Marlee In Huckoo's Gold

694 Words2 Pages

The setting of the novel is Little Rock Arkansas in 1958. During this time period in Little Rock many schools were closed. Fortunately for Marlee the schools where she lived were closed because of segregation. If the schools weren't closed because of segregation then Marlee wouldn't have found her voice. Marlee had to fight for her friendship with a negro and less importantly her sister because of segregation and racism. The author tells the reader the when she stated, “Marlee, you can't still be friends with Liz.’ 'Why not?’ 'Segregationist don't take kindly to Negroes…” Because of this quiet shy Marlee started to say what she thought and joined organizations like the WEC and STOP to open schools not only to get her sister home but to get …show more content…

One of the characters who influenced Marlee for the good was Liz. Not only was she Marlee's first true friend but she gave Marlee courage. An example of when the author tells you this is when she wrote, “Liz was too afraid to be friends with me anymore. There had to be a part of that problem I could solve. Some way to give her back the courage she'd given me.” Gaining courage is always a good thing, and Liz gave Marlee courage. Another character who influenced Marlee was her sister Judy whose influence was bad. When her sister was still with Marlee she coddled her. Instead of letting Marlee gain courage she always was there to the rescue. Marlee's sister's presence just gave Marlee an existential as to why she didn't need anyone else. On page 3 it said, “Open your eyes,’ Judy commanded. I did not that I always do what my sister says, but well- I guess I usually do. In any case, when I saw my sister's clear brown eyes looking at me, I felt much better… 'Do you want to hold your hand on the way down the ladder?” This is a prime example of when Judy always comes to rescue her. There are both positive and negative influences to Marlee in the …show more content…

On page 112 it reveals the main conflict with text that states, “you can't be friends with that girl.” This is a main conflict because throughout the novel Marlee grows more and more courage just to get her friend back from segregationist and that's what the plot is based off of. This conflict is resolved with Marlee and Liz meeting at the zoo one last time hoping to be able to see each other in the future. In addition to the main conflict the second biggest conflict is revealed on page8 when the author wrote, “Only the high schools are closed.” This conflict is part of why Marlee has to fight for her friendship. Also it sends Judy away and provokes Maree to join the WEC and STOP organizations to open schools again. The conflict resolved with Judy coming home and high schools

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