Angela's Ashes Poverty Analysis

The first and most important antagonist in Angela’s Ashes is Malachy McCourt. Frank McCourt described his father, Malachy, as “the Holy Trinity with three people in him, the one in the morning with the paper, the one at night with the stories and the prayers, and then the one who does the bad thing and comes home with the smell of whiskey” (210). While Malachy was an important and influential antagonist in the story, he was not always the best role model for his children. Mr. McCourt was said to be known for abandoning his family for multiple days at a time without warning or any way for them to provide for themselves. Often times Malachy would spend the majority of his paychecks on feeding his addiction, rather than feeding his children.

The night is crisp and black as the moon lets off an eerie glow, leaves rustle and fall somewhere in the distance. A silhouette dwarfs the blackberry bush in the corner as one’s footsteps refrain, they move closer; you run. Suspense is a state of tension and anxiety which was used in the sentence above and is common in books and short stories. In the short story “The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W Jacobs suspense is created in a variety of ways. Jacobs demonstrates this by using foreshadowing, conflict and surprise endings.

Since the story uses a certain object, the Jacket, as the meaning of several issues, it primarily focuses on the narrator's poverty-stricken family. First of all, an example of the poverty is demonstrated when the narrator complains that the jacket "was so ugly and big that I knew I'd have to wear it a long time"(paragraph 3). It is clear that his lack of money was a problem in which he

     Throughout Frank’s childhood, there were very few times when feeding the family was not a challenge. Even when Frank’s father was working, he would very often drink his paycheck instead of bringing it home to his family. Frank remembers a time when his father did bring home his paycheck, and took notice at how proud his mother was when she was finally able to pay the man for her groceries. She was able to “hold her head up again because there’s nothing worse in the world than to owe and be beholden to anyone”(23). This is where Frank learns that the ability to pay brings dignity and self-respect. He draws a connection, that when he has food, his family is prospering. Later on in life, when Frank begins to earn his own wages, he loves the feeling of independence, and dreams of providing for a family of his own. He works for Mr. Hannon, delivering coal, and makes many of the other boys jealous of him. He doesn’t mind when the boys harass him though, because he “has the job” and Mr. Hannon tells him he’s “powerful”(264). Frank connects having a job with being powerful. This shows how Frank was able to overcome the struggles of hunger and actually taught him the value of hard work.

Imagine: A young boy scavenges for food to provide for his impoverished family which was composed of his ill mother and starving siblings or a homeless, single mom desperatley seeking for shelter. These synopses from "Angela's Ashes" by Frank McCourt and "The Street" by Ann Petry share a common theme: perseverance through hardships. In "Angela's Ashes," a memoir by Frank McCourt, he stells about the harships he endured through his childhood, such as, struggling to assist his family in the midst of poverty by stealing food to provide for them. Futhermore, in "The Street," a novel by Ann Petry, tells the story of young Lutie Johnson, a homeless single mom who is seeking shelter for herself and her children. In these two excerpts, the authors use the characters, settings, and events to develop the theme, which I've identified as perseverance through hardships.

In Angela's Ashes, the theme of struggling to get through life's obstacles is shown using character. In paragraph 4, McCourt writes, "You can look in people's windows and see how cozy it is in their kitchens with fires glowing or ranges black and hot everything bright in the electric light cups and saucers on the table with plates of sliced bread pounds of butter jars of jam smells of fried eggs... the mother crisp and clean in her apron everyone washed and the Sacred Heart of Jesus looking down on them from the wall suffering and sad but still happy with all that food and light and good Catholics at their breakfast." This quote shows, that the protagonist has been peering into the houses of the rich and realizes that the rich has everything they want and more. This theme shows that the main character is jealous of the rich lifestyle because they have more struggles than the rich do. In addition, this theme is also presented using events. In paragraph 5, "In a second I have two bottles of lemonade up under my jersey and i saunter away trying to look innocent," (McCourt). This quote is

It found all the dirt and dust and grime on the sidewalk and lifted it up so that the dirt got into their noses, making it difficult to breathe; the dust got into their eyes and blinded them; and the grit stung their skins” (ll 21-25). Wind cannot discourage people or physically lift dirt up into people’s noses and eyes. The personification in this quote emphasizes the negative thoughts about 116th street and how it affects the people who live on this street which further develops a negative relationship between Lutie Johnson and the urban setting Petry uses selection of detail to establish the negative relationship between Lutie Johnson and the urban setting. For example in lines 50-55 it says, “she could see that it had been there for a long time because its original coat of white paint was streaked with rust where years of rain and snow had finally eaten the paint off down to the metal and the metal had slowly rusted, making a dark red stain like blood.” Petry uses selection of detail by the negative way she describes the streets and items on it. Petry uses words that have negative connotation, like “streaked,” “eaten,” and “blood,” to help emphasize the negative relationship between

It’s known to Lutie that the paper, dust, and grime, does not seem to get in her face and anger her like everyone else. The quote that talks about the newspaper that wraps around their feet and triggers the people, causing them to kick their feet in annoyance toward the paper, is an example of parallelism. The reasoning behind this is that the quote gives detail into what causes the citizens difficulty and trouble. However, there are parts of the given story where only the wind plays a difficult and impenetrable effect on the way it deals people with very hectic trouble, which causes them dismay. For example, when Ann Petry expresses that the wind blew newspaper back again and again, it shows the rhetorical device known as an epizeuxis. This is defined as one word that is repeated for emphasis. This shines the focus on how the wind affects the citizens that are moving throughout the street, as they deal with the pain in their eyes and throat, and changes the way they experience their own environment. The citizens in the urban city definitely have a dismantled

Poe and Dahl both create the effect of suspense. The feeling of being uncertain of what may happen next. In "Lamb to the slaughter" Dahl illustrates suspense when Mary Maloney knocks her husband over the head (pg. 4) after she's introduced as a sweet, loving, woman. After she kills

Throughout Angela's Ashes it is evident that the narrator, Frank, is somewhat ignorant to the reasons why he and his family are suffering socioeconomically; he doesn't realize that his parents are actually the root of the problem. This is why it's very significant that Mr. Timoney had Frank read A Modest Proposal to him, for the essay puts blame on the Irish as the initiators of the economic crisis in Ireland. The author, Jonathon Swift, states that the Irish keep having children that they can't support and if they didn't have so many children, they would have more money for food and other necessities. In response, Swift writes that Irish children should be sold to the English as food. In turn, the Irish would gain a profit from their,

However, when their mother came through the door and told them of a hungry family, the 4 women did not hesitate in giving away their luscious breakfast to those in need. The children delivered the food to the family and “a poor, bare, miserable room it was, with broken windows, no fire, ragged bedclothes, a sick mother, wailing baby, and a group of pale, hungry children cuddled under one old quilt, trying to keep warm”(24). The sisters realize what a harsh environment they live in, and because the setting is so pessimistic, they try to share the little wealth they have so that everyone may live long full lives. The setting in which they live, houses many people who have even less wealth than their own family. However, because of this dreadful place, they try and make sure that their community, or their family, is taken care of, even at the expense of their luxuries.

Frank McCourt has a subtle yet striking way of telling his story like it was; miserable. The way he described how little food they had and how close their family came to being homeless is amazing. When telling about the twins' deaths he states it so simply, " I know Oliver is dead and Malachy knows Oliver is dead but Eugene is too small to know anything. When he wakes in the morning he says, Ollie, Ollie, and toddles around the room looking under beds. . . . Dad says Eugene is lucky to have brothers like Malachy and me because we help him forget and soon, with God's help, he'll have no memory of Oliver at all. He died anyway. Six months after Oliver went. . . there was Eugene, cold in the bed beside

Angela’s Ashes is an autobiographical memoir written by Irish-American author Frank McCourt. McCourt is the oldest of five brothers and one sister. He along with four of his sibling were born in America in Brooklyn, New York and lived there until he was four and then moved back to Ireland because they had a hard time surviving in America. His family and moved back to Ireland in the midst of the Great Depression finding it hard for his father to get a job because of his alcoholism and his Northern manner. Throughout McCourt’s childhood he was caught in the middle of all the hardships his parents endured. Although, his family endured much struggle, that did not stop them from fulfilling his religious duties, such as First Communion. It also did not stop him and his brother, Malachy from going to school to learn more about their religion. In his early teens, he realized that his father had abandoned his mother and his siblings when he said he would go look for a job. At the age of 14, Frank stopped going to school and got odd jobs to help support his mother and siblings. He remembers his childhood as the miserable Irish Catholic childhood. He himself decided to move back to America when he was 18 to get away from the poverty in Ireland.

In recent decades, Cormac McCarthy has staked his claim as one of the all-time titans of American literature through publishing masterpieces like Blood Meridian, Suttree, and The Road. In his works his advanced level of technical mastery becomes apparent through his expertly harmonized coordination of literary elements toward certain narrative ends, such as the generation of suspense. In this light, McCarthy’s literary style is a practical one, in that he organizes literary elements in his works toward actualizing particular goals. In The Road, for instance, McCarthy directs his style throughout the text so as to maximize the feeling of suspense that readers experience throughout the book. This kind of stylistic maneuvering is expressed on pages 105-110 and pages 118-123 of the the text. But, it must be noted here that the generation of suspense in these passages does not result from similar stylistic approaches. McCarthy uses style in differently in Passage A and Passage B but ultimately toward the same end, namely generating suspense for readers of The Road. Passage A relies on dialogue to develop its suspense, whereas the style of Passage B relies on narrative action for its suspense.

Poverty in Britain When the Liberal government came to power in 1906 they had no stated intention of government intervention of social policy. Between the years 1906 and 1914, the Liberals took steps to improve the health, living and working conditions of the groups of individuals their policies were designed for. The victory for the Liberals was a surprising landslide which left the Liberals with 401 seats and Labour with 53 seats.