I chose the option to compare and contrast the mothers in “I Stand Here Ironing” and “Girl.” The similarities that the two mothers have in common is their life experience, the difficultly in letting the daughter go and both are honest about motherhood.
The similarities between the two mothers is that they both reflect on the difficult times in their lives and do not want to see their children making the same mistakes that they had made. In “Girl” the mother appears to have no love for her child and is shown as a very hateful woman (College Term Papers, 1999). In “I Stand Here Ironing” the mother is portrayed as a once young mother, who made wrong choices in the raising of her first child, but she seems to love her first child in her own way (College Term Papers, 1999). Both of the mothers in these two stories have trouble understanding the choices that their daughter's make and their lifestyle and does not want them to make the same mistakes. Along with both the mothers past experiences, they also have the same kind of relationship with their daughter’s.
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By the mothers showing what society expects a woman’s role to be, is more of an obstacle to any kind of successful self-discovery (Spark notes, 2016). Rather than help women achieve self-actualization the mothers believe that a woman’s reputation or respectability determines the quality of her life in the community (Spark notes, 2016). Both stories show the concerns within each relationship between mother and daughter (Spark notes, 2016). Although the mothers can be in their daughter’s life, but they can’t always control how daughters turn out different from what they expected. The mothers are having difficulty letting go, but they are also honest with their
Could you imagine what your home life would be like if you and your parents didn’t agree on anything? There would be constant fighting and tension would be everywhere. This is the case of two young girls in the stories “Confetti Girl” and “Tortilla Sun”. The narrators in these stories are the young girls, and they don’t agree with their parent on very important topics in these stories. Because the narrator and their parent don’t have the same point of view in these stories, tension builds up. In, “Confetti Girl”, the narrator disagrees with her father and questions how much he cares about her and in “Tortilla Girl”, the narrator questions if her mother was taking her into account of her new plans. Tension is shown to be caused in the
Are all mothers fit for motherhood? The concept of motherhood is scrutinized in the stories “The Rocking Horse Winner” and “Tears Idle Tears”. In “The Rocking Horse Winner” by D.H Lawrence the mother, Hester, unpremeditatedly provokes her son into providing for her through gambling. In the story “Tears Idle Tears” by Elizabeth Bowen, Mrs. Dickinson disregards her son’s emotions and puts more emphasis in her appearance than her son’s wellbeing. Hester and Mrs. Dickinson both were inadequate mothers. Both the mothers were materialistic, pretended to love their offspring, and their dominance hindered their children’s progress in life.
There are many commonalties between the protagonists in the stories by Flannery O’Connor. First physically, they are all elderly women. All three are mothers of boys. Another likeness is the women and their sheer physical presence. “In Everything Rises Must Converge” Julian’s mother walks on the bus and immediately begins to control the conversation. People seem to feed off her commentaries. These commentaries are usually on the basis of racism. As she states when she notices that there are no black people on the bus, “I see we have the bus to ourselves.”(p.344) Mrs. Turpin is almost the exact same way as Julian’s mother. The only difference between the two is that Mrs. Turpin was waiting in a doctor’s office. She too seems like she is the one who is in command of the conversation. The same holds true for the grandmother in A Good Man is Hard to Find. She continues a conversation with a man that is has murdered her family and threatening t...
First in “Everyday Use” you recognize the differences in all three women throughout the story. The mama
At times it seems strong, as when the narrator is relating her childhood and recounting the good times. Other times it is very strained. All in all, the connection between the two seems to be a very real and lifelike account of an actual mother-daughter relationship. Bibliography:.. 1. What is the difference between a. and a. Orr, Elaine.
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.”
In the article, “A Mother’s Day Kiss-Off,” Leslie Bennetts expresses her malcontentedness with corporate culture’s hostility toward mothers and care taking needs (42). Bennetts uses facts, figures, and even a testimony to shed light on the average mother’s modern dilemma. She attempts to show the unjust treatment of mothers by several different outside forces. In the article, “The Myth of Co-Parenting: How It Was Supposed to Be. How It Was.,” Hope Edelman vents her frustration at the mother’s inability to deny the role of the prominent parent (51). She uses her own personal experience to show just how ingrained societal standards are into the public. Her article goes through her own descension into the average wife, sacrificing her own career
As the author mentions, both narrators suffer or experience oppression. In “Everyday Use”, Walker implies that the mother still live under the shadow of slavery when she mentions about the mother couldn’t look into white man’s eyes (337). Similarly, Olsen in her story “I Stand Here Ironing” writes “I was nineteen. It was the pre-relief, pre-WPA world of the depression” (224). Although the symbols in both story has its implication; however, the act of ironing and quilting represent the chores of woman. Both stories demonstrate that women are typically portray as house wife. Alice Walker and Tillie Olsen embody the tension for the mother-daughter relationship. Both stories have different conflict yet they shared one of the tensions; distance. In “Everyday Use”, there exists a distance between the narrator and her daughter Dee due to different levels of education. They were unable to communicate with each other because they were not on the same level. The narrator in “I Stand Here Ironing” also has a complex relationship with her daughter Emily as she has been absent from Emily’s life and development. Although there are some conflicts between the mother- daughter relationship, both Emily and Dee continues to
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...
The theme of, mother daughter relationships can be hard but are always worth it in the end, is portrayed by Amy Tan in this novel. This theme is universal, still relevant today, and will be relevant for forever. Relationships are really important, especially with your mom. “ A mother is best. A mother knows what is inside you”
Both stories show the characters inequality with their lives as women bound to a society that discriminates women. The two stories were composed in different time frames of the women’s rights movement; it reveals to the readers, that society was not quite there in the fair treatment towards the mothers, daughters, and wives of United States in either era. Inequality is the antagonist that both authors created for the characters. Those experiences might have helped that change in mankind to carve a path for true equality among men and women.
Motherhood in never guaranteed to by easy. Children definitely do not come with instruction manuals and even if they did there are so many variables, such as the national economy and unexpected single motherhood, that are beyond our control. The choices a mother has to make can cause numerous moments of second guessing and immense guilt. “I Stand Here Ironing” explores the perceived failures and gnawing guilt of a post- Depression era mother as she contemplates the childhood circumstances of her oldest, overlooked, and seemingly troubled child. Throughout the story Tillie Olsen takes us through the depths of a mother’s guilt due to pressures of the economy and society on parenting during her time and how much blame she puts on herself for her
...re many similarities when it comes to technique, characterization, themes, and ideologies based on the author's own beliefs and life experiences. However, we also see that it appears the author herself often struggles with the issue of being herself and expressing her own individuality, or obeying the rules, regulations and mores of a society into which she was born an innocent child, one who by nature of her sex was deemed inferior to men who controlled the definition of the norms. We see this kind of environment as repressive and responsible for abnormal psyches in the plots of many of her works.
Many women in modern society make life altering decisions on a daily basis. Women today have prestigious and powerful careers unlike in earlier eras. It is more common for women to be full time employees than homemakers. In 1879, when Henrik Ibsen wrote A Doll's House, there was great controversy over the out come of the play. Nora’s walking out on her husband and children was appalling to many audiences centuries ago. Divorce was unspoken, and a very uncommon occurrence. As years go by, society’s opinions on family situations change. No longer do women have a “housewife” reputation to live by and there are all types of family situations. After many years of emotional neglect, and overwhelming control, Nora finds herself leaving her family. Today, it could be said that Nora’s decision is very rational and well overdue.
There is the major theme portrayed in both stories. In each, there is a forbidden marriage that comes about as a result of children disagreeing with and hence rebelling against the traditional customs or values of their family. The major protagonist in each account coincidentally is the father who goes to great extents to estrange the rebellious offspring. Despite the fact that each story is written within a different era and culture, they both exhibit the dominant male figure as the family head, with very little or no input on what is right for the family from any other member. The paternal figures are strongly opinionated and do not waver from what they believe should be the proper behavior of their children, resulting in conflicts between Papi and Sofia, and Okeke and Nnaemeka.