In The Life You Save May Be Your Own the characters apply to the title. This story is very interesting. It has a lot of emotion and foretelling what might happen in the rest of the story. The characters play a big role in why they named the story what they did. They knew how to put into words the meaning of the story by using the characters. Mrs. Crater was one of the main characters that stuck out to me because she was so influential to the rest of the movie. She was the one that made most of the decisions on what happened. Her daughter was the one that was stuck in the middle of it all. She didn’t do anything and yet she was put in the middle part that everyone was ruining. Mr. Shiftlet is obviously the part in the story that is the most …show more content…
controversial. He makes it controversial because Mrs. Crater paid Mr. Shiftlet to marry her daughter. He made this title mean something. This title is on the sign that Mr. Shiftlet drives by after leaving Mrs. Crater’s daughter. This means a lot for all the parts, though, not just this one. In The Life You Save May Be Your Own there are many connections to the title because of the characters, some of them are Lucynell Crater, Mr.Shiftlet, and Mrs. Crater. One of the main characters in The Life You Save May Be Your Own is Lucynell Crater.
Lucynell Crater is the daughter of Mrs. Lucynell Crater. She is a mentally challenged girl who everyone is making decisions for. The title of the story applies to Lucynell because she is the center of everything. She may not understand what is happening, but many people say that that is a good thing because she would be miserable to see how bad they are actually treating her. She is saving her own life because when Mr. Shiftlet leaves her, it is a good thing because he was only going to marry her for the money. There was no emotions left in it and now she can have a better life because of it. This title means a lot in her life because, like driving, life is a roller coaster and everyone needs to save their own lives in the long run. Everyone is selfish one time or another. Lucynell may not know what is going on, but she does understand that Mr. Shiftlet is marrying her and what that means. She doesn’t know that her mom sold her to him, so that she could get rid of taking care of her. This title is also influential in her life because she is benefiting from Mr. Shiftlet leaving which means that she is saving her own life without even knowing …show more content…
it. Mr. Shiftlet was the character that drove past the sign that said The Life You Save May Be Your Own, so he is one of the most influential characters towards the title. This man is a shady character that is paid by Mrs. Crater to marry her daughter. He has to work for her for awhile and then marry Lucynell Crater. Since he is the one that drove past the sign, many people say he or she has to address that. they say that it was not coincidental that he was the one that saw the sign. He may be saving his life by not marrying her and leaving her by herself. By doing this he is vowing not to take care of her for the rest of his life. This is one of the main reasons why her mom gave her away. She had taken care of her for so long she needed a break and so she gave her to the first man she met. This is one of the main reasons why the title is essential to this character. He wasn’t in love with Lucynell, so he decided to save his own life and he felt like taking care of her was not accomplishing what he wanted. He wanted to go back to his own life, with the money that her mom gave him. He didn’t care about what Lucynell was going to go through, he was not worried about what people may think of him for leaving her. He was truly saving his life. The Life You Save May Be Your Own is a great story and Mrs.
Crater is very connected to the title. She is another one of thos influential characters. At the beginning of the story, she is shown as a character that is controlling and a little overprotective of her daughter. Later in the story she sells her daughter away to Mr. Shifter. This is when the title starts to make a meaning towards her. She is giving her whole life away to Mr. Shifter because she thinks that she is saving her life by giving it away. At first she said that her daughter was basically a prodigy at everything, even though she is mentally challenged. She goes from telling everybody that meets her daughter that she is a prodigy, to giving her daughter away to a stranger. She believes that she is saving the rest of her life by doing this. She wants her daughter to be happy and to be married and move on with her life. Her life is saved by marrying her daughter off. By doing this she believes that this is how she is saving it. Mr. Shifter is a shady man, but Mrs. Crater believes that this man is going to be the best for her because she feels that this was the best way to save her life. The title could not have been understood more perfectly by using this character. She shows her true colors when she tries to marry her daughter off to a stranger. She knows that this might not be the best idea for her daughter, but she believes it will make her more apt to save
herself. In The Life You Save May Be Your Own there are many influential characters that apply to the title they are Lucynell Crater, Mrs. Crater, and Mr. Shifter. These characters are influential to the title, in the sense that they all know how they are going to save themselves or have been saved by themselves. This is because they have been driving safe all along, so finally they get to be saved by themselves. This is how this title works, they understand that although they may not be doing the best for others that can save them, they are saving themselves and that is all that matters. Throughout their lives they have been saving others lives, but now they feel it is time to save their own. Mrs. Crater chooses this moment because she believes it is the perfect moment to give her daughter away for good. She feels that if she pays a man to do this then she will be blessed and saved for the rest of her life. This is why she does what she does. She knows this is going to save her from having a responsibility on her shoulders, till she dies. Instead the responsibility is on her husband. The only downside to this is the question that since Mr. Shifter left her is Mrs. Crater still going to be saved from taking care of her for the rest of her life? This question is valid because when Mr. Shifter leaves her she doesn’t have anywhere to go, even though it doesn’t show this part in the story. She has no where to go so she is probably going to have to go back to Mrs. Crater’s house again. In result of this Mrs. Crater won’t be saved anymore, unless she finds somebody else for her daughter to marry. This, and many other reasons, is why the title is so important to the characters and applies fully to their roles in this story.
1. (T, P) You could see that the luxurious daydreams that fill her day at the beginning of the story show how ungrateful she is of what she has. She clearly does not value what she has based on the amount of time she takes to fanaticize about the amount of things, she wish she had. The price for greediness, pretention, and pride is steep, reluctance to admit the truth of her status. Maupassant purpose of writing this story is that, people
Flannery O’ Connor was educated at the Georgia State Women’s College, and she also attended Iowa State. O’Connor wrote her first piece of literature when she was twenty-seven years old, and she expresses her personal convictions and views in her writings. O’Connor often has characters in her literature that are disabled in some way, and most of the time, she portrays sympathy for these characters. O’Connor died from an uncommon disease called lupus, and she lived with this disease most of her life (“Flannery” 1050). “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” is a story about a traveler, Mr. Shiftlet, who marries a mentally challenged girl to get an automobile and money from the mother of the girl. In the end, Mr. Shiftlet ends up abandoning the girl. In “The Life You Save May Be Your Own,” O’Connor uses duality to show that people and things can have two sides.
The protagonist of the story is Ellen. Ellen is thirty-two years old, with limp blond hair and a plain face and whose eyes oozed sympathy. She is also a fifth-grade teacher who has recently left her job after having experienced the embarrassment of a public fight with her partner Roy in front of her colleagues. From the beginning of the story she is frightened, anxious, with head down and shoulders slumped, indicating she has a lot of pain and suffering kept inside her. Doctors have described her as anemic and depressive and she knows that that life she has led so far has contributed for that diagnosis. The protagonist is a dynamic character because although she starts as a person who keeps all her emotions to herself, in the end, she explodes and releases her frustration on Mr. Lercher, the passenger who tried to kill everyone on the airplane. Her change in attitude can be observed when the narrator describes, “ All she knew was that she’d had enough, enough of Roy and this big, drunken testosterone-addled bully and the miserable, crimpled life that awaited her at her mother’s, and she came up out of her seat as if she’d been launched…”
Throughout the novel, crucial family members and friends of the girl that died are meticulously reshaped by her absence. Lindsey, the sister, outgrows her timidity and develops a brave, fearless demeanor, while at the same time she glows with independence. Abigail, the mother, frees herself from the barbed wire that protected her loved ones yet caused her great pain, as well as learns that withdrawing oneself from their role in society may be the most favorable choice. Ruth, the remote friend from school, determines her career that will last a lifetime. and escapes from the dark place that she was drowning in before. Thus, next time one is overcome with grief, they must remember that constructive change is guaranteed to
When Mrs Hale and Mrs. Peters first walk into Minnie Wrights house, they see how lonely and unkept her house was. The men could not understand why a woman would keep her house in that condition, but the women determine how sad and depressed Mrs. Wright was. "'I might 'a' known she needed help! I tell you, it's queer, Mrs. Peters. We live close together, and we live far apart. We all go through the same things—it's all just a different kind of the same thing! If it weren't—why do you and I underst...
Flannery O 'Connor wrote The Life You Save May Be Your Own in 1955. She had a terminal illness and focused many of her stories on the truths of reality. Within this story, she describes an innocent girl, Lucynell, and the dishonest people around her. She keeps Lucynell a constant innocence throughout the story as the other characters lose their purity. The main thing separating Lucynell from the other characters is her lack of sensibility and general awareness of reality. Flannery O’Connor reveals innocence is only for the unaware using color imagery, situational irony, and allusion.
Louise, the unfortunate spouse of Brently Mallard dies of a supposed “heart disease.” Upon the doctor’s diagnosis, it is the death of a “joy that kills.” This is a paradox of happiness resulting into a dreadful ending. Nevertheless, in reality it is actually the other way around. Of which, is the irony of Louise dying due to her suffering from a massive amount of depression knowing her husband is not dead, but alive. This is the prime example to show how women are unfairly treated. If it is logical enough for a wife to be this jovial about her husband’s mournful state of life then she must be in a marriage of never-ending nightmares. This shows how terribly the wife is being exploited due her gender in the relationship. As a result of a female being treated or perceived in such a manner, she will often times lose herself like the “girl
How the Characters in “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” Change Their Own Fates
Nostalgic finales just seem too good to be real with the quaint happy endings that typically conclude fairy tales; not with Flannery O'Connor's writings, which depict sarcasm with disquieting twists and mordant characters. One of O'Connor's most successful works, "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" epitomizes her writing style that is characteristically seen by many as grotesque and sardonic. This short story represents the antithesis of a fairy tale, ingeniously warping its vital elementsdamsel in distress (Lucynell, the daughter), the mother (Mrs. Lucynell Crates), and knight in shining armor (Mr. Shiftlet)to make its readers see the latent malevolence of all human beings. Utilizing a keen consideration on each fictional component in the story, O'Connor conveys her message effectively by contrasting hideousness against pulchritude. She makes effectual use of liars to demonstrate the truth. O'Connor's deep perspective is evident in the way she inflicts ruthless challenges to the characters in the story.
As Winfield 's wife, Amanda is worthy of love and respect. Amanda is a southern lady, when she was young, she had an attractive appearance and graceful in manner, and her families were also quite rich. These favorable conditions made her the admiration of many men. Still, her final choice was a poor boy. She did not hesitate and bravely to choose her own love. Though her marriage was not as good as she had imagined the happiness of life, and the husband, Winfield meager income also drinking heavily, finally abandoned Amanda and two young children, but she still remembered and loved her husband. Her husband 's weakness did not make Amanda fall down; instead, she was brave enough to support the family, raising and educating of their two young children. Daughter Laura was a disability to close her fantasy world, and she was collection of a pile of glass small animals as partners. Amanda knew Laura sensitive, fragile, she was always in the care and encourages her daughter. Because of her shortcomings, Laura sometimes frustrated and Amanda immediately replied that "I 've told you never, never to use that word. Why, you 're not crippled, you just have a little defect". Amanda for the care of the children was more reflected a mother 's strong from the play that Amanda paid money to send Laura to typing school. She hoped daughter have a better future and married a good man to take care of the family, and encouraged her daughter, prompting her to go out of the glass menagerie to experience her real life, but Amanda placed more expectations for his son Tom because her husband left home, Tom is the only man and the mainstay of the family. She wanted Tom to realize that is a kind of family responsibility, also is a kind of essential social
It is about a young married woman, Louise Mallard, who has a heart condition and a shock can kill her immediately. Her sister, Josephine, was careful not to upset Louise when her husband, Brently Mallard, died in a train accident. Louise cried and went to her room. However, Louise felt happy, even though the situation was tragic. In addition, she realized that she gained freedom from a depressing marriage and from her dominating husband.
Her realization that she is not alone in her oppression brings her a sense of freedom. It validates her emerging thoughts of wanting to rise up and shine a light on injustice. Her worries about not wanting to grow up because of the harsh life that awaits her is a common thought among others besides the people in her community. As she makes friends with other Indians in other communities she realizes the common bonds they share, even down to the most basic such as what they eat, which comforts her and allows her to empathize with them.
Amanda a loving and caring mother devoted her life for her childern .she is abondaned by her husband,the only one she loved deeply.She struggles to secure her children`s lives and when she is overwhelmed by despair she resorts to her memories.
“The story employs a dramatic point of view that emphasizes the fragility of human relationships. It shows understanding and agreemen...
Amanda, somehow, finds a way to be both selfish and selfless when it comes to Laura. Amanda wants Laura to be happy and successful, but does not understand that Laura is too shy and unmotivated to be either. When Amanda discovers that Laura has stopped going to typing class she is beyond disappointing. When discovered Amanda yells at her daughter saying, “Fifty dollars’ tuition, all our plans- my hopes and ambitions for you- just gone up the spout, just gone up the spout like that.” Laura quit something as simple as learning how to type; this realization struck Amanda because if she cannot do that there is no way Laura could provide for herself without a husband. Mrs. Wingfield’s worst nightmare is is for her children to become dependent on relatives and not being able to take care of themselves. After Laura drops out of typing school Amanda says, “What is there left but dependency all our lives? I know so well what becomes of unmarried women who aren’t prepared to occupy a position. I’ve seen such pitiful cases in the South—barely tolerated spinsters living upon the grudging patronage of sister’s husband or brother’s wife!—stuck away in some little mousetrap of a room—encouraged by one in-law to visit another—little birdlike women without any nest—eating the crust of humility all their life!. Amanda had always wanted for Laura to find a nice husband, but then the situation became desperate when the younger women