Waythorn, the main male figure, in Edith Warton’s, “The Other Two,” takes a journey of psychological development. At the beginning of the story, we find he has returned home early from his honeymoon because, his new wife’s daughter has taken ill. He describes himself as being “surprised at his thrill of boyish agitation,” (220) as he is waiting for his wife to join him for dinner. This is part of his initial conflict, his emotions are changing, highs and lows, something which at age thirty-five, “he fancied himself already in the temperate zone” (220). As the story develops so does Waythorn’s internal conflict over his new wife’s continued contact with her ex-husbands. When he is told that the first husband has written a letter through …show more content…
The author uses words such as “stammered,” and “hastily” to describe the initial conversation between the two men (225). His day continues and he finds himself trying to control his inner feelings and emotions as his once simple life is beginning to become messy with interactions with men who know his wife intimately. This is demonstrated Waythorn’s musings, wondering if the former husbands had ever had similar encounters with each other as he was currently …show more content…
It cannot be avoided. He didn’t want to accept that Haskett might be a decent man, wondering if he might perhaps try to take advantage of the situation, but “Haskett’s sincerity of purpose made him invulnerable, and his successor had to accept him as a lien on the property.” This signifies his initial resignation to the situation of Haskett being a permanent fixture in their lives. The falling action continues as he recognizes his wife is right in her acceptance of these men in her life, after they are in close proximity at a ball. “Even Waythorn could not but admit that she had discovered the solution of the newest social problem” (234). He admits “habit formed a protecting surface for his sensibilities,” and had “drifted into a dulling propinquity with Haskett and Varick, … He even began to reckon up the advantages which accrued from it”
In John Knowles’ A Separate Peace, characters Gene and Phineas begin their journeys to adulthood in a war-torn environment. The dynamic formed between a world full of struggle and the crucial age of development in high school proves to be an excellent setting to examine the abilities of both Gene and Phineas to “come of age.” Being a Bildungsroman, the theme of coping with war and death is highlighted via the imagery that surrounds both Gene’s epiphany moment at the marble stairs, and its introduction at the beginning of the novel. Additionally, Knowles employs a flashback to set a nostalgic and somewhat reflective mood, which further extends this meaning. In Knowles’ “coming of age” novel A Separate Peace, the use of imagery surrounding the marble stairs, and a reminiscent flashback aid Gene discovers that war and death can never be understood.
The remaining story developments of both books detail further growth in the character development of the protagonists and the principle characters. And so it is with us and how we unravel the mysteries of symbolism in literary word puzzles, that we as readers can also grow like "blossoms blooming" through the eyes of Hurston and Fitzgerald.
What is most remarkable about Crane's series of letters to Mrs. Crouse is the tone of his love-stricken entreaties. He gracefully plays off of his burgeoning fame and his growing success as a published artist with good-natured self-deprecation and a propensity to undermine his own endeavours. The series of letters commences with a carefully constructed communique crafted to provoke a sympathetic response from Mrs. Crouse. Employing "inside" reactions to his celebrity to impress, he relies on an aura of exotic settings and playful humor to win a reply. Having succeeded in securing an apparently satisfactory response, he eagerly raises the temperature of the correspondence in his second letter. Without compromising further relations with Mrs. Crouse, his words adopt a more acute degree of intimacy, with Crane even going so far as to volunteer to accept her literary advice.
Throughout “Ethan Frome,” Edith Wharton renders the idea that freedom is just out of reach from the protagonist, Ethan Frome. The presence of a doomed love affair and an unforgiving love triangle forces Ethan to choose between his duty and his personal desire. Wharton’s use of archetypes in the novella emphasizes how Ethan will make choices that will ultimately lead to his downfall. In Edith Wharton’s, “Ethan Frome.” Ethan is wedged between his duty as a husband and his desire for happiness; however, rather than choosing one or the other, Ethan’s indecisiveness makes not only himself, but Mattie and Zeena miserable.
When Victorian Era, England is brought up in most context’s it is used to exemplify a calm and more refined way of life; however, one may overlook how the children of this era were treated and how social class systems affected them. Samuel Butler’s The Way of All Flesh is a novel written to take a closer look at the life of children growing up in the unfair social hierarchy of Victorian Era England. Butler’s main characters are Theobald and Ernest, who grow up during the time period; Overton, who is Ernest’s godfather, is the narrator of the novel and provides insight into Theobald and Ernest as they mature through the novel. Theobald is the son of a wealthy, strict, and abusive father who treats him with no mercy, but leaves him with a rather significant inheritance from his Christian publishing company, at his death. Ernest is the son of Theobald, who beats him with a stern fits over even the pettiest things in
All three texts portray leading characters who suffer due to flaws within their own personalities; however, it could be argued that the flaws these individuals fall victim to are directly a product of their environments rather than being innate within themselves. These texts were written between 1623 and 1989 and depict figures from all levels of the social hierarchy; from a King in Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale to a servant in Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day and a socialite in Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, showing that falling victim to a weakness within one’s own character is not an experience exclusive to one era or one class of people.
In Home Jack Boughton 's story from the perspective a sister, Glory who has reluctantly come back to Gilead at 38 years old to watch over her diminishing father, a Presbyterian minister and John Ames ' closest companion. Jack, the family 's odd one out, a drunkard with a shameful past, returns for reasons that he will just cozy they are all the more completely uncovered in Gilead. Glory’s has privileged insights she could call her own: a man to whom she thought she was in love with, yet who ended up leaving mortified her. In Gilead, know Jack 's mystery yet not to his family this obliquity is essential to a tale about the limits of information, and how that impediment decides our judgments of others. In Gilead Ames watches that Jack dependably
Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth presents an interesting study of the social construction of subjectivity. The Victorian society which Wharton's characters inhabit is defined by a rigid structure of morals and manners in which one's identity is determined by apparent conformity with or transgression of social norms. What is conspicuous about this brand of social identification is its decidedly linguistic nature. In this context, behaviors themselves are rendered as text, and the incessant social appraisal in which the characters of the novel participate is a process of deciphering this script of behavior. People's actions here are read, as it were, according to the unique social grammar of this society. The novel's treatment of this conception of social reading is brought to the fore through its devaluing of written texts in favor of legible behaviors.
Wharton, Edith, and Edith Wharton. Ethan Frome ; & Summer. New York: Modern Library, 2001. Print.
...is interactions with his wife are filled with tension and he is saddened when he reflects upon the men lost during war and the death of his brother.
Immediately, the narrator stereotypes the couple by saying “they looked unmistakably married” (1). The couple symbolizes a relationship. Because marriage is the deepest human relationship, Brush chose a married couple to underscore her message and strengthen the story. The husband’s words weaken their relationship. When the man rejects his wife’s gift with “punishing…quick, curt, and unkind” (19) words, he is being selfish. Selfishness is a matter of taking, just as love is a matter of giving. He has taken her emotional energy, and she is left “crying quietly and heartbrokenly” (21). Using unkind words, the husband drains his wife of emotional strength and damages their relationship.
Harmon, William, William Flint Thrall, Addison Hibbard, and C. Hugh Holman. A Handbook to Literature. 11th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2009. Print.
Abrams, M.H. and Greenblatt, Stephen eds. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Seventh Edition. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2001.
In conclusion, the author’s choice of utilizing the third person narration is what provided the high level of ignorance, as the voice concentrated on the protagonist husband. It brought the reader to the place of how inadequately the husband treated the wife and how he was oblivious of how his actions affected her. The reader is also able to envision that the protagonist is not cognizant that he is not being truthful to himself. It permits the reader to realize the how boring, prideful, thoughtless, and insensitive the protagonist is overall.
... Norton Anthology of English Literature. 9th ed. Vol. D. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2012. 1166-86. Print.