Scarlet Ibis Color Red Analysis

Hurst, the author of The Scarlet Ibis, uses the color red to symbolize a recurring theme throughout the story which is: Pride can aid, but if not controlled will cause harm. The color red is used throughout the story symbolically, to convey the author’s message. The color in itself has two sides to it; one being that it is a royal color, meaning pride, love, and power. The other is that red represents danger, blood, death, and destruction. Just like the color, pride also has two sides to it. Pride encouraged Brother, the narrator and protagonist of the story, to teach Doodle, his younger brother, to walk. However, pride then began to pull Brother into dangerous territory, and caused harm to Doodle. Pride, like the color red is filled with the yearning to see our loved ones do well. Just like the alternate side of the color red that brings destruction, pride’s alternate side

is that is makes people arrogant, and in this case caused Brother to arrogantly push Doodle to the brink of death.

One of the first few instances where the color red is portrayed negatively is when Doodle is just a small infant, and is trying to learn to sit up. Here, we see Doodle trying to be normal, trying to push himself beyond his limits, and turning red in color. This is seen in the quote, “Trembling, he’d push himself up, turning first red, the as soft purple, and finally collapse back onto the bed like a worn out doll” (Hurst 464). This scene uses the color red to symbolize that it takes every last bit of Doodle’s energy to accomplish everyday tasks. Him turning red, signals danger and possible early childhood death, because of Doodle pushing himself. This scene, however, is trivial in comparison to the ones later in the story. Once Brother believes that his not fully

developed sibling could be “taught” to be “normal”, his pride becomes his enemy when he gets ahead of himself. The first thing Brother decides to teach Doodle is to walk. When he accomplishes that, his pride swells up, his ego enlarges, his confidence is boosted, and his arrogance is born. He begins to be even harder on Doodle as expressed in the text, “Wherever we went, I purposely walked fast, and although he kept up, his face turned red and his eyes became glazed” (Hurst 471). We are again shown the fact that Doodle is pushing his limits, that he is turning red. This time, however, Brother is the one who is pushing Doodle, because of the pride that has consumed him by this point. Brother is cruel, and destructive towards his younger sibling; Brother believes that he can make Doodle be a normal brother, just like he always wanted. This is not achieved, when at the end of the story both brothers come to terms with the fact that Doodle can never be normal, and he accepts it, but Brother does not.
In the very end of the story, the color red is used to symbolize death, when Brother finds Doodle in the swamp they used to play in, dead. Doodle is covered in blood, he is red, and he can’t change the fact that he is. In very last page of the story, the text states, “I began to weep, and the tear-blurred vision in red before me looked very familiar” (Hurst 475). This is symbolizing the death of a loved one that pride has cause. Pride engulfed Brother in it’s ostentatious red color, and then caused the death of Doodle. The author compares Doodle’s dead body to that of a Scarlet Ibis, which is infact red. This symbolizes the similarities between the bird and Doodle, who were both red when they died. The color red, much like pride, brought destruction and a bloody death to Doodle, because his brother could not control his arrogance.