In her novel Charlotte Temple, Suzanna Rowson presents Charlotte Temple as a young 15-year-old naive girl. Although Charlotte appears innocent, she actually causes her own downfall because she allows her emotions to shape her decisions. Her poor decisions are reading Montraville’s (her lover) letters, copulating with Montraville outside of marriage, and going to America with Montraville without thinking it through.
After seeing Charlotte two years earlier, Montraville sees a very attractive Charlotte walking with her teacher Mademoiselle La Rue and joins them. Montraville finds Charlotte very attractive and bribes La Rue with 5 guineas to see Charlotte once more on the next field day (Rowson 29-30). Montraville presents Charlotte a love letter to read asking her to meet him. To ensure their safety, Charlotte plans on telling Montraville not to meet her again because she and her teacher can get expelled from the school. Charlotte falls under the negative influence of La Rue who goes only to church to get invited to parties and flirt. Charlotte does not want to open and read the letter, but La Rue encourages and insists she to open it. Charlotte tells La Rue that her mother always told her not to ever open letters from young men unless her mother read them first, but La Rue tells her
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that if she shows the letter to her mother, she will not have the freedom to meet the young, smart Montraville again. La Rue tells Charlotte that Montraville may go to America and may probably be injured or killed there; she will probably never see him again (Rowson 48-50). Charlotte made the decision to open the letter and read it, which made her go and visit him. Montraville figured that she would act respond this way (Rowson 30,41). Montraville tempts Charlotte into meeting with him again and again. As the story unfolds, Charlotte and Montraville scandously remain intimate outside of marriage. Montraville admires Charlotte and would like to marry her, but when he finds out that she is financially poor, he decides to still continue with his relationship with her by keeping her as his mistress. Montraville’s father will not help him financially with anything if he marries a poor girl. Charlotte knew that her parents would never approve of Montraville, and yet she still had relations with him. She told Montraville that she cannot bear to be separated from her beloved mother, but Montraville gives her the option of either picking him or her parents (Rowson 70). She tearfully says that she cannot hurt her mother, but La Rue brings up another letter from Montraville and lets her read it to change her mind. Charlotte continues to have sexual relations with him, which leaves her corrupted losing her moral values and neglecting her parents. During the Victorian era, it was dishonorable for women to have premarital sex. It was determined that “women were expected to both avoid improper encounters with men and to uphold the ideal of feminine gentility.”(“Sexual responsibility of women,” 2013). Montraville makes Charlotte feel bad for him to get her to come along with him to America.
Charlotte goes to America with Montraville because she pities him and thinks that she is in love with him. Her parents advised her not to go with him, but she chose Montraville over her parents. Mr. Temple (her father) was very worried about her because she did not come home from school. Mr. Temple was worried that his daughter may be very sick or even dead. He is appalled to find out that his daughter has acted this way and run off with Montraville to America. Mr. and Mrs. Temple hoped that she got married and that Charlotte and her husband would come back and ask for forgiveness (Rowson
55). Charlotte’s mentality is reinforced by the social rules of her time in the 1700’s. When a marriage was appropriate before sexual relations. She is distracted by her passion for an elopement with Montraville to the degree that she is no longer able to think wisely. She continued to believe he would marry her. In America, Charlotte does not take the responsibility of learning to support herself. On many occasions Charlotte “threw herself entirely on the protection of Montraville” (Rowson 43). In America Montraville’s best friend Balcour wants to ruin their relationship by accusing Charlotte of infidelity, so he can have her as his own mistress. Montraville kicks out Charlotte and gets her a place with a female tenant ten miles away from New York. He still comes and makes love with her but doesn’t return for days, sometimes even breaking a promise. He meets a rich girl named Julia and falls in love with her. He goes to visit Charlotte to tell her that he is in love with Julia but does not want to hurt her; therefore, he stays overnight with her and leaves early in the morning before she wakes up leaving a note stating that he wants to be just friends with her (Rowson 79). When Charlotte becomes pregnant with Montraville’s baby, Balcour tries to use her to his own advantage. Balcour has trouble committing to relationships and is easily tempted by a woman. Montraville gives Balcour money to support Charlotte and the baby but Blacour never gives the money to her. He soon cuts all counteracts with Charlotte and she becomes very ill. La Rue marries and does not give Charlotte a place to stay. Charlotte writes her parents a letter asking for forgiveness, and her parents later decide to receive Charlotte back. She gives birth to a baby girl whom she does not name or care about because she is a baby out of wedlock. Her father names the child Lucy and takes care of her. When Charlotte dies, Montraville starts feeling very guilty and sad and tries to kill Balcour because he was supposed to take care of her. La Rue also starts feeling shameful and guilty and asks Mr. Temple for forgiveness for leading their daughter astray and not helping her when asked. She loses her husband, lives in poverty and is later admitted to the hospital where she dies. Charlotte was ultimately responsible for her own demise because she made dishonorable choices by not stopping herself from reading his letters and continuously meeting him. She became intimate with him out of wedlock and eloped to America with him without thinking of the consequences. She had the choices of doing the right things, but she let her feelings make the decisions for her. Charlotte is easily persuaded in this book and does not take full responsibility for her actions. The moral of the story is that parents always want the best for their child. Charlotte broke ties with her parents for Montraville’s sake and disobeyed them. She makes the mistake of having premarital sex with a man she barely knows, going to America with him, getting pregnant with his child and then she dies. Her wrongful decisions lead to her downfall. She learns the cruelty of this world and pays for her mistakes she made in life. Life is not a fairy tale, and every little decision can have a huge impact in one’s life when one is young and naive.
At the beginning of the show Charlotte does not like Catherine. Catherine even confronts her about it on page 22 when the girls are making plans to go out and get ice cream. Charlotte makes excuses so she can avoid going out. However, Catherine tells her, “You don't have plans. You just don't want to go out with me.” Catherine is determined to win her co-worker over. “You're gonna like me yet, Charlotte Purcell,” she remarks. By the end of the show, many years later in the play time, Charlotte has changed her mind. “Catherine Donohue….You're my hero.” she says on page
She takes a job in a white lady named Ms. Cullinan’s home as a maid, who calls her Mary for her own convenience and lack of respect. This enrages Maya and in order to get away she smashes the finest china to get her fired. At her eighth-grade graduation, a white man comes to speak in front of everyone and he states that black students can only become athletes or servants which makes Maya furious. Later, when Maya develops a nasty toothache, Momma decides to take her to a white dentist who refuses to work on her. Momma claims that she lent him money during the Great Depression so he owes her a favor but he says he’d rather stick his hands in a dogs’ mouth. Lastly, one day while Bailey is walking home he sees a dead black man rotting in a river and a white man present at the scene says he will put both the dead man and Bailey in his truck. This terrifies Bailey and Momma wants to get them out of Staples so she sends them to Vivian’s again in San Francisco. There they live with Vivian and her husband Daddy Clidell who is a nice man to Maya, and has a lot of money from his businesses. One summer Maya goes to live with her father Big Bailey and his girlfriend Dolores, who are poor and live in a trailer. Maya and Dolores do not get along and constantly fight, so Maya runs away and lives with a group of homeless teens
(p 75). With this quote, the reader can figuratively sit in the place of Charlotte and feel her teenage years with the little support from her “civilized [and] clean, [but] disciplined...mother”
After they enter the stage of adulthood, Kitty has been writing his brother many letter about her life lately but every time Larry seems to have different excuses, which makes her tired of waiting as she writes one letter, “ Can you come, Larry? It 's been a while.” (King 25). She particularly adds this remark at the end of the letter to remind his brother of her purpose of writing letter to him and her hope is slowly but surely destroyed. Throughout the story, Kitty exhibits drastic change but her brother only notices the change after she commits suicide. He describes, “I couldn 't believe that my sister and the beaten woman who signed 'Kitty ' in a circle at the bottom of her letters were really the same person.” (King 25). Larry has grown up but he forgets to catch up Kitty’s growth and he still remains at the point, where her “sister was a girl with pigtails, still without breasts.” “Pigtails” here can represent naivety and in opposite, “breast” is always associated with maturity. Larry is blinded in front of Kitty’s growth and simply ignores her need, which subsequently leads to her loss in hope. Now she loses trust in both her husband and her brother, who only turn her trusts into despair. “She was the one who stopped writing” (King 26), as Larry later realizes. Kitty finally decides to lay her pen to rest so there is no more disappointment, but the only thing left for her is desperation and endless suffering. She struggles to find a reason to go on living and tries to battle with herself about committing suicide, but her brother has not yet shown up. In the last letter, Kitty writes, “I 've been thinking about it a lot lately... and what I 've decided is that it would have been better for me if the last rung had broken before you could put the hay down.” (King 26) Kitty regrets that Larry saves her and she knows the hay will not be there anymore because there is
In contrast to Lucy Temple, Charlotte’s mother, La Rue was cunning, selfish, and manipulative. As Charlotte spent time with La Rue going to meet Montraville and Belcour, she constantly questions whether she should be accompanying her friend or not. Initially, she will conclude that it is a bad idea, but eventually comes along anyway. Sometimes, La Rue played a hand in persuading Charlotte to come, but others Charlotte would plan that the visit would be her last, but continue anyway. A turning point in the beginning of the novel occurs when La Rue convinces Charlotte to read Montraville’s letter. At first, Charlotte is hesitant, stating that her mother told her to let her read through letters from men before reading it herself. La Rue quickly dismisses this by exaggerating the absurdity of Charlotte’s notion. Once she read the letter, “Charlotte had taken one step in the ways of imprudence; and when that is once done, there are always innumerable obstacles to prevent the erring person returning to the path of rectitude” (Rowson 29). In making this decision, Charlotte already knew that she should not read the letter. This event serves as the beginning to Charlotte’s
survive an awful life in slavery, Charlotte Temple was naïve and was betrayed by Montraville,
New Wark or New York A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens is a story of great sacrifices being made for the sake of principle. There are many examples of this throughout the book made by many of the characters, but some more evident than others. In Book The First, entitled “Recalled to Life,” the most obvious sacrifice for the sake of principle was made by Dr. Manette. He was imprisoned for eighteen years in the Bastille, for no apparent reason.
Every time the family comes to a confrontation someone retreats to the past and reflects on life as it was back then, not dealing with life as it is for them today. Tom, assuming the macho role of the man of the house, babies and shelters Laura from the outside world. His mother reminds him that he is to feel a responsibility for his sister. He carries this burden throughout the play. His mother knows if it were not for his sisters needs he would have been long gone. Laura must pickup on some of this, she is so sensitive she must sense Toms feeling of being trapped. Tom dreams of going away to learn of the world, Laura is aware of this and she is frightened of what may become of them if he were to leave.
Catherine is very pleased to meet Isabella after being disappointed in not seeing Mr Tilney again. The narrator informs the reader that Catherine is fortunate in finding a friend as ‘Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.’ (p.18 NA). Isabella being the elder of the two has much more knowledge of fashionable society than Catherine and is, therefore, able to teach her a great deal about the expectations of society at that time.
Louisa is a loyal and faithful woman. She waited for Joe Dagget for fourteen years without any complaints or questions. Louisa learned how to be optimistic out of the difficult times. When her mother and brother passed away, she continues to live her life by herself. She quickly moves on and she is thankful for her final choice. “She gazed ahead through a long reach of future days strung together like pearls in a rosary, every one like the others and all smooth and flawless and innocent, and her heart went up in thankfulness”
This feeling intensifies when Mr. Brocklehurst arrives to take Jane away to Lowood School. Her aunt is pleased to see her go, but manages to influence Jane's life even after Jane is settled in at the charity school, by informing Mr.
The Gift of a Lifetime: Sacrifice in a Tale of Two Cities. Some men are engraved eternally in the hearts and minds of those he inspired. It is done so in a fashion that allows his name to live eternally, long after his ephemeral existence. However, what truly sets a man apart from his lesser counterparts is his willingness to give without taking.
While at Lowood, a state - run orphanage and educational facility, Jane’s first friend, Helen Burns, teaches her the importance of friendship along with other skills that will help Jane grow and emotionally mature in the future. She serves as a role model for Jane. Helen’s intelligence, commitment to her studies, and social graces all lead Jane to discover desirable attributes in Helen. Helen is treated quite poorly, however, “her ability to remain graceful and calm even in the face of (what Jane believes to be) unwarranted punishment makes the greatest impression on the younger girl” (Dunnington). Brontë uses this character as a way to exemplify the type of love that Jane deserves. This relationship allows Jane to understand the importance of having a true friend. Given Jane’s history at Gateshead, finding someone like Helen is monumental in her development as a person. Helen gives through honest friendship, a love that is
Since the beginning of her life, Louisa isn't allowed to express herself because her father continually stresses the facts. Mr. Gradgrind suppresses Louisa's imagination and all she can do is wonder. One example of Louisa attempting to view the unknown occurs when she and Tom peep through a loophole in order to see a circus (8). This is the first time both Louisa and Tom have seen such a sight. When asked why they were there, Louisa curiously answers, "Wanted to see what it was like" (8), a response any normal child would have. Her "starved imagination" (8) is curious and needs some sort of avenue for release. As Louisa blossoms into a young lady, the young Miss Gradgrind enchants one particular suitor. Her father thought that it was time for Louisa to marry and had a suitable companion in mind. When Mr. Gradgrind asks Louisa if she would like to be Mrs. Bounderby, all Louisa can utter is, "You have been so careful of me, that I never had a child's dream. You have dealt so wisely with me, father, from my cradle to this hour, that I never had a child's belief or a child's fear" (63). Mr. Gradgrind interprets his daughter's words as a compliment to him and his strict belief in teaching only the facts. But Louisa means she has not experienced life and has never been given the chance. Her childhood has been murdered by her father's strict insistence on the perpetuation of facts only. Although Louisa realizes she has been enslaved by the theories of fact, she willingly enters yet another bondage to Mr. Bounderby allowing the process of her suppression to continue.
On the train to Chicago, Carrie had met a traveling salesman, Charlie H. Drouet. She is impressed by the way he talks and dresses. When they meet again, Drouet is aware of her beauty and innocence and he hopes to charm and seduce her. He "lends" Carrie money to buy nice winter clothes, treats her to fine meals, takes her to the theater, and shows her the sights of Chicago. Because Carrie is young and inexperienced in the world of men, she is not wise enough to understand where all Drouet's attention is leading toward. Although she senses that the money should be given back, her desire and longing for the good things in life are so powerful that she ignores her beliefs in what is right and wrong.