Compare And Contrast Hanging Fire And Hanging Death

It is a known fact that humans crave attention. If a person feels as if they are not receiving enough attention they will do anything in order to be noticed. In the poem “Hanging Fire” by Audre Lorde and the short story “Jason Will Be Famous” by Dorthy Allison there is similar theme shared between the two. They both focus on attention and self awareness. Also, they face a lot of challenges today, such as social pressures, but modern day youth seems as if they do not want to work hard to get where they want to be in their lives.The main characters of each narrative desires their existence to be meaningful to their parents. They are both willing to go through extreme measures such as dying or being kidnapped in order to initiate change. In other

Even though their tactics seem over thought and to say the least exaggerated overall they share the same believe that at the end of the day someone will acknowledge them.

Growing up in a household where a person’s parents are constantly arguing can be stressful. It is even worse when the parents divorce because it causes a split between the child and their parents. In the story “Jason Will Be Famous” toward the end of the story it was revealed how dysfunctional Jason’s parents were and that he longed for them to reconnect as a family. Jason constantly had dreams of himself being kidnapped. The dream first seemed to be a nightmare, until the recurrence of the same dream lead him to believe he could possibly get kidnapped. In daydreams Jason thought of what he would do if he was kidnapped and how he would escape. He thought of how important he would be after his escape and how his parents would change their thoughts of him. Jason had visions of himself cool

Lorde begins her poem with “ I am fourteen and my skin has betrayed me”(1050) giving the impression the child suffers with insecurities. When a person is insecure with themselves they crave a special kind of attention. The narrator speaks of the things they are self conscience about like the ashiness of their skin and their desire of social things like learning to dance and what to wear. It seems in this poem the child suffers from normal preteen pressures but it does not help if they are going through these phases by theirself. The teen then says “...what if i die before morning...”(1050). Teeagers are typically very emotional and over exaggerate, but this teen is willing to die for the attention from their parent. In the poem the narrator says “I have nothing to wear tomorrow, will i live long enough to grow up and momma’s in the bedroom with her door closed” (1051) almost as if the teen is challenging their mom to notice. Throughout the poem this phrase “ and momma’s in the bedroom with her door closed”(1050) is repeated, which gives the poem a special tradition that emphasized the lack of presence from the mother. The teen wonders about everyday life challenges and wonders if their story would be told. The teen also wonders if anyone would understand their side of the story if they were to die since their mother was not attentive. In order to not have to deal with