The Theme Of Quilt In Everyday Use By Alice Walker

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In the short story, “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, is written in manner to inspire the reader to show them how deep some family traditions can go. Walker, in her writings, tend to talk about issues that she had experienced in her life, and being an African American, she has learned the value of certain things in her life that her parents and grandparents had taught her. The quilt is so important to Dee because it is something that tells a story of the previous generation; the quilt actually consists of pieces of material that the family once used. The issue of the quilt also sets the mood for the story. It helps the reader to understand the deep rooted power simple things can have when it comes to family relations. All this helps explains …show more content…

She writes in a manner that speaks to where she grew up. The environment was not one of immense wealth, but the knowledge and the love she gathered in this environment is far greater than any monetary amount. As in the story that makes reference about the quilt, Walker tells her stories in a manner that are bided together. “Among some critics there is a tendency, which finds encouragement in Walker’s writing itself, to claim a strong analogy between quilting and storytelling, which allows one in turn to see Walker’s storytelling as metaphorically subsumable to quilting which in this scenario precedes her story”(Whitsitt 445). Walker expresses a different way for the reader to understand her work, because she “quilts” the story in a manner where all things flow together. The quilt is also an important aspect because it keeps the family warm, and offers a feeling of comfort. This is something that can be seen with the struggles African Americans faced during the period Walker wrote this …show more content…

Walker goes a step further, however, by using hooking cows and hangdog looks to reinforce the major themes of her story”(Christian 185). Walker is a writer who can not only touch African Americans with her writing, but also those who have never knew what it meant to live and grow up in those type of conditions. Walker in her writing showed what be enslaved meant; she wrote from the angle of trying to entail the love overpowered whatever position they were in. Alice Walker is vital to the ideas of literary traditions because she is a writer who speaks about how she feels. She writes from what she knows, not what she has learned. Walker, in her stories expressed the problems that may have kept a group in people from achieving what they wanted in life, but still managed to show that these people still had joy in their lives. Her works should continue to be incorporated into Literature on the college level in order to maintain for those who do not understand the plot of African Americans the struggle they faced. She is a powerful force in the Literature that can stand with the likes of Shakespeare because she presents her works in a manner to make the reader think about what life and what is really important. All three of these short stories support the main thought in this essay because Walker as a writer, wrote from what she knew; she grew up in a culture where African Americans seemed to be enslaved to their race which in turn, forced them

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