A household is a precious and sensitive system of a group. Everyone has a role and responsibilities and even if someone took a sliver of more than the rest the balance could be broken. In the short-story “The Boat” written by Alistair MacLeod, the mother controls decisions in the house and abuses them even if they are not for the better of the house. She refuses to accept the daughter’s gifts, she discourages her family towards getting a better education and she married their father and pressured him to be a sailor. Though these decisions are what she feels is right, it does not work out for the rest of the family members. The mother’s stubbornness towards change and education caused the state of desperation in the house-hold. The mother gave birth to six daughters. The daughters all got jobs at a seafood restaurant ran by a man from Boston. All of the sisters “made good money on tips” (MacLeod 268) but even though they made a respectable income the mother “was angry [her daughters] should even conceive of working in such a place” (MacLeod 267). The mother does not judge the restaurant on their food or the service but simply that he is an outsider. She didn’t accept their daughter’s gifts because they get their money from that restaurant. If the mother were to accept financial help from the daughters they would have a better lifestyle. The six daughters of the mother later became wives to six young men in big cities such as New York or Montreal. There they are wealthy and “drove expensive cars” (MacLeod271), yet the mother “never accepted the young men” (MacLeod 271) because “They were not of her sea” (MacLeod271). The daughters becoming so wealthy could have been a blessing for the family. They could have had help from the d... ... middle of paper ... ...e disapproved of every job but fishing the father would not have died and he would have gotten an education. The mother is a selfish and stubborn woman. Raised a certain way and never falters from it. She neglects help, oppresses education and persuades people to be what she wants or she will cut them out of her life completely. Her own morals out-weight every other family member’s wants and choices. Her influence and discipline brought every member of the family’s future to serious-danger to care to her wants. She is everything a good mother isn’t and is blind with her own morals. Her stubbornness towards change and education caused the families state of desperation. The realization shown through the story is the family would be better off without a mother to anchor them down. Works Cited MacLoed, Allistair, “The Boat”. Canada: Oxford University Press, 2001
The excerpt I chose to read for this assignment was Chapter 1 from Jeanette Walls’ “The Glass Castle: A Memoir” titled “A Woman on the Street” This chapter of the novel depicts the main character and her mother’s relationship. The mother has decided to live her life in poverty for reasons yet to be explained to the reader. It is said that this is how she wishes to live. Her daughter, the main character, is ashamed by her mother and the way she is living and intends to try to help better her life, however her mom insists that she isn't the one who needs help. This readings goal is to establish the core relationship of the novel, and set up the beginning of how the story may begin to change.
I was told from a young age the easiest way to get in touch with your cultural heritage is through food. Many good memories and cultural traditions are passed down via food. Food is a way of connecting people to each other, bringing up good memories from the past. Food has a way of healing old wounds and making people happier. You have a sense of pride knowing you are connected to your culture through the use of food. However there are times when you question your cultural food choices, particularly if you haven’t grown up on certain dishes.
The story describes the protagonist who is coming of age as torn between the two worlds which he loves equally, represented by his mother and his father. He is now mature and is reflecting on his life and the difficulty of his childhood as a fisherman. Despite becoming a university professor and achieving his father’s dream, he feels lonely and regretful since, “No one waits at the base of the stairs and no boat rides restlessly in the waters of the pier” (MacLeod 261). Like his father, the narrator thinks about what his life could have been like if he had chosen another path. Now, with the wisdom and experience that comes from aging and the passing of time, he is trying to make sense of his own life and accept that he could not please everyone. The turmoil in his mind makes the narrator say, “I wished that the two things I loved so dearly did not exclude each other in a manner that was so blunt and too clear” (MacLeod 273). Once a decision is made, it is sometimes better to leave the past and focus on the present and future. The memories of the narrator’s family, the boat and the rural community in which he spent the beginning of his life made the narrator the person who he is today, but it is just a part of him, and should not consume his present.
The Sky Fisherman by Craig Lesley is a story about a boy learning about life’s way of balancing out. Culver and his mother, Flora, moved to the small town of Gateway, for a fresh start from their troubling past. Culver will witness the effects of guilt and repayment of debt on his Uncle as he tries to balance out the community of Gateway. Guilt and debt encourage people to make unwise decisions in favor of those who they are repaying. Their goal is to make things even and fair. Life balances out.
Mama, as a member of an older generation, represents the suffering that has always been a part of this world. She spent her life coexisting with the struggle in some approximation to harmony. Mama knew the futility of trying to escape the pain inherent in living, she knew about "the darkness outside," but she challenged herself to survive proudly despite it all (419). Mama took on the pain in her family in order to strengthen herself as a support for those who could not cope with their own grief. Allowing her husband to cry for his dead brother gave her a strength and purpose that would have been hard to attain outside her family sphere. She was a poor black woman in Harlem, yet she was able to give her husband permission for weakness, a gift that he feared to ask for in others. She gave him the right to a secret, personal bitterness toward the white man that he could not show to anyone else. She allowed him to survive. She marveled at his strength, and acknowledged her part in it, "But if he hadn't had...
The mother plays a very important part in this story. The mother from the beginning of the story is dealt with a difficult decision of how to feed her 2 boys after her husband leaves her. Since the husband worked, he brought food into the house, but when he left, there was no one who worked. The mother had to get a job, which made her tired. When the mother came home from work tired, she would send the boy to the store. When the mother found out that the neighborhood boys were beating up her son, she repeatedly sent him to the store, so he faces the boys and learns to stand up for himself.
...pport that they require. These events force us to encounter a leap of maturity, in order for us to finally realize our mothers’ need for love. By experiencing these crises, we can see our parents not as helpful objects, but rather as human beings like ourselves.
In the story "The Open Boat," by Stephen Crane, Crane uses many literary techniques to convey the stories overall theme. The story is centered on four men: a cook, a correspondent, Billie, an oiler who is the only character named in the story, and a captain. They are stranded in a lifeboat in stormy seas just off the coast of Florida, just after their ship has sunk. Although they can eventually see the shore, the waves are so big that it is too dangerous to try to take the boat in to land. Instead, the men are forced to take the boat further out to sea, where the waves are not quite as big and dangerous. They spend the night in the lifeboat and take turns rowing and then resting. In the morning, the men are weak and exhausted. The captain decides that they must try to take the lifeboat as close to shore as possible and then be ready to swim when the surf inevitably turns the boat over and throws the men into the cold sea. As they get closer to land a big wave comes and all the men are thrown into the sea. The lifeboat turns over and the four men must swim into shore. There are rescuers waiting on shore who help the men out of the water. Strangely, as the cook, captain and correspondent reach the shore safely and are helped out of the water, they discover that, somehow, the oiler has drowned after being smashed in the surf by a huge wave. (255-270) “The Open Boat’s” main theme deals with a character’s seemingly insignificant life struggle against nature’s indifference. Crane expresses this theme through a suspenseful tone, creative point of view, and a mix of irony.
In her chapters on Garret Tallinger and Tyrec Taylor Lareau is careful to point out that both Garret’s father and Tyrec’s mother try their best to attend their sons’ sporting events. Both Garret’s parents and Tyrec’s mother live hectic lives but both are concerned with their children’s happiness. It was a great stress on Tyrec’s mother to attend and afford Tyrec’s football, but she sacrificed so that her son could be happy. Unlike the references to “broken homes” made by the Moynihan report, Lareau highlights many of the virtues that are apparent in the lifestyle of the Taylor house, despite their lack of a live-in father. In some cases, she points out ways in which the working class families have better sibling and extended family relationships than those in middle class families. While it may be said that a specific culture, or as Lareau would say habitus, has arisen within the Taylor household, this culture is not inextricably linked to poverty nor is it one that is trapping the Taylor children within their social class. Lareau’s observations are not specifically collected to fit an assumed “culture of poverty”. For example, she observed that working class children had a more developed awareness of their parent’s sacrifices. This awareness arguably would compel individuals to try to escape poverty, rather than being a component of the Moynihan Report’s culture of
The author illustrates the time in Dave’s life when everything was actually good because his mother wasn’t always as sick as she becomes. Dave writes, “Mom told me she was crying because she was so happy to have a real family,” (23) when talking about a Christmas before his two little brothers came along and things got bad. However, after the mother gets “sick” (as Dave says multiple times in the book) the persona he gives his mother is this horrible woman that almost kills her own son. She starves, beats, and tortures him everyday like it is her personal routine. The reader begins to feel that she is a horrid woman, that doesn’t deserve life herself, however, in a way some readers may feel bad for her. You begin to realize that maybe she does this because her marriage isn’t doing great, so she needs someone to blame for it, and since Dave was the only other one around when the marriage was good she goes after him. . Even though, the only reason her husband eventually leaves is because she’s so terrible to not only Dave but his dad as well. This being because Dave’s dad actually tried to help him against his mother, however, in a way he is also given the persona of a horrid person because he never actually does anything to get Dave out of the situation and gives him false hope by telling him one day they will get away from the hell together.
A single mother’s frustration, mami and her two son’s a Dominican family living in New York city try to cope with their mother being a single parent. Throughout the story the author uses many literary devices to capture how the characters feel in this rough time. Through the use of plot, theme, and tone readers can connect to the culture and feelings of the narrator.
Something to focus on in “A Sorrowful Woman” is the conflict between the mother and her son. For many people having a healthy child is one of the greatest blessings anyone can get. Even the woman recognizes this: “I am the luckiest woman,” she says while crying, which is ironic because she does not seem to feel so due to her weariness from doing things for her husband and
When people write, they always write with a purpose. We, the readers, may not be able to discern what this purpose is; however, most authors decide to either write a story, explain or inform, or persuade the reader of a particular position or opinion. Stephen Crane joined the writing world to tell stories with a lesson within them. His stories are unique in the respect that his works asserts we live in world of uncaring, natural forces. His story “The Open Boat” is rich in this style of writing. Every piece of this story is symbolic in some way, such as the boat, the waves, and the act of drowning.
What is it that intrigues you into wondering what is going through their lives: the slavery that is in their pasts, is it the poverty they have, the family that is helping them to move along, or is it the independence the they gave up or lost for their families? In both of the essays, the mothers are the inspiration and the hope. They keep the family from going too far into poverty. Motivation for improving their lives makes the family stick together and stay together longer.
In the reading of A Mother’s Tale, explains about her family issues. Right from the beginning, Bom Jesus De Mata had no or little education, but she wrote her story about her life. Furthermore, her mother, which is her title of the story, mentioned she had a poor mother, and she had to get help from her aunt. She said, “When I was about five years old, Mae [mother] took me away from Tia [aunt] and gave me to another woman, a woman who lived next to us on the plantation” (1). Her mother could not take care of her, so she had to take her in another place to another woman in the plantation. The other woman, Jacinta Vegas has a similar problem with having family issues. In the article, “It is difficult living here, but I have to used to it and my children, after all, were born