Literary Analysis: The Jilting Of Granny Weatherall

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Literary Analysis: The Jilting of Granny Weatherall Katherine Ann Porter’s lamentable short story, “The Jilting of Granny Weatherall” illustrates that abandonment has the power to leave one scarred even years down the road. Porter’s utilization of stream of consciousness highlights Weatherall’s fixation on being left at the altar and the role this distress plays in her life, leaving her detriment. Porter employs stream of consciousness in order to portray that even as Granny lies on her deathbed, her mind diverges from her current thoughts and she refers back to the time which she was left at the altar. Granny Weatherall’s train of thought shifts numerous times throughout the story: one particular change of thought shows Granny telling her children “You waste life when you waste good food” to her recalling the day of wedding which she was left at, “Fresh breeze.. green day.. she has put on the white veil and set out the white cake for a man and he doesn’t come.” The sudden shift of thought from dialogue to …show more content…

Stream of consciousness, however, provides an internal monologue of her train of thought, consisted of George and proving herself worthy to him. Abandonment can leave others impaired and alter the way they see themselves. In these ways, being left at the altar had stripped off any self-worth Granny saw within herself and has pushed her to follow a checklist of what a perfect housewife should be in order to build back any esteem George had destroyed through leaving her at the altar. Additionally, Granny still thinks about George and their wedding day together 60 years after it had happened -- even after having married John and having 3 kids. Abandonment left Granny scarred in taking control of what she spent the rest of their life doing in order to prove her worth, leaving her fixated in the memory of being jilted even near the end of her

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