Essay about Alice Munro's The Red Dress and The Day of The Butterfly

In Laura Kryhoski’s critical analysis of “The Red Convertible,” she points out several elements often overlooked when reading the short story for the first time. At first glance, the story appears “definably tragic” (Kryhoski). Kryhoski claims that if the reader were to investigate author Louise Erdrich’s background, the story would seem less of a tragedy and more of a reflection of her upbringing. As the narrator in “The Red Convertible,” Lyman seems to be recalling the tale from his memories rather than telling the events as they occur. Lyman focuses more on the distinct detail of each moment than he does on the bigger picture. This invokes the image

Parents cling to their children wanting them to stay young forever, wanting endless memories and nothing to change, yet they must be able to part from these feelings to allow the child to grow. In the story “A Private Talk with Holly”, the author, Henry Felsen, uses symbolism to convey the central idea that if you love someone you have to let them go. When Holly, the main character of the story, talks to her Dad about changing her plans, he is faced with a difficult decision, but in the end he allows Holly to chase her dreams for her own good.

Fitting in is always an issue in the world of teenage girls and some girls have better outcomes than others. “Snow White” by Grace Hu is a story about a teenage girl named Mary who is an albino. Mary struggles to be accepted because of her scary white exterior. Also she has low self confidence from being teased by her peers. Mary also only has one true friend that begins to drift apart from her. Another story that deals with the issue of acceptance is the story “Red Dress”. “Red Dress” by Alice Munro is a story about a teenage girl entering her first year of high school. She fights to be accepted and decides to go to the school dance with her one friend Lonnie, despite her terrible clothes put together by her crazy

The Red Convertible by Louise Erdrich is more than an emotional story about the lives of two brothers who grew up together on an Indian reservation. She uses a writing style that allows the reader to understand the text, while providing the opportunity to read into the story. Erdrich uses metaphors, symbols, imagery to describe and define the brothers Henry and Lyman’s relationship.

In the short story “The Red Convertible” you will find some important elements that are integral to the support and development of the theme brotherhood. First, you will see how the road trip gives a lesson in the story. Second, you will discover how the war affected the relationship of Lyman and Henry. Finally, you will understand the symbolism of the red convertible and the link it has between both brothers. One important element that has a powerful lesson in the story is the road trip. While Lyman and Henry went on a drive one afternoon, they met a girl named Susy in the middle of the road. Susy had her hair in buns around her ears and was very short. They let her jump in the car and

Not only that but her questioning of gender role was a concern for her. After her parents were separated, her father’s expectations of her were no longer there and did not speak to one another. After a while, blaming one-self after a separation of the parents is always expected from young children and so Roberta’s feeling that the separation of her mother and father was due to her misbehavior at home allowed her to be not happy. The separation of her parents did not only cause Roberta to feel not happy but also her thinking was shaped in ways that blamed all men to be the exact same way and that on one could be the same. This can be related to what each child feels and thinks if that were to happen to their own family, and unfortunately in our current society there are people that still the same way as Roberta’s father and

Jeanette’s father is a man that is extremely smart in science and math, and an amazing storyteller, however he drinks/smokes way too much and can be very abusive. Her mother is a religious and tough woman, who could live with basically any situation and will go through with something until it is done. Jeanette’s tone to her parents, however, is not of happiness, but instead sadness, because of the father’s behaviors, and her mother’s stubbornness to stay with him. The tone towards their actions from Jeanette is dismay, because for almost all of their actions, both her mother and father don’t think about the consequences before they

Lastly, her family betrayed her by not listening to her side of the story after her sister told lies about her, and they betrayed her when they acted as if they did not care if she moved out of the house. In all of these actions, the family itself and certain members of the family are portrayed as uncaring, unsupportive, disrespectful, conniving, deceitful, and hateful to Sister. Through every action of the family, Sister is treated harshly, and she tries to not let this bother her. Yet, anger and bitterness build up inside of her until she cannot take it anymore. Consequently, it built up so much inside of her that it severely affected Sister so profoundly that she moved away from her home to get away from her family.

The narrator is totally crushed by the gender discrimination. She longed to be seen by her mother and her grandma. The narrator is heartbroken that her mother loved her brother more than her and failed to notice her. “When she went into Nonso’s room to say good night, she always came out laughing that laugh. Most times, you pressed your palms to your ears to keep the sound out, and kept your palms pressed to your ears, even when she came into your room to say Good night, darling, sleep well. She never left your room with that laugh” (190). Her agony can be easily seen by the way of her narrating. She does not get the affection that she deserves. She really needs the affection from her own mother, but she is not getting it. She compares the love which her mother shows to his brother and herself. This is gender discrimination can be seen with her grandmother too. She hated her grandma as she would always support her brother and find fault with her. Even though what the brother did, no matter what crime. Her mother and grandmother always supported her brother and never supported or showed interest towards

"Riding The Red"at first glance is a simple narrative with a grandmother telling a story about a wolf, but with further analyzation the two themes of first love and innocent become very clear. The author’s repetition of certain words like blood and dance directs your attention to a deeper meaning hinting and connections to the "Little Red Riding Hood" which reflects back to the underlining message of what happens when a girl grows up.

Every person reaches a point in their lives when they must define themselves in relation to their parents. We all come through this experience differently, depending on our parents and the situation that we are in. For some people the experience comes very early in their lives, and can be a significant life changing experience. In William Faulkner’s “Barn Burning” Colonel Sartoris Snopes must decide either to stand with his father and compromise his integrity, or embrace honesty and morality and condemn his family. This is a difficult decision to make, especially for a ten year old boy that has nothing outside of what his father provides. Sarty’s decision to ultimately betray his father is dependent on his observation of Abner’s character

In the story the author portrays the protagonist differently from the other characters because she talks about the physical appearance of other characters and when it comes to the narrator we have no idea what she looks like but she is developed partially through her relationship with other characters, although we the readers do come the find out that the narrator is around the age of 15-17 years old and we can assume that she has a bad relationship with her parents because first of all she talks about them maybe once or twice in the whole story and second of all we know that they sent her to boarding school so that alone proves that her relationship with them is lacking. As readers we also know that she has trouble opening up in the story she say “To open your heart. You open your legs but can’t, or don’t dare anyone, to open your heart” (237). This is a prime example of how author characterizes the protagonist as broken and emotionally damaged. And as the story progress the author becomes more honest with us the readers and herself, she starts the reveal the pain she is in and how lonely she feels. The narrator gives us an example of how she feels after sex by saying “After sex, you curl up like a shrimp, something deep inside you ruined, slammed in a place that sickness at

In the short story, “A Red Dress 1946” by Alice Munro, Color imagery is used for signifying a girls point of view of her world and her own self by using the color red which represents nonconformity. The narrator has only a slight interest in being red, but she really wants to be blue, just like everyone else. Munro writes, “When I was asked a question in class, any simple little question at all…that I had blood on my skirt”.(2) The narrator is just so nervous about being red she is thinking of bad things that can happen with the color red. She is thinking of all the bad times the color red could do a girl badly, just like a girls period could leak at any moment. In “A Red Dress 1946”, a short story by Alice Munro, she uses Color Imagery to show the significance of the narrator’s view of the color red and all the “Evil” about it.

In her transformation of the well-known fable "Little Red Riding Hood," Angela Carter plays upon the reader's familiarity. By echoing elements of the allegory intended to scare and thus caution young girls, she evokes preconceptions and stereotypes about gender roles. In the traditional tale, Red sticks to "the path," but needs to be rescued from the threatening wolf by a hunter or "woodsman." Carter retells the story with a modern perspective on women. By using fantasy metaphorically and hyperbolically, she can poignantly convey her unorthodox and underlying messages.

her father tries to change who she is and force her into a gender role