Jeanette Walls Research Paper

Rex would use their income to buy alcohol, and forces Rose Mary to give him her salary. Since they are terrible at managing their money, they can’t provide their children with a meal everyday to school. Jeanette's teacher, Mrs. Ellis, usually gives her money to buy lunch at school, knowing that she doesn’t have any. Also, Rose Mary uses the money to buy art supplies. They don’t use the money to buy beds for their children. Not able to provide enough food and obtain a sufficient living situation means that Rose Mary and Rex aren’t looking for their children’s best interest, but they’re selfish. They are unsuccessful in using the money they make for their family, especially for useful things for their

In this both heart wrenching and slightly humorous memoir, journalist Jeannette Walls tells the bittersweet story of her rather dysfunctional and poverty stricken upbringing. Walls grows up in a family trailed by the ubiquitous presence of hunger and broken homes. Throughout the memoir she recounts memories of moving from one dilapidated neighborhood to another with her three other siblings, insanely "free sprinted" mother, and incredibly intelligent yet alcoholic father. The author focuses on her unconventional childhood with parents who were too lazy and self-absorbed to obtain decent jobs. Although Walls's childhood gushes with heartbreaking tales of searching through dumpsters for food, she remains as unbitter as possible and

The Glass Castle, a memoir written by Jeannette Walls, is a story that discusses the insights of a dysfunctional, yet vibrant family. The four Walls children have two parents, Rose Mary who was an unconventional artist, and Rex who was an alcoholic father. The family travels constantly across the country, with their parents using their imagination as a distraction from their poverty. Despite the hardships the Walls family has faced, Jeanette writes her truth in order to reconcile with her past. She expresses through her story of how she has reflected upon her childhood, and how it has shaped her character in the present (The glass castle: Jeanette Walls, 2016). The majority of readers may believe that Rex Walls is an irresponsible, neglectful parent. However, Rex’s viewpoint of how he cares for Jeanette and her siblings can be portrayed as supportive, intelligent, and sensible.

However, she does not finish the job, indicating that the little house on Hobart street could not be a permanent home. Fortunately, at the end of the novel, Jeanette finally has a home of her own. Walls state's, “I showed Mom and Lori the house… the first house I’d ever owned. Mom and Lori admired the planked floorboards, the big fireplaces, and the ceiling beams made from locust posts, with gouge marks from the ax that had felled them” (Walls, 287). Walls uses imagery to show the warmth and homey feel of her new home which contrasts to the other homes she had lived in before and represents how, after her whole life of dreaming, she finally has a home of her own. The theme of possessions also played a role in Walls’ memoir. Living in a life of poverty means the Walls’ family do not have what middle class families have such as toys, transport, and food. Therefore, when the Walls’ children get a present, it is cherished. In the desert, Rex comes home with three new bikes for the children as a surprise. Jeanette describes, “We ran out the front

“Life with your father was never boring.” – Rose Mary Walls. Rose Mary Walls, Jeannette Walls’s mother and Rex Walls’s spouse, reminisces life with Rex, which included migrating frequently, refusing to conform, and advocating self-sufficiency. Despite Rose Mary finding Rex disdainful at times, she still believes that being with Rex was an adventure. In Jeannette Walls’s The Glass Castle, Walls reveals that there are turbulence and order in life, the influence of family, and how she develops as she grows up through Walls’s recollection of her life, from living in a nomadic household, where her parents neglect their children, to living in a squalid hovel with no plumbing, and finally living in New York City, where she is employed as a journalist.

The life the Walls kids put up with was not the way the wanted to live. When Lori graduated high school she moved to New York City. Then Jeanette’s

The parents of the Walls children, Rex and Rose Mary, began their life of extreme self-sufficiency even before their children were born. Rex, coming from a relatively unfortunate home life,

Jeannette Walls is an American writer in journalist who found success in New York City, most notably writing a gossip column for MSNBC in which she details the effects of gossip in politics. She published her memoir, The Glass Castle, in 2005. The book spent 261 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list. In it, Walls recounts her childhood while growing up in an unstable family with her father and mother, Rex and Rose Mary Walls, her older sister Lori, and her younger brother and sister, Brian and Maureen. Rex and Rose Mary could not settle down and constantly uprooted their family of six to different locations in the southwest region of America. Neither parent could keep a job and struggled to feed and put a roof over their heads. In the novel, Walls views her parents as irresponsible because it rarely seems as though Rex and Rose Mary genuinely want to work and make money to support the family. They thrive off their sense of adventure, as they drive all over the country in a rundown car, looking for their latest shack to pile their family into, usually without running water, heat, or indoor plumbing. Walls will tell the story of her childhood through a series of pivotal moments that ultimately shape her opinion of her parents and lead her to a successful career in New York City.

Jeannette Walls is a critically-acclaimed author (of both biographies and works of fiction), despite her unorthodox upbringing. Her parents supported giving their children excessive amounts of freedom, even though they were clearly too young to be taking care of themselves, causing Walls to light herself on fire while cooking herself a meal at only 3 years old. Also, they did not believe in proper treatment, hence why they force Jeannette to leave the hospital, although she is not finished with treatment, and still had third-degree burns all over her body. Considering her father would waste all of their money on cigarettes and alcohol, there were periods of her life where she was homeless, and would have to sleep in a cardboard box, that of which she shared with her three other siblings (and this is if they were lucky; otherwise, they would be forced to sleep in their car). However, a young Jeannette’s father would manipulate her into thinking it was “an adventure,” causing her to get

In the detailed story of an impoverished family during the late 1900’s, Jeannette Walls describes her experience from the young age of 3, up until adulthood. The family of 6, with Rex Walls as the father, Rose Mary as the mother, and her three siblings, Lori, Brian and Maureen, were constantly moving throughout the country with little to no food or cash. The memoir shows how dysfunctional the family was, but never seemed to force the reader to condemn the parents. In a life of poverty, the have to move for own to town, and often lived in various mining towns. Although they each found something they learned to love (like Jeannette’s rock collection) in the desert, they had to leave them behind once Rex’s alcoholism only worsened, and they ran

Jeannette Walls grew up in the 1970’s with her family traveling around the desert states. She was a young, fearless child that enjoyed adventure, family, and the ability to live anywhere. Jeannette was independent at a young age, cooking food, caring for her siblings, and growing up with very little. Jeannette was a skinny girl when she was young and was always dirty from her mini adventures.

Even when things got difficult, Rex and Rose Mary Walls refused to become charity cases. They do not ask for nor accept support from their children when they become homeless. The value of being self-sufficient stems mainly from Rose Mary Walls, whose upbringing in an exceedingly disciplined home leads her to abandon rules when she becomes a mother.

People are happy; they get what they want, and they never want what they can't

“Folks are usually about as happy as they make their minds up to be”, exclaimed Abraham Lincoln in Goodreads.com. Happiness is defined in many ways that not a single person can give a true definition of. People have been searching the true meaning of happiness, but in reality there are no actual definitions. Happiness is all around, a person just needs to find their path to what makes them truly happy.

"There is no happiness except in the realization that we have accomplished something.”   -Henry Ford