There is an Ancient Greek belief that one’s greatest strength is also his or her greatest weakness. In Willa Cather’s, O Pioneers, Marie proves this belief on many different occasions. Marie’s liveliness, which is arguably her greatest quality, acts in turn as her greatest weakness when it becomes a contributing factor to her death. Marie, a beautiful, vivacious Bohemian girl, migrates to the prairie from the city at a young age. She is used to getting attention from everyone everywhere she goes. Her personality, normal in Europe and even the city, is foreign to the plain pioneers on the prairie. She is an oddity compared to them. Because of this, Marie’s vitality gets her into a dangerous love affair with her friend, Emil, and ends up …show more content…
However, shortly after marrying, Frank and Marie have internal realizations.They need to be with different people. Frank needs a wife subservient to him, while Marie needs a more expressive and affectionate husband. Frank could not be this person to Marie because his main priority has always been and will always be his land. Marie could not be this person to Frank because her personality is too strong to conceal. Marie is a constant reminder to Frank that he is not the young, spontaneous man he used to be, which she still is. Marie, according to Alexandra is “too young and pretty for this sort of life.”(102) As mentioned before, Marie’s personality does not correspond with many aspects of prairie life. Another example of this is hunting, a leisurely activity to most. While out hunting with Emil, Marie was happy and content until it actually started. “There was a sharp crack from the gun, and five of the birds fell to the ground.”(109) After Emil shoots the birds, Marie is distraught and cannot understand why he must kill living beings. As Emil tries to comfort her, seeing her distress, Marie does not find comfort. Marie’s emotions overcome her : “she said tearfully, ‘but I didn 't think. I hate to see them when they are first shot. They were having such a good time, and we 've spoiled it all for them.’”(109) Marie expresses her sadness and illustrates an outstanding quality about her; she does not think before acting. When she is
Four have already left home, one will leave soon and the other three still dwell in the house with her. She then begins to express the dangers of the world around her in a bird’s point of view. For example, she is afraid that her young will fall in a fowler’s snare, be caught in a net or by birdlime on twigs, or hurt by a hawk. In a human world a fowler’s snare might be fallings into the hands of trickery, robbery, or any other type of crime. Caught by net or birdlime might represent being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and a hawk-inflicted injury might symbolize being wounded or killed by an Indian or criminal.
O'Brien's The Things They Carried O’Connor remarks “The Things They Carried” is a short story that is written “as an experience not an abstraction” and that “the meaning has been embodied in it”. These quotations are truly pure in description and interpretation of the short story as the reader, must look beyond the crude physical properties of the objects and actions chronicled and focus more upon their hidden meanings and messages. O’Brien uses the physical characteristics of weight to make an impact upon the reader to relate with the men. In emphasizing the soldier’s everyday burden, the reader can easily relate to the situation in general. As the story progresses, the main attention of the
“ (Cather, 91). Despite her father’s disapproval, they elope after Marie spends a year away at a convent, while constantly thinking about Frank. A few years after marrying, Marie realizes that she is not the right one for Frank. She shares in a conversation with Alexandra, “I could pick out exactly the right sort of woman for Frank – now. The trouble is you almost have to marry a man before you can find out the sort of wife he needs…” (125).
Early on when she is newly blind due to the cataracts that formed in her eyes life is very difficult for her. “What is blindness? Where there should be a wall, her hands find nothing. Where there should be nothing, a table leg gouges her shin . . . [Marie’s] only sanctuary is in bed, the hem of the quilt at her chin . . .” (Doerr 27). In his kindness, Monsieur LeBlanc meticulously carves a model city for her to learn how to find her way around safely. Due to this kind act Marie is now able, with her father accompanying her for safety, walk around her neighborhood. Later on when they are forced to flee to Saint-Malo where some of their relatives live, Marie and her father walk the entirety of the journey and again, Marie has to depend on her father’s guidance to help her make the journey safely. “‘Marie, I see a hotel.’ ‘You said the hotels were full.’ ‘. . . Come. It’s not far.’ Again [Monsieur LeBlanc] carries his daughter. One more half mile” (Doerr 110). Even though she can sense something is not going as planned with their trip, she allows her father to carry her and believes that he will bring her to Saint-Malo safely. Marie’s faith in her father, although she is blind, allows them to arrive safely in Saint-Malo where they can stay safely through the duration of the
O Pioneers by Willa Cather sets itself apart from other novels of its time because of what its stands for, feminism. It exemplifies women’s equality, represented by the main character, Alexandra, by showing her survival in a male dominated society. She succeeded in building her female identity and achieved a sense of female attainment by revolutionizing the wild land and struggling for her equal rights with all that surrounded her. This paper focuses on the feminist thoughts and the positive attitude of the image of the strong character Alexandra, who was independent, brave, and optimistic. A spirit like hers, of strength and courage, insisted that she would never be defeated by man or nature.
Frank needs something to protect. Cee, his dearly loved sister, take up this role for most of the novel. Concurrently, Frank satisfies his troubled need to care for someone and loves his sister. Willingly, Frank admits, “I’ve had only two regular women. I liked the small breakable thing inside each one. Wherever their personality, smarts, or looks, something soft lay in each…A little V…that I could break with a forefinger if I wanted to. But never did” (67-68), Frank expresses his obsession with weakness. Frank denotes this weakness as a small child to whom he is the parent. He handles it cautiously, cares for it, and provides a home for it. He needs it to feel needed, which happens to be a reoccurring theme throughout the novel. “When…I caught my reflection in a store window, I thought it was somebody else. Some dirty pitiful-looking guy…Right then, I decided to clean up” (69). In this moment, Frank’s search of his relationship with Lily begins from a forceful self-hatred that has presented itself since his deployment to Korea. After his relationship with Lily fades and
The first part of the diary starts with her being a regular girl having fun and turns into a girl going into hiding with seven other people. In addition, she has to deal with relation problems with her mom, sister, and the people she is in hiding with. The problems begin when eight people are confined in a small area and everybody begins to irritate and annoy one another. Anne was especially concerned with herself and with her attitude towards the others in the group. She's mainly concerned with her mother who always treats her like baby. Mr. Frank tires to ease the quarrels between them by telling Anne to help out more around the house, but Anne stubbornly declines preferring to concentrate more on her studies. She especially gets plenty of confrontations with Mrs. Van Daan who thinks she is a spoiled little girl. Mrs. Van Daan constantly tells Anne’s father, “ If Anne were my daughter.” Anne’s respond to this in her diary was, “Thank heavens I’m not!” Of course
Joyce Carol Oates has captivated the imagination of the reader within her short story The Abduction. There are many components to making a story great as well, and in his Ted Talk “The Clues to a Great Story”, Andrew Stanton goes into detail about the dos and don’ts of story. Joyce Carol Oates uses several of the positive references from Stanton’s Ted Talk throughout her short story to grab the reader’s attention and envelope them into the story of a girl gone missing.
Anne matures throughout the course of her diary entries, moving from detailed accounts of basic activities to deeper, more profound thoughts about humanity and her own personal nature. “I know what I want, I have a goal, an opinion, I have a religion and love. Let me be myself and then I am satisfied. I know that I’m a woman, a woman with inward strength and plenty of courage.” This shows that Anne matures through the course of her diary, she considers herself as a woman rather than a young girl and sets goals for herself that she wants to achieve. Anne becomes more optimistic even after she feels misunderstood by everyone and feels completely alone.
Many things influence a person’s overall perception and opinions about the world around them, such as their education, geographic location of upbringing, or religious views. All of these factors, combined with countless others, shape each person into who they are and how they interact with society. The time period a person lives through is another exceptionally important contribution, as it is creates the entire backdrop of their experiences -- socially, economically, and politically. A psychoanalytical look at O Pioneers! by Willa Cather, explains how the social and cultural implications of Willa’s life are transferred to this piece of literature. I believe that Willa Cather created the primary, male characters in O Pioneers! based on the unfortunate experiences she had with men in her early adulthood, which caused these strongly biased characters, while the female characters are given exaggerated positive personality traits.
Religion is a big influence in Flannery O 'Connor 's writing. “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” stresses the idea of good and evil. This can also be viewed at the evil in Christ. The story is set in the early 1900s. “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” begins with a woman and her disabled daughter sitting on their porch and she notices a man walking towards their home. The man, Mr. Shiftlet, sees an old car that he wants. The old woman, Lucynell, is also craving something and takes the opportunity to achieve it. By her use of symbols, imagery, and irony, she reveals that there is corruption within Christ.
The novel Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick has a long list of things to teach us about the New World. The fact that it’s showed us that the very first pilgrims had no idea what they were in for was crucial. They were hit with the realization that the Natives would be wild and ferocious instead of calm and tame. They’d known they would be introduced to new ways of life, and disease, but they didn’t suspect that it’d be the most destructive part to the goodwill of the newly born colony.
O Pioneers!(1993) by Willa Cather begins on a blustery winter day, in the town of Hanover, Nebraska, sometime between 1883 and 1890. The narrator introduces four main character: the very young Emil Bergson; his older sister, Alexandra; her friend Carl Linstrum; and a little girl, Marie Shabata. Alexandra's father, John Bergson, is dying. He tells his two oldest sons, Lou and Oscar, that he is leaving the farmland, and all of what he has accomplished, to their sister.
In the novel O Pioneers! the author Willa Cather?s vision of Alexandra Bergson is consistent in character treatment with other authors such as Nathaniel Hawthorne (Scarlet Letter), and Stephan Crane (Maggie: A Girl of the Streets). In each novel, all authors possess a central character that has an obvious tension between themselves and their community. Unlike the previous authors, Cather?s sympathies lie toward Alexandra. She makes Alexandra seem artificial because she has given a woman (also being her main character) strength and courage, along with power to overcome those who wish to pull her down.
'For the first time, perhaps, since that land emerged from the waters of the geologic ages, a human face was set toward it with love and yearning'