Cruelty In 'All Summer In A Day'

662 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Narrative Essay on Child Abuse

“All Summer in a Day” is about a girl named Margot who lives on the planet Venus. However she is special unlike the other kids her age, she remembers the sun. You see, every seven years the endless torrential rain turns into a beautiful summer day. She is a girl only nine years of age, and she moved from Earth(Ohio to be specific) and she saw the sun everyday for fours years of her life. She remembers the warmth of the oh so bright sun, and the other children only remember the rain on their faces on a planet wrought with dysphoria.
A theme interwoven in the short dystopian tale All Summer in a Day is cruelty. In the short story A Summer in a Day is congested with baleful and malignant behavior from the other children that is directed towards Margot which points to the theme cruelty being the most present theme throughout this melancholic story. The other children don’t understand Margot and almost believe that she has committed a crime against them for remembering something they cannot picture, the sun. A few examples of this theme throughout the story are William discounting Margot’s intelligence by mocking her for making a poem, or …show more content…

It is almost as if all of the children have personal vendettas against Margot dor having the foggy memory of the sun shining on her face and the warmth on her skin when the other kids only remember the bone chill of the constant gelid rain. This is an example of cruelty as theme married in the story because it shows that children will do anything so that Margot can feel the pain they have felt, but the kids have gotten caught up in their own pain and are causing more than the have ever felt. They are making her life horrible and unbearable by critiquing everything she has done, which is just one thing they are doing to make her life

Show More
Related

  • Compare And Contrast All Summer In A Day And Harrison Bergeron

    519 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the story it says, “About how it was like a lemon, it was, and how hot . . . I think the sun is a flower, That blooms for just one hour.” This connects back to my idea that outcasts are sometimes the solution to society’s problems. Due to this quote, Margot’s statement about the sun is what makes her an outsider in the eyes of society. Later in the passage, it is revealed that Margot’s statement about the sun was correct and solved the problem of what the children think the sun resembles.

    Read More

  • Cruelty In The Kite Runner

    1474 Words  | 3 Pages

    The way our friends treat us in the face of adversity and in social situations is more revealing of a person’s character than the way they treats us when alone. In Khaled Hosseini’s novel The Kite Runner, ethnic tensions, nationality, and betrayal become the catalyst that drives and fuels Amir, Assef, and other characters to embark on their particular acts of cruelty. Serving as a way to illustrate the loss of rectitude and humanity, cruelty reveals how easily people can lose their morals in critical circumstances. Through Amir, Assef, and the Taliban’s actions, cruelty displays the truth of a person’s character, uncovering the origin of their cruelty. Amir’s cruelty spurs from his external environment and need for love from his father, choosing

    Read More

  • Bad Judgment In All Summer In A Day By Ray Bradbury

    635 Words  | 2 Pages

    One possible main idea is that this short story is about how actions lead to regret. Support for this theme comes at the end of the story, where the children are described as stakes driven into the ground. This regret came after the children denied Margot the ability to be out in the sun after it had finally come out. Another theme is that the allure of rare things or events can induce powerful emotions. Support for this is present during the end of the story, where the kids run around in the sun and experience joy like never before. A final argument for the theme can be made of the idea that people never realize how much things are worth until they are gone. Evidence for this theme takes form in the shape of a depressed Margot, who is always sad and moping in the story, something that the author says is because she misses the sun on Earth. Although all of these themes have some support, none of have enough evidence and backing to be the true

    Read More

  • Ways Hartley and Frayn present Childhood in The Go-Between and Spies

    1253 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...sual atmosphere created by the heat contributes to Leo’s feeling that the world in his imagination has more reality than everyday life. In addition, the weather acts as a metaphor for events which Leo cannot control, ‘It all began with the weather defying me’ (Chapter 1. p. 39) and comes to symbolize the increasing emotional intensity of a young child’s involvement in the adult world, ‘All the heat of the afternoon seemed to be concentrated where we stood…It made me uncomfortable’ (Chapter 7. P. 82-83). This creates a mood of intense anticipation and suspense as the heat reflects how events are escalating out of control. Furthermore, the writer portrays the world of children through Leo and Marcus’s daily ritual of visiting the thermometer to track record temperatures as it adds to the mood of innocent expectation and conveys the simplicity of childhood pursuits.

    Read More

  • Sadness And Depession In Ray Bradbury's All Summer In A Day

    342 Words  | 1 Pages

    While someone might argue that the theme is jealousy they forget that in the text is says that Margot was sad when the class bullied her. When the kids locked Margot in the closet,

    Read More

  • All Summer In A Day: Jealousy

    256 Words  | 1 Pages

    In All Summer In A Day it shows that people can be jealous over things.The kids disagree with Margot, about saying what the sun looks like.This makes them jealous because the kids only see the sun every seven years.Margot was jealous when the other kids got to go see the sun but she didn’t.She was jealous because Margot doesn’t get to see the sun for another seven years.That more than one person can be jealous over

    Read More

  • Jealousy Kills Quotes

    601 Words  | 2 Pages

    All the kids her were rude and bullied her about remembering the sun.“ I think the sun is a flower; That blooms for just one hour:”( page 2 para 1). Margot says this the day before the sun come out. Of course the kids were still mean to her about it.“There was talk that her father and mother were taking her back to Earth next year; it seemed vital that they do so, though it would mean the loss of thousands of dollars to her family.”( page 3 para3). In this text it shows that Margot is jealous of the people on Earth and how much she wants to go back. She doesn't care that her family would lose thousands of dollars she just wants to be on earth where she belongs

    Read More

  • The Veldt Theme

    473 Words  | 1 Pages

    Margot goes to school with classmates that resent her. They hate her for having seen the sun, something they wanted so badly. This jealousy led to an overwhelming hatred that they were reminded of any time they saw her. Her classmates let their hatred take over and they locked her in a closet as revenge for the pain she had caused them all. But unlike Wendy and Peter from The Veldt, Margot was affected negatively from her classmateś actions.

    Read More

  • Cruelty In A Thousand Splendid Suns

    1206 Words  | 3 Pages

    Women are beaten, and it is culturally acceptable. Like routine, women are beaten in Afghanistan almost every day. When a person purposely inflicts sufferings on others with no feelings of concern, like the women of Afghanistan, he is cruel. Cruelty can manifest from anger, irritation, or defeat and is driven by self-interest. An idea that is explored in many works of literature, cruelty also appears in Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns in the relationship between a husband and wife. In their case, the husband uses cruelties in the form of aggression are to force his wife to submit. In A Thousand Splendid Suns, Hosseini’s use of cruelty elucidates the values of both Rasheed and Mariam as well as essential ideas about the nature of

    Read More

  • All Summer In A Day And The Lottery Comparison Essay

    566 Words  | 2 Pages

    It’s always cold and raining, and the sun only comes out for two hours on one day every seven years. Margot is a schoolgirl who moved from planet Earth. She’s depressed because she misses the sun and the other children don’t seem to like her. On the day the sun comes out, the other children lock Margot in a closet so that she can’t see the sun.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of All Summer In A Day By Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

    911 Words  | 2 Pages

    In All Summer in a Day by Ray Bradbury, Margot isolates herself from her peers because she does not accept their society’s opinions of the sun. The children welcome all those who conform to their ideals of their naive society, yet Margot distinguishes herself as a pariah and distances herself from her peers. William and his peers scorn Margot which brings upon her loneliness and unhappiness. An example of this is, “They edged away from her, they would not look at her. She felt them go away… And then, of course, the biggest crime of all was that

    Read More

  • Ray Bradbury's Indirect Characterization

    717 Words  | 2 Pages

    As shown above, the nonexisting sun played an immense role throughout the story. It was like the cause for the conflict and the central idea of the plot. It was also the element that caused the external conflict. The lack of sun and the constant presence of rain made this story. Overall, the setting was a major aspect in the story. To conclude, Bradbury highlights the conflict between Margot and her classmates by using a strong plot, a detailed setting, and

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Ray Bradbury's All Summer In A Day

    407 Words  | 1 Pages

    In the story, a classroom of kids are living on Venus, where all it does is rain. The children cannot remember a time where there wasn’t nonstop downpour of rain. One child, Margot, who transferred to Venus from Earth has seen the sun. The children don’t believe she has seen the sun, because jealousy brings them to deny Margot’s words. The kids obviously don’t have control over the sun and rain. That is why the presence of the sun every

    Read More

  • All Summer In A Day

    1049 Words  | 3 Pages

    The story starts off with these children bullying Margot out of jealousy of how she was able to remember and picture the sun, and because she was quiet and continued to allow it to happen. For instance, “when the class sang songs about happiness and life and games her lips barely moved. Only when they sang about the sun and the summer did her lips move as she watched the drenched windows.” It’s clear how this quote shows that her memory of the sun was

    Read More

  • All Summer In A Day Immigrants

    505 Words  | 2 Pages

    The kids would bully Margot in many ways. In the text “Immigrants”, many families migrated although it was not easy. The migrants had to take a test before migrating. If one would fail the test they were forced to return to their homeland. Also many of the migrant’s names were changed.

    Read More

More about Cruelty In 'All Summer In A Day'

Open Document