The Good Corn is a complexly written short story, although it only

The Good Corn

The Good Corn is a complexly written short story, although it only

involves three prominent characters. Elsie, who is one of the least

prominent characters in text is referenced in the story throughout, as

the girl or only Elsie.

I have chosen Elsie as a character to contrast my views about because

the text encourages the readers to have a less sympathetic response

and approach to her but I seemed to have had a very compassionate and

sensitive approach to Elsie and think that because the author hasn’t

gone much into detail, in the narration, about her feelings, we are

shrouded and made to loathe her character given the third person

omniscient point of view.

In the author’s context, the book was written in the 1950’s and is so

forth, an outcome of white, male middle-class ideas about masculinity

and femininity where males were the dominant species and the females

were always referred to as the inferior race in general. Also

ethnicity and culture played a great part in those times because most

non – white people were considered to be greatly inferior and made to

do degrading jobs like maids or servants. This is the context in which

we are made to view Elsie. She is portrayed as an uneducated and is

described as being short and dark, with a thick bright complexion. In

the reader’s context being short or dark doesn’t mean much to us

because, in this 21st century, multiculturalism is a big factor and

even white people could look noticeably dark maybe because of a tan.

Also having a servant or helper is now, not considered as much of a

degrading job as before since and extensively large amount of servants

lead equally sufficient and satisfied lives as any normal middle-class

working person. Also, a significantly large amount of these servants

are actually of the white population.

Also, Elsie is represented as an uncaring, emotionless, un-maternal,

morally irresponsible and a calculative and selfish person. The

refusal of access into her thoughts and feelings coax the reader to

see her as a just a body who is only alive for bodily pleasures rather

than being an individual human being with personal suffering, guilt or

self-conscience. This has once again occurred because of superiority

issues where the narrator has chosen to be omniscient and has rejected

Elsie’s thoughts and feelings. In the reader’s context, Elsie would be

seen as a sexually promiscuous person as the text wants us to see her

but we would also have questioned the reasons behind her being

eighteen and so free with her body that she could bear two children in