The Glass Castle Quotes

The Glass Castle is a novel that follows the life of a dysfunctional family from the perspective of Jeannette Walls, the third child of the Walls family. Throughout the stories, the readers see all the hardships the children face, as their lunatic parents do what they think is right. After reading the book, it seems to agree the quote “Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands” by Anne Frank. Through her adventures of boiling hotdogs and performing the “skedaddle,” it is constantly seen that the children in the Walls family is given a lot of freedom. After burning herself at the age of three, and being in the hospital, a young Jeannette states “Mom says I’m mature for my age,’ I told them. ‘and she lets me cook for myself a lot” (6). Children making themselves food is normal, as around the age of say five, a child could make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich safely. But no child at the age of the three should be messing with a stove, which helps to show a lot of the irresponsibility of the parents. This is important, as the parents are constantly showing two traits the whole story. The first is that they are irresponsible,

Jeannette and Brian find a ring nearby their house in Welch, causing this conversation, “But Mom’…’that ring could get us a lot of food’…’That’s true,’ Mom said, ‘but it could also improve my selfesteem. And at times like these, selfesteem is even more vital than food” (118). Even though the mother could buy her children food, clothes, or pay off the house, she chooses herself over the children. It happens again in the end of the novel, where readers find she might have had a million dollars in land, but chose not to sell it because the land was in the family. The dad also shows this trait, as he breaks OZ the piggy bank, stealing all the money the kids earned so that Lori could get to New