The Change of Generations
“I Stand Here Ironing” and “Everything That Rises Must Converge” are two different stories that were written at different times and by different authors, however, have much in common. Both stories tell about the problem of the relationship between children and their mothers. These are two stories that raise one of the most important social problems. Every reader can find a reflection of his or her relationship in these stories. That is why these stories are very popular among the people for many years.
The story of Tillie Olsen “I Stand Here Ironing” is about the history of the formation of the complex relationship between a mother and her daughter Emily. The story has the form of mother’s monologue, which reflects on the relationship with her daughter. For Emily, image of her mother will always be associated with the ironing. One day, Emily told her: “Aren’t you ever going to finish the ironing, Mother? Whistler painted his mother in a rocker. I’d have to paint mine standing over an ironing board” (Olsen, 1913). Ironing has become a symbol of this story as an indicator of a difficult life of all mothers with many children.
Emily was the eldest child in the family. When she was born, her mother was only nineteen years old. Of course, her mother had no experience in raising children and anyone around to teach her how to be a mother. Moreover, when Emily was a one year old, her father abandoned them. Therefore, Emily’s mother had to leave her with a neighbor so she could go to work and earn money for the daughter. Despite the fact that Emily was very small and did not realize all the things, it was the first turning point in the relationship of Emily and her mother.
Emily’s mother has made, as she thoug...
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...king about warm feelings of children to their mothers. In the “Everything That Rises Must Converge”, the author tells how much Julian is annoyed by the behavior and habits of his mother: “Everything that gave her pleasure was small and depressed him” (O’Connor, 1965). He believes that his mother lives in the past and sticks in her own narrow field of vision. Julian does everything possible to prove the falsity of his mother’s opinions and views. He is ready to marry a black woman in order to annoy his mother. However, his actions do not bring any result. Julian looks like a mischievous child who causes the resentment of his mother. Emily does not have such a rebellious nature as Julian. She is calm and unsociable person, without friends. She shows no warm feelings to any member of her family. She rarely communicates with her mother but does not reveal her feelings.
Emily was lying in bed when all of a sudden she heard a loud knock on her door in the middle of the night. She went to go see who it was and fortunately it was her good old friend Johnny Surrat whom she hadn't seen in a long time, Johnny had said he was away on business, well he came in and he talked to her and asked how her and her mom were surviving since their slave had been set free before President Lincolns death. He gave her twenty gold pieces and said he was on an important mission and that he didn't know when he would be back. Emily lived with her mother who was dying. And she took care of her mother till the day she died. When her mother died at first she was kind of relieved that it was all over yet she really missed her mom. Before her mother had died, her mother told her whatever she did not to go live with her uncle but her uncle somehow got legal custody of her. And she was sent to go live with him. Her uncle said that he was a doctor and he had many patients that would come to his house and he would help many people and she always wondered why her mom hated him so much he seemed like a good man.
Although, a mother’s determination in the short story “I Stand Here Ironing” mother face with an intense internal conflict involving her oldest daughter Emily. As a single mother struggle, narrator need to work long hours every day in order to support her family. Despite these criticisms, narrator leaves Emily frequently in daycare close to her neighbor, where Emily missing the lack of a family support and loves. According to the neighbor states, “You should smile at Emily more when you look at her” (Olsen 225). On the other hand, neighbor gives the reader a sense that the narrator didn’t show much affection toward Emily as a child. The narrator even comments, “I loved her. There were all the acts of love” (Olsen 225). At the same time, narrator expresses her feeling that she love her daughter. Until, she was not be able to give Emily as much care as she desire and that gives her a sense of guilt, because she ends up remarrying again. Meanwhile narrator having another child named Susan, and life gets more compli...
No matter what actions or words a mother chooses, to a child his or her mother is on the highest pedestal. A mother is very important to a child because of the nourishing and love the child receives from his or her mother but not every child experiences the mother’s love or even having a mother. Bragg’s mother was something out of the ordinary because of all that she did for her children growing up, but no one is perfect in this world. Bragg’s mother’s flaw was always taking back her drunken husband and thinking that he could have changed since the last time he...
The main Character in the short story “I Stand Here Ironing” by Alice Walker explains in the beginning of the story that she has 2 children and one is coming to visit her from school in Augusta. Mama had decided to send Dee off to school in Augusta after their house caught on fire and she was now coming home to visit Mama and her younger sister Maggie. Mama says “Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in the corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs, eying her sister with a mixture of envy and awe”(Walker 155). Maggie was in the house when it caught fire, her mother had to drag her out but Dee and been out first so her does not have
Having been the only daughter of a noble family, Emily was overprotected by her father who had driven away all the young men wanting to be close to her. As a result of that, when she got to be thirty, she was still alone. It was Mr. Grierson who alienated his daughter from the normal life of a young woman. If she weren?t born in the Grierson, if she didn?t have an upper-class father, she could have many relationships with many young men in order to find herself an ideal lover. Then she might have a happy marriage life with a nice husband and children.
The stories “I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen and “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, are different in many ways, but are also similar. “I Stand Here Ironing” and “Everyday Use” both focus on the relationships of the mother and daughter, and on the sibling’s relationships with each other. Emily from “I Stand Here Ironing” and Maggie from “Everyday Use” have different relationships with their mothers, but have similar relationships with their sisters. Although the stories are similar in that Emily and Maggie are both distant from their sisters, they differ in that the mother is distant from Emily in “I Stand Here Ironing,” while the mother is close to Maggie in “Everyday Use.”
As time went on pieces from Emily started to drift away and also the home that she confined herself to. The town grew a great deal of sympathy towards Emily, although she never hears it. She was slightly aware of the faint whispers that began when her presence was near. Gossip and whispers may have been the cause of her hideous behavior. The town couldn’t wait to pity Ms. Emily because of the way she looked down on people because she was born with a silver spoon in her mouth and she never thought she would be alone the way her father left her.
In the short story "I Stand Here Ironing" by Tillie Olsen, the reader is introduced to a mother living in the midst of the Great Depression dealing with angst and anxiety towards her daughter Emily. Because this story looks back during the Great Depression when Emily was born the mother's trauma is coming between the both of them. The mother wants her daughter to live a beautiful life, however, poverty, depression and dislocation has built a wall between the two women.
In the short story "I Stand Here Ironing" by Tillie Olsen the conflict between a mother whose giving is limited by hardships is directly related to her daughter's wrinkled adjustment. Ironing, she reflects upon when she was raising her first-born daughter, Emily. The mother contemplates the consequences of her actions. The mother's life had been interrupted by childbirth, desertion, poverty, numerous jobs, childcare, remarriage, frequent relocations, and five children. Her struggling economic situation gave way to little or no opportunity to properly care for and nurture her first-born child. In spite of the attention and love Emily craved and never received, she still survived, and even made strengths, and talents, out of the deprivations she had endured.
Emily’s isolation is evident because after the men that cared about her deserted her, either by death or simply leaving her, she hid from society and didn’t allow anyone to get close to her. Miss Emily is afraid to confront reality. She seems to live in a sort of fantasy world where death has no meaning. Emily refuses to accept or recognize the death of her father, and the fact that the world around her is changing.
The domineering attitude of Emily's father keeps her to himself, inside the house, and alone until his death. In his own way, Emily's father shows her how to love. Through a forced obligation to love only him, as he drives off young male callers, he teaches his daughter lessons of love. It is this dysfunctional love that resurfaces later, because it is the only way Emily knows how to love.
In “A Rose for Emily”, by William Faulkner, Emily Geierson is a woman that faces many difficulties throughout her lifetime. Emily Geierson was once a cheerful and bright lady who turned mysterious and dark through a serious of tragic events. The lost of the two men, whom she loved, left Emily devastated and in denial. Faulkner used these difficulties to define Emily’s fascinating character that is revealed throughout the short story. William Faulkner uses characterization in “A Rose for Emily”, to illustrate Miss Emily as a stubborn, overly attached, and introverted woman.
Emily was kept confined from all that surrounded her. Her father had given the town folks a large amount of money which caused Emily and her father to feel superior to others. “Grierson’s held themselves a little too high for what they really were” (Faulkner). Emily’s attitude had developed as a stuck-up and stubborn girl and her father was to blame for this attitude. Emily was a normal girl with aspirations of growing up and finding a mate that she could soon marry and start a family, but this was all impossible because of her father. The father believed that, “none of the younger man were quite good enough for Miss Emily,” because of this Miss Emily was alone. Emily was in her father’s shadow for a very long time. She lived her li...
Growing up Emily’s father, Mr. Gierson, made her stay in the house and not socialize with others. He taught her that he was only trying to protect her from the outside world. Mr.Gierson was a rude man who felt that things should go his way; therefore, his daughter hopelessly fell for him because she did not know any oth...
Without the inner monologues Julian ponders throughout the story, it would be difficult to claim he was ever in a wrong mindset or that he ever truly would wish harm upon his mother. However, since readers do have access to these realities, Julian’s character seems much more interesting to them, whether good or bad.