Jimmy Dean once advised, “I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to reach my destination.” The novel A Long Walk to Water authored by Linda Sue Park, is a work of realistic historical fiction and a dual narrative focused on adjusting to change. One storyline is about a young eleven year old girl named Nya who is apart of the Nuer tribe and lives in Sudan. Nya lives the life of a young Sudanese girls because they collect water for their family every day. The other storyline is about an eleven year old boy named Salva who is in the Dinka tribe and lives in Sudan, but travels throughout many countries and states in his life. Salva’s story line shows how getting attacked by rebels and escaping from civil war changed his and many others’ lives. Both characters face many changes throughout the story. Linda Sue Park wants readers to know to accept change for good or bad.
Symbolism is the use of a person, place, or thing to represent an idea or quality. In the story The Yellow Wallpaper is filled with symbolism the pattern of the wallpaper, the moonlight, and the house. The pattern of the yellow wallpaper can be seen as a cage. This can be why the narrator feels like she is trapped inside the wallpaper. The moonlight can symbolize the narrator because during the day she remains motionless due to her husband watching her and at night she creeps through the room and remains alert and awake. “At night in any kind of light, in twilight, candlelight, lamplight, and worst of all by...
Her hair is one of the main things that represented Janie. She always wore her hair loose and she liked it down, she liked it free. And that’s exactly how Janie was; she loved being free and wild she didn’t like to be tied down. Another symbol in this story is the horizon always mentioned in the novel of the pear tree and a sundown. She was on a journey to find her horizon. The horizon symbolizes hope and beauty for Janie. Another symbol in this novel is the pear tree that was on her grandmother’s plantation. The tree represented how Janie had become a woman and it also encouraged her to start he free-spirited journey on love.
Thus, the poets conceptual ideals contribute to a incredibly different treatment of motherhood. More specifically, the orator in In the park views motherhood as a agent of the disperal of the her identity not only as a woman but also a poet. Evidently, Andrew Taylor confirms the poet’s loss of idenity when he states that the children in the poem In the park “…were the agents for the woman’s dispersal of identity , they were scattered constituents of her identiy as disperal, as non identiy” (148). In this case, the poet’s treatment of maternity is seen through her perspective in the of loss of her individual self. Moreover, Taylor also mentions that the poem In the park “…is a comparatively simply poem, and there is little temptation to equate the woman in the poem with the poet herself, despite the frequent references thoughout Harwood’s poetry to her children and the role of mother which delayed one can only assume, her emergence as a poet” ( 146). The identity that has been taken away, by the speaker’s offpsring’s, according to Taylor, was Harwood’s rise in the poetic world. As for the perspective of the poet, on motherhood, in the poem Daystar, there is a singifinalt dissimliarity. The orator , in Daystar views motherhood as over taking other womanly roles. The maternal roles that overtakes the life of a mother are evident when the poet states that “she wanted a little room for thinking” (line1 ). Simply put, according to Elizabeth Beaulieu, the orator, in In the park “articulates a strategy for coping with children……she recognizes the need for a place of her own” ( 146). The poet’s objections on motherhood are clear; maternal resposniblities are percevied as a trap which encapsulates a woman indefinately without the freedom to do what she as
An author uses symbolism to draw out the symbolic meaning of a text. It is stated in “Strange Fruit”, “Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck” (Mirraple 9). This interpretation of this line can be quite literal, in the sense that the “crows” mentioned could be a direct reference to Jim Crow. Crows usually eat the remains of dead animals and are ominous. Jim Crow depicted blacks as animal-like in nature and he face painted his face to show how blacks looked and acted like. Jim Crow’s actions made him look and feel ominous. “Southern trees bearing a strange fruit that is hanging down from the trees” (Mirraple 1,4). The use of symbolism would be towards the southern trees. The trees hanged the strange fruit, otherwise known as colored people. The Southern trees symbolize the location of the deaths of the colored people. Blacks were brought to these trees to be hanged which portrays the message that discrimination yields human suffering and possibly death. Abel Mirraple’s use of symbolism successfully illustrated the theme of the poem. Jean Toomer uses imagery, rather than symbolism, to elucidate the theme of the
Some examples of symbolism are Pearl and how she was of great price to Hester yet she is also an example of sin, the scarlet letter that Hester had to wear. The letter could mean able, it stood for the grace that Hester had while wearing it and the main meaning behind it was adultery, the sin that Hester committed. The rosebush is a symbol of defiance and the moral blossoms in one’s heart. They give those who have no hope, hope and the realization that not everything in the world is terrible. The last item that was explained was the meteor that was shaped like a large red “A”. The townspeople believed that the meteor was a sign of the governor that they had just lost becoming an angel. Dimmesdale thought that the “A” stood for his unnamed sin. The book stated no specific meaning of the elusive letter and it was left up to the reader to interpretation. The meaning behind anything symbolic is different to everyone because people have different opinions. Using the definition of symbolism and having examples in a literary work helps the reader better comprehend what they read and give the topic a deeper meaning. The comprehension process and makes it easier to
...to literature than what is seen by the eye. Sometimes the reader just needs to look a little closer to get a true understanding of what is being offered by the author through symbolism. O’Connor places symbolism throughout the story to foreshadow the future of the family and to show the true lives the individuals live. The symbolism in the story is what makes the reader read more closely and gain in depth the understanding of the story’s meaning, which also gives the story an exciting edge. O’Connor is well known for her symbolism and it is shown in this story over and over.
The “fat and …bone” are compared to symbolize the difference between whites and blacks. The second stanza compares black and whites to rivers and the sea; one is fresh and the other salty, but both are bodies of water. The third stanza uses a metaphor to compare living out lives alone while pitching a tent in solitude, all alone in our own little world. It also uses the “sun and shadow” to symbolize whites and blacks. In stanza four grief and joy are contrasted with the use of personification. While joy only favors a few, grief is a common factor shared by all people, making it a common ground one in which anyone can come together. The fifth stanza or the last uses similes to give the message that although it is sometimes painful and unpleasant to share other’s grief it is something that must be done in order for everyone to live in harmony. It also relates grief to a weapon, calling it a “blade shining and unsheathed that must strike me down”. It also compares sorrow to a crown of “bitter aloes wreathed”. The overall poem contains Biblical allusions. It sends the message that everyone should rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn. Cullen is calling all Americans to do as Jesus did and be a man of the people
Symbolism is defined in Webster’s Dictionary as a representation of a concept through symbols or underlying meanings of objects or qualities, sometimes abstract, other times more literal. Often times in literature an author or poet employs the concept and use of symbolism where one object is used to refer to something else in order to create an emphasis or convey a point without slamming it in the face of the reader. It’s a person’s individual perception or system of belief that brings them to the true meaning of a specific symbol as it applies to their lives. Sometimes an entire piece of work is an extended metaphor for an idea the author is trying to convey such as in Animal Farm. However, the importance of this literary device is undisputed, in any work. Writers insert symbols into their writing to allude to a feeling, mood, attitude or ideology, without directly stating the perspective or mood intended. The authors of Ethan Frome and The House of Spirits use symbolism to convey both emotions such as anxiety and foreboding, and other things such as the ideas of what a woman should be, morality, and representations of revolutionary ideology.
Symbolism is when indirect messages are used to represent hidden meanings. In the poem, symbolism is used to represent the unknown thoughts of the children described by the reader. An example of this is, “That morning we galloped / through the grassed-over mounds,” (9-10). The children are all running around in a cemetery. The cemetery is where many fallen soldiers lie, and since it was memorial day, the cemetery had significant meaning. The “grassed-over mounds” are representative of the tombs of these fallen soldiers. “ And named each stone / for a lost milk tooth,” (11-12) is another example of symbolism. The children are naming the tombstones after their baby teeth that they had lost. This represents that they had lost their teeth, like the soldiers’ families lost their relative. “The children are running happily through it, disregarding the words on the stones and instead naming each headstone for a lost baby tooth,” (“‘Grape Sherbet’ Analysis”). This demonstrates how the children didn't know that they were running on top of the tombs of fallen soldiers, but instead they played a game and named the tombs
This poem has an allusion to “The Fall of The Garden of Eden” as well as our own lives. Just like the flowers subside, or degrade to leaves, Eden also sinks into destruction. This refers to the biblical fall of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, When Eve ate forbidden fruit she and Adam, and all their descendents,
Symbolism is used to foreshadow an event in the story. In the passage the author uses symbolism to foreshadow negative events for example "upon the bleak walls - upon the vacant eye-like windows - upon a few rank sedges - and upon a few white
And in the last 2 lines of the poem it talks about how nature forgived
The author most likely wrote this piece for the purpose of addressing how the fear of death among people is futile. Since everyone will die eventually, it is better to live a life with no regret than to live a selfish one that is filled with fear and self-pity. This is shown throughout the poem in various ways, but mostly through the dialogue between Death and the Lady. This piece is very captivating, it's use of end rhyme steals its readers attention and it's diction effectively supports it's meaning. This author successfully has made a beautiful piece of literature on the fear of death, that will hopefully continue to influence other as it has up until
This is a poem about the joy and sadness that comes with the flash of burning life soon blown out with nothing more then a sigh. It focuses on the sadness as those we care for go far too gently into that good night. Of those who left before their time. As this poem was written specifically for Thomass dying father it is even more poignant in the emotional weight the words convey. This poem radiates with intensity, in particular, the verse beginning: wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight is simply beautiful poetry. Addressed to the poet's father as he approaches blindness and death. The relevant aspect of the relationship was Thomas's profound respect for his father, tall and strong in Thomass passionate mind but now tamed by illness and the passing of time. The acceptance of death and a peaceful rest afterwards are pushed aside in favor of an ungentle rage so blind it almost mirrors the vigor of childhood frustration at the nature of things we are powerless to change. Further more, the poem speaks as much of the loss of love and the feelings of one left behind as of death itself. The meaning of the poem stays shrouded in metaphors like the references to night as "good". He acknowledged his father stood somewhere he had not, and perhaps saw what he could not. Thomas was not ready to let go of such an important part of his life even though his father was facing an irreversible course, and Thomass grief was perhaps all the greater.