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Flannery o'connor literary analysis
The life you save may be your own meaning
Flannery O'Connor story analysis from the author
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“The Life You Save May Be Your Own” was written by Flannery O’ Connor, published on May 12, 1955. The symbolism used by Flannery O’ Connor described a sense of mystery for the story. With color imagery, O’ Connor foreshadowed the plot of the story, and O’ Connor plotted a series of situational irony throughout the whole story, making contrast between the characters at the beginning and at the end of the story. From the story, O’ Connor wrote, “She had long pink‑gold hair and eyes as blue as a peacock's neck” (Connor); in this sentence, the description described the dressing of Mrs. Crater. However, a peacock was mentioned; peacocks in literature often symbol nobility, beauty, and mystery. In this case, mystery would be the suitable symbolism …show more content…
“Although the old woman lived in this desolate spot with only her daughter and she had never seen Mr. Shiftlet before, she could tell, even from a distance, that he was a tramp and no one to be afraid of” (Connor), Mrs. Crater said Mr. Shiftlet was a tramp and no one to be afraid of; however, Mr. Shiftlet proved her wrong by leaving her daughter Ms. Crater in The Hot Spot and drove the car away by himself. Next, “‘Lady,’ he asked finally, ‘where would you find you an innocent woman today’? I wouldn't have any of this trash I could just pick up.’”(Connor). From the quote that was spoken by Mr. Shiftlet, he appeared to be looking for an innocent woman, or an honest woman to marry. However, he did found an innocent woman, but he abandoned her at the end. If Ms. Crater was the innocent woman he was looking for, then why did he dumped her at the end and moved on to Mobile with a stolen car? Another example was given when Mr. Shiftlet first stayed at the farm. “‘Why listen, Lady,’ he said with a grin of delight, ‘the monks of old slept in their coffins!’”(Connor). In this conversation, Mrs. Crater could only offer him to sleep in the car. Then, Mr. Shiftlet compared himself to monks who slept in their coffins and that he could definitely sleep in the car. However, at the end of the story, he stole Mrs. Crater’s car, who was his host, that’s not what a monk would do. With the situational irony in the story, it provided many unexpected ending at the end of the story and displayed the changes that happened to the
I enjoyed reading Disciplined Hearts by Theresa O'Nell because i find that many people today do not know a lot about the Native American culture and what they have been through. Their cultures history is not talked about as much the African American or Hispanic's are. Most Americans know about the hardships that the African American and Hispanics had to overcome to assimilate to the level that they are today. I think O'Nell is trying to talk about the history of the Native American culture because, she believes that the reason that their culture is not well-known because of the fact that they have chosen to keep living like their ancestors and not assimilate to the American culture.
The drama, Mission of Mercy, by Esther Lipnick is a very inspiring read. It tells about a girl who doesn’t want to be like her proper, fancy family at all. Instead she wants to become a nurse. She leaves her home and becomes a nurse. It inspires me because both of my parents, and other family members of mine, are teachers, although I’m not going to be one. Mission of Mercy is a drama that could inspire many people to go for what they want, even if other people don’t always approve of it. Florence changes throughout all of the the scenes 1, 2, and 3.
In Flannery O’Connor’s “Revelation” a woman, as the title implies, who experiences a revelation. Pigs are an important symbol in the protagonist’s, Ruby Turpin’s, revelation. Throughout Ruby’s journey to her revelation, pigs appear frequently in “Revelation” and are important to Ruby’s revelation at the end of the story. Pigs reflect several aspects of Ruby’s life, primarily her perceptions. Ultimately, pigs reflect Ruby’s true character throughout the entire story.
On an ordinary day, Leslie opens the main door of her house, when she walked inside she saw her mom and sister Islla sitting on the coach. Islla was crying, and Leslie ask her “What happened?’ Why you crying?’”. Islla told her that she is pregnant and that she wants to keep the baby even if her boyfriend will be against the baby, but she will need to drop out from her University. In a few minutes of thinking, Leslie decided and told her sister “You don’t need to drop out I will help you to babysit with my nephew.”
A Stolen Life by Jaycee Lee Dugard is an autobiography recounting the chilling memories that make up the author’s past. She abducted when she was eleven years old by a man named Phillip Garrido with the help of his wife Nancy. “I was kept in a backyard and not allowed to say my own name,” (Dugard ix). She began her life relatively normally. She had a wonderful loving mother, a beautiful baby sister,, and some really good friends at school. Her outlook on life was bright until June 10th, 1991, the day of her abduction. The story was published a little while after her liberation from the backyard nightmare. She attended multiple therapy sessions to help her cope before she had the courage to share her amazing story. For example she says, “My growth has not been an overnight phenomenon…it has slowly and surely come about,” (D 261). She finally began to put the pieces of her life back together and decided to go a leap further and reach out to other families in similar situations. She has founded the J A Y C Foundation or Just Ask Yourself to Care. One of her goals was, amazingly, to ensure that other families have the help that they need. Another motive for writing the book may have also been to become a concrete form of closure for Miss Dugard and her family. It shows her amazing recovery while also retelling of all of the hardships she had to endure and overcome. She also writes the memoir in a very powerful and curious way. She writes with very simple language and sentence structures. This becomes a constant reminder for the reader that she was a very young girl when she was taken. She was stripped of the knowledge many people take for granted. She writes for her last level of education. She also describes all of the even...
The story, “Raising the Blinds”, by Peggy Kern, inspired the reader to correct their life from difficult dilemmas. The author was excited to be in college, and there was a different reason she wants to be in college. In the past year, Peggy started having problems with her parents. At first, her parents would argue in their bedroom, but the quarrel became extreme. Soon her father moved to the basement, and he no longer ate at the dinner table with them.
In the novel “Shane”, by Jack Schaefer, Marian, the wife of Joe and the mother of Bob is initially played out to be a very simple character. She cooks and cleans and cares for her family. She starts to develop a more complex character as Shane arrives. You can tell from the beginning that Marian wants to impress her guest with her cooking and her curiosity of the latest fashions. But as the novel progresses you begin to see that Marian may want more from Shane than originally shown.
I believe that Mr.Shiftlet, the character from the story “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” by Flannery O’Conner is an innocent, truthful, and honest man. Although there are many misconceptions towards Mr.Shiftlet, this is mainly due to his complex character. My first example is as Mr.Shiftlet enters the story. At first he appears to the reader as innocent and pitiful. He shows an emotion to the reader as him being portrayed as helpless, innocent, and as a cripple. Mr.Shiftlet later questions Mrs. Crater why she trusts him stating, “…you never have seen me before: how you know I ain’t lying?” again appealing to his innocent appearance. Mr.Shiftlet’s helpless and pitiful character shows those around him believing that he is trustworthy. Another example is that as he is first led off his religious course by the thought that the car would be his ultimate passage to spiritual freedom. He compares the spirit to a car starting “the spirit...is like an automobile: always on the move.” This supports Mr.Shiftlet complex character because all of Mr.Shiftlet’s actions were specifically put to help himself, or in other words, to obtain the vehicle, as another action of just simply using his resources. A complex character once again expressed in the text, yet this time through his guilt. In the story it relates that Mr.Shiftlet searches for one last chance of redemption. Mr.Shiftlet knew that a man with a car has his responsibilities, so that’s why he gave the boy a lift. This act of kindness was a chance for Mr.Shiftlet to feel better about his mistakes. Once again, I believe that there are many misconceptions towards Mr.Shiftlet actions due to his complex character.
Throughout reading this novel, my thought on transgender and transsexual individuals was pretty set and stone. For example, I knew from reading the textbook that a transgender is a person that is born—in Jenny’s case—a male, but was psychologically and emotionally born a female. However, Jenny took things one-step further and became a transsexual, which is an individual that underwent surgery to obtain the genitals that match the psychological and emotional gender within, which in her case was a female. Therefore, Jenny Finney Boylan would be considered a transsexual female. What I did not know prior to reading this book is how tedious the process is to make a sex change. To be honest I never thought about the process a transsexual needed to go through to become one’s self, I did not think about the many steps taken to obtain the voice, or look of a female that Jenny was striving for. I also did not think about the surgery, and how scary that type of surgery could actually be. For example, on page 124 Jennifer is discussing the process of transition with her psychologist, Dr. Strange. On this page Dr. Strange is beginning to inform Jenny, and essentially myself, on how to begin the transition of becoming a female. First Dr. Strange was listing off the effects the hormones will have on Jenny’s body, and I first they made sense to me; softer skin, fluffier hair, but I never knew the physical changes hormones could have on someone, especially a man. For instance, I learned that there is such a thing called “fat migration.” This is when the fat on previous parts of your body migrates to another location. I learned from this novel that fat migration is a result of hormones, and since Jenny was once a man, her face would become less r...
In the short story “A Kind of Courage” by Ruth Sterling, the protagonist, Davy, is trying to win Ginny’s heart.
In the book This Song Will Save Your Life written by Leila Sales, the main character, Elise Dembowski, struggles with accepting herself for who she is. Elise spends the summer of ninth grade completely renovating herself. She tries to study pop culture, update her wardrobe, and exercise. Elise’s first day of school does not go too well, and she struggles to make new friends. When a final attempt at popularity fails, Elise stumbles upon an underground warehouse club where she meets Vicky, a girl in a band; Pippa, a carefree spirit from England; Char, a charming DJ; and most importantly, her newfound love for DJing. This witty novel shows a brave protagonist, characterization, and an abundance of complicated conflicts.
There are many policy issues that affect families in today’s society. Hunger is a hidden epidemic and one major issue that American’s still face. It is hard to believe that in this vast, ever growing country, families are still starving. As stated in the book Growing Up Empty, hunger is running wild through urban, rural, and even suburban communities. This paper will explore the differing perspectives of the concerned camp, sanguine camp, and impatient camp. In addition, each camps view, policy agenda, and values that underlie their argument on hunger will be discussed.
The author begins the story with a strong statement, “I found myself in a Chinese funeral parlor because of a phone call I made to my cleaning lady” (Schmitt); it takes the reader right into the funeral parlor and draws the reader into the story: how she got to the funeral parlor and what she doing there was the question I had. She starts the story with some background about how she got to China. Then moves on to the funeral that was happening in her neighbors’ home. She describes how the family was grievously weeping as she was walking toward her apartment. She noticed what happened and wonder why they were weeping. “Do you know why the neighbors are very sad?” she asked her cleaning lady.
Shiftlet drives to the courthouse and gets married with Lucynell, while the Senior Lucynell is a witness. Mr. Shiftlet is not satisfied with the act of signing of papers, and he mentions again that if they cut his heart out they still wouldn’t know anything about him. He says that he was raised knowing that he should send his wife to a hotel and a nice dinner, but since he had no money to do that, he ‘milked’ the Senior Lucynell for seventeen, fifty dollars for a modest honeymoon. Mr. Shiftlet and the young Lucynell take a trip for their honeymoon and the Senior Lucynell felt pained saying goodbye to her daughter for the first time, but she knew or she thought she knew that they were going to come back in two
Flannery O 'Connor wrote The Life You Save May Be Your Own in 1955. She had a terminal illness and focused many of her stories on the truths of reality. Within this story, she describes an innocent girl, Lucynell, and the dishonest people around her. She keeps Lucynell a constant innocence throughout the story as the other characters lose their purity. The main thing separating Lucynell from the other characters is her lack of sensibility and general awareness of reality. Flannery O’Connor reveals innocence is only for the unaware using color imagery, situational irony, and allusion.