Overthinking - The Bane Of The Brain Personal Response - “The Painted Door” by Sinclair Ross Have you ever stressed out about something that turned out to be insignificant? Whether it be writing this English personal response, an interview with a future employer, or forgetting to bring your homework even though you've finished it? Most of us have experienced this stress, or source of unhappiness, caused by negative thoughts. I believe we all have bad imagination. We like to think about the worst possible situation and get used to it, which is why many of us worry and blame our sadness on others causing more unhappiness. In the story, “The Painted Door” by Sinclair Ross, the protagonist, Anne, is a very lonely individual that is very unhappy
In the short story, “The Painted Door”, John and Ann are a married couple, who have been together for seven years, and yet despite this fact, they still have trouble communicating. Ann wishes, from the very beginning of the story, that John would stay at home with her rather than go to check on his father. However, rather than expressing these sentiments exactly, she acts very cold towards him and insists that she’ll be perfectly fine, trying to guilt him into staying. Though it works, as John offers to stay with her rather than visiting his father’s farm, Ann decides to instead push away her feelings of spite and loneliness and allows him to leave, despite worrying about his safety and how she’s going to cope while John is gone. This is the
In “The Art Room,” by Shara McCallum, the author is telling a story about her childhood. McCallum and her sisters did not grow up with a lot of money so they had to make due with what they had. “Because we had not chalk or pastels, no toad, forest, or morning-grass slats of paper, we had no color for creatures. So we squatted and sprang, squatted and sprang.” They used their imagination and their bodies to create music and art. The tone of this poem is reminiscent and whimsical, the theme is about how even if you do not have a lot of money you can still have fun.
"The Painted Door" by Sinclair Ross centers on a woman who finds herself unhappy living on the farm far away from any companionship. The story takes place in the early part of the 20th century in a rather desolate farming area in Canada during the most bitter part of the winter. In fact, during the story, a terrible blizzard breaks which becomes a major part of the story.
The Glass Castle is a memoir of the writer Jeannette Walls life. Her family consists of her father Rex Walls, her mother Rose Mary Walls, her older sister Lori Walls, her younger brother Brian Walls and her younger sister Maureen Walls. Jeannette Walls grew up with a lot of hardships with her dad being an alcoholic and they never seemed to have any money. Throughout Jeanette’s childhood, there are three things that symbolize something to Jeannette, they are fire, New York City and the Glass Castle, which shows that symbolism gives meanings to writing.
Under the orders of her husband, the narrator is moved to a house far from society in the country, where she is locked into an upstairs room. This environment serves not as an inspiration for mental health, but as an element of repression. The locked door and barred windows serve to physically restrain her: “the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls.” The narrator is affected not only by the physical restraints but also by being exposed to the room’s yellow wallpaper which is dreadful and fosters only negative creativity. “It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide – plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.”
Mental illness and madness is a theme often explored in literature and the range of texts exploring these is tremendously varied. Various factors can threaten a character's sanity, ranging from traumatic events which trigger a decline to pressure from more vast, impersonal sources. Generally speaking, writers have tried to show that most threats to sanity comprise a combination of long-term and short-term factors - the burning of the library in Mervyn Peake's novel 'Titus Groan' precipitated Lord Sepulchrave's descent into madness, but a longer term problem can be discerned in the weight of tradition which caused him to worry 'that with him the line of Groan should perish'. Such interplay between the acute and the chronic is, it would seem, a matter of agreement between authors who explored this issue. The manner in which characters respond to these threats is not. In some works the threatened character succeeds in becoming empowered - they find a way to maintain themselves and emerge from the ordeal undefeated, if not unbowed. Esther Greenwood as portrayed in Sylvia Plath's autobiographical novel 'The Bell Jar' is one such character, although the question always remains whether such a victory is a permanent solution. In many other works the only option for the characters is escape. This may be an escape from reality as described in Roald Dahl's short story 'Georgy Porgy'. It may be an escape from self-awareness as shown in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's novella 'The Yellow Wallpaper'. The ultimate escape is self-destruction - Sepulchrave's death in 'Titus Groan' and Sylvia Plath's real-life suicide in 1963 (barely three weeks after 'The Bell Jar' was published) ca...
When books are very popular most of the time they are made into a movie. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is a book that depicts the struggle of poverty and addiction. A movie then was made based on the book. The movie did not follow the book completely, but, that was to be expected. The movie did an excellent job with the cast. No one could have played Rex better than Woody Harrelson. The director did a respectable job of casting people who would have looked like the author described them in the book. Overall the movie did a fantastic job of portraying the major events and showing the overall theme of the book. Watching the movie, you notice a few differences. For example, Lori has glasses on and in the book, she did not get glasses until
Jeannette Walls has lived a life that many of us probably never will, the life of a migrant. The majority of her developmental years were spent moving to new places, sometimes just picking up and skipping town overnight. Frugality was simply a way of life for the Walls. Their homes were not always in perfect condition but they continued with their lives. With a brazen alcoholic and chain-smoker of a father and a mother who is narcissistic and wishes her children were not born so that she could have been a successful artist, Jeannette did a better job of raising herself semi-autonomously than her parents did if they had tried. One thing that did not change through all that time was the love she had for her mother, father, brother and sisters. The message that I received from reading this memoir is that family has a strong bond that will stay strong in the face of adversity.
Ann and John, two characters from he short story "The Painted Door", do not have a very healthy relationship. John is a simple farmer who thinks the only way he can please his wife, Ann, is by working all day to earn money for her. However Ann would prefer him to spend more time with her. Their relationship is stressed even further when Ann is left at home alone with nothing to think about but their relationship because John has to go to his father’s house. The terrible snowstorm accentuates Ann’s feelings of loneliness and despair. John does not pay enough attention to Ann, and therefore creates a weak relationship.
It is commonly believed that the only way to overcome difficult situations is by taking initiative in making a positive change, although this is not always the case. The theme of the memoir the Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is that the changes made in children’s lives when living under desperate circumstances do not always yield positive results. In the book, Jeannette desperately tries to improve her life and her family’s life as a child, but she is unable to do so despite her best efforts. This theme is portrayed through three significant literary devices in the book: irony, symbolism and allusion.
I am not writing this to you looking for an explanation just acceptance and understanding. I wish for you not to immediately judge but to just read and have an open mind for what it is I am about to suggest.
Often in life things that are meant to help can hinder and positive intentions do not always bring about desired effects. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charolette Perkins Gilman illustrates such an occurrence. In the short story the narrator is locked away in a lonesome room in an attempt to free her from a nervous disorder. During this time period, the kind of treatments the narrator describes were common and considered beneficial. The narrators husband, John, is a physician and believes this and forces his wife into a treatment of solitude. Rather than healing her psychological disorder during this time, the treatment contributed to worsening her effects and sending her into a downward spiral of depression.
The idea of people playing pretend and using their imagination may sound silly, but it is in fact not. Imagination has the potential to be used as a utensil. It can used to create multiple universes with diverse outcomes and possibilities. These are what we call counterfactuals. These thoughts are the woulda-coulda-shouldas. “What if I did…?” “I wonder what my life would have been like if…” The list goes on and on. You can use counterfactual thinking to think ahead in the future to plan out your next actions, look into your past to see what you could have done differently or to even watch your present self. In this essay, I argue that imagination and counterfactual thinking can be used as a means to problem solving because counterfactual thinking
John Grisham’s book, ‘A Painted House’ places the reader within the walls of a simple home on the cotton fields of rural Arkansas. Within the first few pages, the author’s description of the setting quickly paints a picture of a hard working family and creates a shared concern with the reader about the family’s struggle to meet the basic needs of life. The description of the dusty roads, the unpainted board-sided house, the daily chore requirements and their lack of excess cause the reader a reaction of empathy for the family. Although the story takes place in a dusty setting very unfamiliar to most readers, the storyline is timeless and universal. Most everyone has a desire to meet the basic needs of life, embrace their family ties, and make others and ourselves proud. The crux of this book is that it does an excellent job in showing the reader through other’s examples and hardships to persevere and never give up.
The narration above simply provides a vivid explication on how fun school is for Layla. School turns to be a moment where she finds most of her happiness. It does not necessarily mean that she is not happy at home, however, after getting her period, home connotes horror rather than place where one can find peace except for her private room. School offers Layla the freedom of just being herself where she does not feel the confinement at home. It also suggests that she values and treasures education and that she is waiting for achieving higher education, the university life. As personal, Layla strongly opposes the perception that the future of a girl is marriage (82). She is completely aware and believes that education can aids people to understand things and decide what is best for them (77).