Analysis of the First Paragraph in Porter’s Old Mortality
First, I would like to make some broad generalizations about Katherine Anne Porter’s stories. The selections of stories that I have read could be considered stories about transition, passage from an old world to a new. There is a prolific amount of life and death imagery related to changes from slavery to freedom, aristocracy to middle-class, and birth to death. Her stories contain characters from several generations and the narratives move through out this multi-generational consciousness. The stories are as much about antitheses as the move from tradition to modernity or new ideas/ideals. The narrative perspectives illustrate the chasm between old and young/old and new.
I believe the opening text of “Old Mortality” illustrates both the conflicting views of different generations/values and ideals as well as the attempt to understand and resolve each other’s opposite. The first paragraph gives the reader a description of Aunt Amy. It is difficult to distinguish who the narrator of the text is at this particular point. It is neither Miranda or Maria nor the Grandmother. It would appear to be an omniscient narrator of no relation to the characters. Yet, the narrator displays the affect of both the young girls’ feelings and thoughts about Aunt Amy’s picture as well as the Grandmother’s perception of Amy.
While the first sentence is mostly objective description, the second sentence is full of the affectation of a subjective point of view. Aunt Amy is described as wearing a “white collar [that] rose from the neck of her tightly buttoned black basque, and round white cuffs set off lazy hands with dimples in them, lying at ease in the folds of her flounced skirt.” Words like “tightly,” “lazy,” and “ease” seem to describe what would be considered the traditional concept of the Southern woman. The wealthy Southern female is conservative, pure, fragile, peaceful, and delicate. These descriptive words could be viewed as an alignment with the traditional Southern view of women; therefore Amy is “beautiful and charming” in the eyes of the Grandmother and “every older person” and “everyone who had known her.” However, within those same words there appears the rather opposite yet still highly subjective view of the young girls who are attempting to reconcile the new values and ideas of the present with the old traditions of the past. The words “tightly,” “lazy,” and “ease” could be seen from the young girls perspective as negative descriptions suggesting boundaries, confinement, limitations, and exclusion.
Early on in the story, there is a phrase about an older woman explaining an image. It says, “A woman with shorn white hair wearing tennis shoes and a shapeless gray sweater over a summery calico dress. She is small and sprightly, like a bantam hen; but, due to a long youthful illness, her shoulders are pitifully hunched.” She dresses comfortable but we know
The characters and themes in these writings contrast and relate in several ways. The poem is told through the perspective of the grandfather’s grandchild, who cares for him, saying certain things remind them of him after he didn’t “live here anymore” by stating that their grandfather “is blankets and spoons and big brown shoes.” Like the grandfather in “Abuelito Who”, the grandfather in “The Old Grandfather” is old and it is stated that his legs “would not carry him” and his eyes “could not see”, which affected his family’s feelings towards him. The grandfather’s old age was viewed as a weakness, and he was not treated as an equal by his family, such as not being able to sit with them at the table for dinner.
...ther is losing her daughter to time and circumstance. The mother can no longer apply the word “my” when referring to the daughter for the daughter has become her own person. This realization is a frightening one to the mother who then quickly dives back into her surreal vision of the daughter now being a new enemy in a world already filled with evils. In this way it is easier for the mother to acknowledge the daughter as a threat rather than a loss. However, this is an issue that Olds has carefully layered beneath images of war, weapons, and haircuts.
Another form or irony found through out the pages of Flannery O’Connor’s short story is dramatic irony. This irony occurs at the very end of the story, when the...
In the books Where the Girls are and Coming of Age in Mississippi, the authors portray how they questioned their place within the American society, and how they found their voice to seek opportunities for themselves and others. The childhoods of Douglas and Moody are major factors in these women’s lives and character development. It is through these experiences that they formed their views of the world and learned to understand the world’s view of women. Douglas and Moody had very different experiences for they grew up in different decades, social and economic classes, and races. It is these differences that cause them to have different reactions. Susan Douglass in Where the Girls are and Anne Moody in Coming of Age in Mississippi have different critiques of American society and solutions, because of the differences of what they were exposed to.
Cofer, Jordan. "Flannery O'connor's Role In Popular Culture: A Review Essay." Southern Quarterly 47.2 (2010): 140-157. OmniFile Full Text Mega (H.W. Wilson). Web. 2 Nov. 2013.
Katherine Anne Porter wrote “The Jilting of Granny Weatherall” to showcase how one woman responds to loss with strong faith. The reader is introduced to a feisty eighty year old woman named Granny Weatherall. Granny Weatherall is near death and while laying in her bed she starts to reminisce about past events in her life which include her being jilted by George, her fiancé. Then later on, Granny marries a man named John, who soon later dies leaving her with four kids. Granny assumes the role of both mother and father by taking care of everything for her kids. When Granny turns sixty, she prepares for death by seeing all of her kids and their children. On Granny’s bed side is Cornelia, her daughter, her doctor, and Father Connolly, a Roman
... dresses more since I know that from the very beginning when the cotton is ripe in the hot sun, little boys and girls must pick it for my dresses, while their backs grow tired and their heads ache”. This shows that the girl in this passage appreciates her clothes more because she knows that children are being forced to labor in the fields so that the cotton they pick can be used to make different items. With this, many children across the country are being deprived of a regular childhood and are not being allowed to do what they want as kids.
Marijuana while illegal on a federal level has been legalized in 18 states and the District of Columbia for medical use and also for personal use for anyone over 21 in Washington and Colorado. 48% of Americans admit to using marijuana according to a 2013 survey conducted by Scientific America. With the change in public opinion concerning marijuana the need to understand the effect and consequences associated with its use are vitally important. What are the effects on the brain and the rest of the body? Does it matter when you start using marijuana? Also what is the effect marijuana use has on a person’s life, to include school, work, family and friends.
The main focus of this research proposal is to address the study of social psychology and the role it plays in helping one understand human social behavior. In this proposal, one will attempt to explain how the field of social psychology will evolve within the next 10 years. Allport, (1985) maintains that social psychology is the scientific study that seeks to understand the nature of individual’s behavior and how they think, feel, and are influenced by others. To understand the framework of this proposal, one will focus on human social behavior as it relates to research in social psychology.
Flannery O’ Connor’s story: “A Good Man is Hard to Find” is the tale of a vacation gone wrong. The tone of this story is set to be one irony. The story is filled with grotesque but meaningful irony. I this analysis I will guide you through the clues provided by the author, which in the end climax to the following lesson: “A Good Man” is not shown good by outward appearance, language, thinking, but by a life full of “good” actions.
The first similarity is that elderly people are left out of the society. In the novel, the elderly cannot have a family. They live in the House of the Old because they are separated from the society. All the people are getting older and weaker without exception, so it is hard for them to live without family. Nonetheless, the society isolates the elderly. “The Old were sitting quietly, some visiting and talking with one another, others doing handwork and simple crafts. A few were asleep” (p. 28). Likewise, in the modern society, elderly people are lonely. Some avoid taking care of their parents suffering from disease like Alzheimer. The elderly are apt to be easily depressed, and this depression can be triggered by the deaths of their spouses, relatives, and friends or by financial worries. Therefore, old people need constant care and their family’s affection. However, due to hectic lifestyle of current society, many elderly people live alone or in care center without their family.
The persuasive attempts in both literary works produce different results. The effectiveness of the mother’s guidance to her daughter is questioned since the girl cannot recognize the essence of her mother’s lesson. Despite that, the mother’s beneficial instruction serves as a standard for the daughter to reflect her future behaviors in order to live up to the community’s expectations. On the other hand, Anne’s value of candid expression and lasting relationship dissuades her from obliging to her family’s meaningless duty to place her love and interest above to experience fulfillment in life.
This essay will study what social psychology actually is and the debates within the field as well as the history and origins of social psychology. In addition to this it will then continue and look at what they study within this field and what types of questions to ask and what results they gain from this.
Von Galhn and Taulbee. 2013. Law Among Nations. An Introduction to Public International Law. Pearson Education.