Examples Of Selfishness In The Scarlet Ibis

Doodle was persistent, since he was motivated and determined. In the story, it says, “Doodle, don’t you want to learn to walk? He’d nod his head, and I’d say, well if you don’t keep trying, you’ll never learn” (Hurst, 598). Being persistent and active played a big role in both of their lives. It isn’t implied that Doodle never gave up, but from what the brother said to keep trying instead of giving up, one may see that Doodle didn’t give up. If Doodle had given up, it would have meant that he would have never learned how to walk. The scarlet ibis traveled around, and it was strange, since it came out of nowhere, and

The short story “The Scarlet Ibis”,by James Hurt is about two brothers, the older one being the narrator and the younger one named Doodle, which is physically disabled. The older brother was thirteen when Doodle was five. Thus, the older brother wasn’t actually old enought to take good care of him yet. Doodle’s older brother took care of him more than his parents did. The film What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, by Peter Hedges is also about two brothers, the oldest being Gilbert and the youngest being Arnie, which is mentally disabled. Gilbert took full responsability for Arnie even when he got in trouble.This is because his mother is obese, she is unable to be a mother to Arnie, she can barely walk, and can’t go up the stairs to her room. The older brothers tell their story. They mostly talk about the relationship with their younger brothers, which involved kindness and cruelty. Siblings tend to be harsh and amiable at the same time, in the following paragraphs the kinship among the two brothers in each story will vary.

The narrator, Brother, tells the story of Doodle, his brother, and his childhood with all his disabilities; starting off by telling about Doodle when he was a baby and toddler, about how he could not do much for himself for a long time, but eventually learns to crawl. He soon moves onto when Doodle got a little older and Brother would have to take him everywhere he went and how the two would take on the mission of teaching Doodle to walk; they spent almost everyday out in the woods making Doodle stronger and stronger. On Doodle’s sixth birthday, they showed the family what he could do;

When Brother set out to teach Doodle to walk and realized he had succeeded he became so proud and was convinced that he could teach Doodle anything. The only thing is Brother didn't teach him anything that he did for Doodle's benefit he did it for his own satisfaction. When Doodle had failed and couldn't get up Brother let his pride control him. "I ran as far as I could, leaving him far behind with a wall of rain dividing us" (604). The only reason Brother left Doodle is because of his pride. He felt he had spent so much time teaching him things so he could be normal all for nothing, and that aggrevated him. Doodle had just shown extraordinary success by rowing against the current and running as far as he did but for some reason that wasn't enough for Brother. The least that Brother could have done was went back and picked him up helping him back to the house considering all of the energy he had exerted. The only thing that Doodle ever asked of his brother was not to leave him and that is exactly what he

The setting of “The Scarlet Ibis” helps prepare the readers’ state of mind from the very beginning. In the first place, the story takes place at the end of World War I and represents the internal conflict the narrator has as he struggles between guilt of his younger brother’s death and the acceptance of his brother’s disabilities. With this in mind, the narrator is abashed over Doodle’s inability to walk because he thinks disabilities are shameful, and he wanted a brother who was athletic, outgoing, and adventurous. For this reason,”When Doodle was five years old, I was embarrassed at having a brother of that age who couldn't walk, so I set out to teach him (Hurst 417).” The narrator admits to going out of his way to train Doodle to walk because he has so much pride that it is getting in the way of more important goals, meaning he would rather have a “normal” brother than a happy one. The poor treatment of his brother ultimately leads to Doodle’s death. Furthermore, he forces Doodle to do things unwillingly, such as touch his own coffin and train him to be “normal”. The narrator traumatizes his little brother to think a certain way in order to become accepted by society. Even

The story explains, “... Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having a crippled brother.” (347). This to me means that brother only taught Doodle how to walk and swim and other things only because he was embarrassed of having a brother with disabilities. Brother also says, “ It was bad enough having an invalid brother, but having one who was not there at all was unbearable.” (345). This proves him guilty because he said having an invalid brother was unbearable. This is because of pride being a destructive

Throughout the story, you find that this isn’t the first time that the narrator endangered Doodle’s life, such as the time when he tried to suffocate him early on in the story. “I began to make plans to kill him by

Brother even said, “Doodle walked only because, I was ashamed of having a crippled brother.” Technically Brother helped Doodle learn how to walk, but not in the right way. He helped him only because he was embarrassed for people to see that his brother couldn’t walk. Brother was so embarrassed of his brother being crippled that Brother had to teach him to walk before school started. On top of Brother being embarrassed and Brother not loving Doodle, he also pushed his brother closer to death than he already

The narrator does it strictly for his pride, and not Doodle’s sake. The narrator regrets,“They did not know that I did it for myself, that pride, whose slave I was, spoke to me louder than all their voices, and that Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having a crippled brother”(Hurst).This continues the theme by explaining his regret for teaching his brother to walk for his pride, rather than for Doodle. Although the narrator sees the bad in what he’s done, he still doesn’t understand what he should do prevent it from happening again. The narrator plots,“Once I had succeeded in teaching Doodle to walk, I began to believe in my own infallibility”(Hurst). This idea supports the theme by identifying the narrator’s pride with teaching Doodle to walk and how he believes he can make it stronger.

In “the Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst, Brother’s motivation to teach Doodle to walk and to try and teach him to run, climb, swim, and row a boat is because of his pride- he’s ashamed to have a crippled little brother. Brother was pride’s slave, “Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having as crippled brother” (Hurst, 319). This shows that Brother only taught Doodle to walk because he was ashamed of having a crippled brother. Brother cries when people hug him for teaching Dooble to walk because he’s embarrassed that he was embarrassed of Doodle and that’s the only reason that Doodle can walk. Brother successfully taught Dooble to walk but felt shameful that pride was the only reason that Doodle knew how to walk but when he fails to teach

When people hear the word pride, it’s usually not referred to being positive. Like the need for materialistic objects and a thirst for revenge, pride comes to us instinctively. Saint Augustine says, “It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels.” This quote states that having an unnecessary amount of pride can transform us into beings that we shouldn’t be; turn us into these monsters that others refuse to be around, but having a sense of humbleness can better us in both our perspective of ourselves and others. Whether we are afraid of being wrong and admitting our mistakes or eager to claim credit for the satisfaction of feeling like we’ve accomplished something, pride has the tendency to take over our

In America, acts of kindness are becoming more rare. In my opinion, kindness is an act of generosity or compassion toward another person. Random acts of kindness are my favorite expressions of kindness because they are unexpected acts of generosity, usually toward a complete stranger. This could be anything from paying for someone’s morning coffee to helping someone pick up something they dropped. Seeing the smile on their face is the most rewarding part, along with the feeling of personal satisfaction. In my life, I have seen my fair share of gracious acts. My favorite, and most memorable, personal experience with kindness occurred when I was a senior in high school.

Kindness is the act of doing something nice towards others by showing concern and generosity. Everyday we experience an act of kindness from our friends, family, or strangers and without someone acting kind to us then they start to act hostile to us. I was taught by my parents to always show kindness to everyone around me no matter what kind of person they are; therefore, I started to act kind everyday by showing kindness to my friends and family. While I acted kind to others I was able to receive kindness from strangers on the street, yet there has been times where I seen someone acting hostile to me.

Kindness is a mask people use to hide their true identity. People use kindness as an excuse to draw attention to themselves. It is used as a way for people to say, “Hey, look at me! I did something nice!” Quite often, celebrities and politicians post thing on social media, doing this exact thing.

Kindness is a great virtue that every single one of us should have, our society needs to be more kind and love our neighbors as ourselves. I think our society does not understand what Kindness means and we forget to do to our neighbors what we want them to do for us. Kindness is more than simple attitudes, kindness is sometimes give up our desires to serve those in need, kindness is serving without expecting something in return, kindness is not something forced, it comes from who we are. It may sound redundant but we cannot be kind if we are not kind, I mean, we cannot offer a ‘fake kindness’ because kindness is authentic.