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In the short story "The Possibility of Evil",by Shirley Jackson, Miss. Strangeworth appears to be a normal old woman that is highly respected among the town, but we soon realize that she has a dark side. She writes letters to people telling them things that are mere suspicion, but have negative consequences to their lives. These events in the plot show the theme that anyone can have the capacity of being evil. The beginning of the story displays the theme by showing that Miss.Strangeworth seems innocent in her public life, but later shows that she lies about what she thinks to people. When she told Mrs. Crane “All babies are different. Some of them develop much more quickly than others", in response to her worrying about her child, she …show more content…
Strangeworth being evil, deceptive, and not thinking that she is doing evil things. The first example of the theme in the middle of the story happens when Mrs.Strangeworth sends an anonymous letter saying “EVER SEE AN IDIOT CHILD BEFORE? SOME PEOPLE JUST SHOULDN'T HAVE CHILDREN SHOULD THEY”. Mrs. Strangeworth sent this after earlier saying that she thought the child would be normal and healthy. This shows that she doesn’t show her true opinion to people, but she is happy to tell them later in a hateful letter mailed anonymously. Another example of theme in the middle of the story is when Miss.Strangeworth sends a letter to Mrs.Harper saying “HAVE YOU FOUND OUT YET WHAT THEY WERE ALL LAUGHING ABOUT AFTER YOU LEFT THE BRIDGE CLUB ON THURSDAY? OR IS THE WIFE REALLY ALWAYS THE LAST ONE TO KNOW?” After seeing this she might start to question what her friends and her husband are doing when she is not around them. After writing writing this letter she is happy with her good work and doesn’t care about the impact on the people that she writes to. These examples show that she is deceptive by making the people she talks to believe she thinks one thing but then sends them letters with a vastly different opinion. These examples show her being evil by displaying her willingness to tell people that she thinks their friends and family are
The first character we encounter is Mrs. Freeman. She is the wife of Mrs. Hopewell's tenant farmer. She is a very outspoken woman, and "she [can] never be brought to admit herself wrong on any point" (O'Connor 180). Mrs. Freeman is a gossip; she is nosy and she "ha[s] a special fondness for the details of secret infections, hidden deformities, assaults upon children" (O'Connor 183).
There is no doubt that Miss. Strangeworth is not an easy person to deal with, let alone live with, and although her character is fictional, there are many people with the same personality. We can tell quite easily that she is a very meticulous woman, with a lot of perfectionist tendencies, a few of which are to nitpick people’s lives and make sure that even the most minute detail is up to her standards. I know of someone with these attributes and as difficult as they are to deal with, with their list of requirements to be met and their eagle-eye for detail in even the smallest things, they mean the best, and are always trying to help, despite the possible repercussions.
One of the ways this is achieved is by using an exterior appearance to deceive ones true morals for an intriguing motive. This is seen through the character of Miss. Strangeworth the main character in "The Possibility of Evil" appearing to be a sweet old lady however, she is not what she seems. Her deceiving exterior is seen when the narrator states "Walking down Main street on a summer morning, Miss. Strangeworth had to stop every minute or so to say good morning to someone or to ask after someone 's health (Jackson 1). This quote illustrates Miss. Strangeworth uses her
Jackson, Shirley. “The Possibility of Evil.” Literature Reading, Reacting, Writing. Kirszner, Laurie. Mandell Stephen. 4th edition. Sea Harbor: Harcourt College Publishers. 2001. 463-474
Evil is a popular theme in many novels and plays, and there are many factors that contribute to characters becoming evil. Factors such as no interaction with people and the way someone is treated can turn a person to become evil and commit bad acts. The person may start out as a selfless person with good morals, but eventually he will turn evil as a result of outside factors. Some factors might be isolation, the way he is treated by others, and motives. A person’s selfish needs often consume him and he wants nothing but to benefit himself. He will do anything to get what he wants and will eventually commit so many bad acts that he will turn purely evil. In the play Macbeth by Shakespeare and the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, the characters
The reader is shown how other characters perceive Miss Strangeworth when in the story it says, “Most of the children stood back respectfully as Miss Strangeworth passed, silenced briefly in her presence, and some of the older children greeter her . . . .”(5). These children who treat Miss Strangeworth as an honorable elder emphasize the fact that everyone in the town has been fooled to believe that she is innocent. No one at the post office would be suspicious of Miss Strangeworth’s intentions because they have only seen one side of her. Miss Strangeworth's character is also developed in the last line of the story when it reads, “She began to cry silently for the wickedness of the world when she read the words: Look out at what used to be your roses”(6). Don Crane’s bold action of destroying Miss Strangeworth’s precious roses shows how hurtful and cruel Miss Strangeworth's words are. The way in which Don Crane interacted with Miss Strangeworth compared to how other people interacted with her displays the drastic difference in how she is treated depending on which aspect of her personality is shown. Miss Strangeworth’s multifaceted personality causes her to be regarded in different ways based on which side she reveals to those around
Miss Strangeworth’s character can be analyzed by considering what she does. For instance, she is conceited. In the story she says, “ I’ve watched ‘my’ town grow.” Emphasis on the ‘my’ part. It isn’t actually her town, but she likes to think of it that way. Also, later in the story she states, “but it should have been a statue of my grandfather.” It’s nice that she thinks that it should be her grandfather but that is disrespectful to the person who is the statue. She probably doesn’t mean for it to come off as cocky or conceited, but that is just how it seems. Lastly, I think she is envious that although her grandfather built the first house on her street,but the statue wasn’t him.
For every person there is a difference within them. Nobody is just like one another. In Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Possibility of Evil,” this may have been quite difficult for Miss Strangeworth to understand. Miss Strangeworth’s can be analyzed by considering what she does, what the narrator thinks, and how other characters interact with her.
“The Possibility of Evil” is a story about a strange woman named Miss Strangeworth. Her life is about thinking of all the bad in the world and writing anonymous letters to fix it. In “The Possibility of Evil”, by Shirley Jackson, the author uses dialogue, symbolism, and inner thinking to show how Miss Strangeworth thinks of evil in the world.
In “The Possibility of Evil,” Miss Strangeworth, the main character, is an insane person because of her ego and how highly she thinks of herself, her malicious intents that were dont with no remorse to the townspeople, and her unfathomable denial of her wrongdoing. Miss Strangeworth considers her duty to the town is to nitpick and judge everyone in it simply because she values herself so highly as the only Strangeworth of Pleasant Street. While looking around in "her" town, she notices the absent-minded librarian, Miss Chandler. Miss Strangeworth takes in her appearance and deduces that "she had not taken much trouble with her hair that morning" (Jackson 208). Being her egocentric self, Miss Strangeworth sighs at the lack of effort that Miss Chandler had when around her. No matter how small a
In Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Possibility of Evil”, Mrs. Strangeworth shows the epitome of the human’s common trait to deny to associate oneself with the negative qualities within them. She does this by constantly regarding the townsmen as corrupt people that need her watching over them. The way she does this reveals corruptness as she sends passive-aggressive letters to “misbehaving” townspeople. The quote shows an attempt to justify her sending of manipulative letters.
In this story, it also dealt with disturbed personalities, she would do things that other people in the town wouldn’t for example, “Kept her notebook paper inside the desk and locked…” Social Structure was used to characterize Miss Strangeworth, she was known
Mr. Chillingworth as can be seen at the beginning of the novel is a good person but is also somewhat devious because he changes his name.
Something that can turn a naturally good person into a bad person is some sort of tragedy. Someone can be a happy person, but then someone they love dies, and it turns them into an angry person who hates everything. Another thing that can change good people into evil is if they are treated bad. Someone can be a happy child, but when they start going to school they get bullied every day. This turns them into an angry person, so they decide to bring a gun to school, and start shooting people. This person could have been a naturally good person, but other people have turned them into essentially a villain. On the other hand this person could be born angry, and become a school shooter simply because they want to. However, most people who we see as villains were not born that way. Outside circumstances, and outside people turned
Underneath a good moral, there could be a hidden truth. In, “The Possibility of Evil”, Shirley Jackson shows how the protagonist, Miss Strangeworth presumes she is protecting her neighborhood by eliminating the evil that exists within her community, but ironically, she is the most evil neighbor of all. In the beginning, the community considers Miss Strangeworth an old, caring and respected woman. Throughout the story, a handful of community members realize Miss Strangeworth is a bitter, insensitive woman, who is creating more evil in the neighborhood. In other words, Miss Strangeworth’s intentions to rid her neighborhood of evil, ultimately has the opposite effect and ironically creates more dilemma.