emotion is the story but is also surprised the husband can say cruel words to his wife when she tried hard for his birthday. Katharine Brush wrote a good short story that uses imagery, symbolism, and tone to show how marriages can end easily just like a burning candle.
Imagery is used in thus poem to help the reader unsderstand exactly what hte Century Quilt looks like, and to know more about the speakers family. The first use of imagery can be seen on line 15-17 when the speakers says’ six van Dyke brown squares, two white ones, and one sqaure the yellow brown of Mama’s cheeks.”(15-17) This quote explains exactly how the Century Quilt looks and how specifally the speaker describes the Century Quilt shows how important it is to her. Within this quote it can also be reasonably inferred that this quilt is hand made. When the poem says “the yellow brown of Mama’s cheeks” it helps to show how this
In “The Yellow Wall-paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the unnamed female protagonist is going through a rough time in her life. (For now on, this paper will refer to this unnamed character as the “the narrator in ‘Wall-paper,’” short for “The Yellow Wall-paper. The narrator is confined to room to a room with strange wall-paper. This odd wall-paper seems to symbolize the complexity and confusion in her life. In “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin, the protagonist, Mrs. Mallard must also deal with conflict as she must deal with the death of her spouse. At first there is grief, but then there is the recognition that she will be free. The institute of marriage ties the two heroines of these two short stories together. Like typical young women of the late 19th century, they were married, and during the course of their lives, they were expected to stay married. Unlike today where divorce is commonplace, marriage was a very holy bond and divorce was taboo. This tight bond of marriage caused tension in these two characters.
This duality is concealed within a character because the darkness(truth) conflicts with the light(dreams/hopes) when we hold onto our desire to unite ourselves with our true lover. The author reveals that the light of the “sunset” represents the strength, by illuminating that days are going by, but the true lover still sticks to their strength. The author portrays darkness through the “death” of the“lilacs” representing the inevitable truth that one has to face when holding onto their desire to meet their true love. Parker illustrates that one whose “eyes are deep with yearning”, will persist to their strength until their determination does not overcome the obstacles preventing one from accessing true love, embracing love as a natural and beautiful thing. “Deep” represents her strength and “yearning” is symbolic of her desire to meet her husband. “Yearning” adds a sense of beauty and “deep” illuminates a depth to her strength and how it can overpower obstacles in her life. The author blends “deep” with “yearning” to enhance and illustrate that when we hold a desire we have to deepen our strength and embrace it to achieve what we aspire. The image of “an old, old, gate” where “the lady wait[s]” emphasizes the idea that her husband’s death is “old”; it occurred many years ago, but
The novel “The Orphan Train” written by Christina Baker Kline is a fictional portrayal of a young girl who migrated to America from Ireland, and found herself orphaned at the age of ten in New York City in the year 1929. The book tells the story of the pain and anguish she suffered, and the happiness she would later find. From the mid 1850’s through the early 1900’s there was an surge of European immigrants just like Niamh and her family who came to America in search of a better life. Unfortunately, most were not as prosperous as they had hoped to be. As a result, many poverty-stricken children were left orphaned, abandoned, and homeless. They roamed the streets looking for food, money, and refuge by any means necessary. Since there
Through the use of symbolism, and characterization that involves an instance of imagery, the author advocates this notion through the newlywed’s decision of neglecting her personal feminine taste to make her husband’s preferences her own, and embracing her title of submissive partner by kissing the hand. Also, the choice of words to describe each partner differs tremendously, as the author seems to give more importance to the man by making him appear handsome, and particularly strong. On the contrary, the young woman appears to be weak and minor, which supports this idea of submissive women in a couple through the perception of the woman being way behind her husband. This story demonstrates a great symbolic significance when it comes to the hand, which can lead to other important ideas surrounding the message the author is trying to
When a wife surprises her husband on his birthday, an ironic turn of events occurs. Katherine Brush’s “The Birthday Party” is a short story about relationships, told from the perspective of a nearby observer. Brush uses the words and actions of the married couple to assert that a relationship based on selfishness is weak.
This imagery is incredibly personal, as it discusses the loss of a person. This quote suggests that it is the loss of a loved one because of the added phrase “the joking voice, a gesture I love” (Bishop 556). This quote shows that the person that was lost was important and familiar to the narrator, while simultaneously a loss that was easy to accept. The imagery used in within this poem purposefully starts off with impersonal items and the simplicity of grieving for them, as it adds to the meanings of the final example of imagery displayed in the poem. Bishop writes that the grieving and acceptance come quickly, regardless of the fact the lost entity is a house key or a loved one. This tension effectively portrays the theme, as well as leave room for a second interpretation. The last line of the poem, Bishop says that writing poetry about loss is just as easy as “the art of losing” (556). The final stanza brings forth two meanings of One Art, suggesting most poetry has multiple
The people at the party are so drunk that they are barely aware of what they are doing. As they become more drunk, they become more absurd. The woman singing a happy song bursts into tears for no reason. Men become more friendly to women other than their wives, and wives become more violent in de...
Initially he views his wife as a mere possession, a toy doll. which he is able to show off at party’s to the admiration of fellow. members of powerful society, ‘curtsy here, curtsy there – and the vision of loveliness was gone as they say in fairy tales.’ However.
Symbolism in the poem is used to describe a painful setting. That setting is used to symbolize the pain the speaker is experiencing when she is reflecting on her lover. The phrase,
In the poem “My Papa’s Waltz” the author interprets his experiences through imagery in the poem. Roethle is describing the
To begin, in “There is No Word for Goodbye,” by Mary Tall Mountain, imagery is used to bring emotion into the words that are spoken. It helps the reader understand how truly indicative the aunt’s words are. For example, it says, “Sokoya, I said, looking through/the net of wrinkles into/wise black pools/of her eyes.” (Page 678, lines 1-4). The net of wrinkles shows her age, which indicates wisdom. The wise black pools of her eyes supp...
The bleak tone of this story takes a particularly sad and disturbing tinge when the wife illustrates a scene from early on in her marriage where she tries to get her husband to satisfy her desire and provide her with mutual satisfaction, only to have him rebuke and reprimand her. In fact, the husband responds in such a particularly brusque and hysterical manner that the reader can see how traumatized the wife would have been at ...
Throughout the poem the reader can identify many different examples of imagery being used to convey the theme. For her the chair is one of the most important items that holds a special place in her heart because her dad would always sit on it. It being empty shows how empty her life is after her father’s death. Also, while the poet puts on her father’s blue cardigan, she feels cold in the dark. This shows the loneliness and sadness she feels after losing her father. Another example is when she says the hot July afternoon her father is wearing
list and more, good old dad. I think I've got about 10 coming plus all