John Kennedy Toole's The Confederacy Of Dunces

Her parent’s have managed to never show her any affection, and leave her as sort of an empty shell who is left to create her own structure in the world. This is evident in the way Mary Katherine vocalizes her untrue perspective of a situation that involves herself in relation to her family. In this skewed perspective she states “Mary Katherine, we love you. You must never be punished. Lucy, you are to see to it that our most loved daughter Mary Katherine is never punished” ( Jackson 95). This desire to be fawned over by her parents shows that there was a true lack of affection in this family which can be quite draining on a young impressionable child. This lack of affection and care ends up being so life draining that she can only seem to keep order in her life by creating a structure completely her own as opposed to one normally placed on children by their

When Janie is about sixteen her grandmother finds her in the act of kissing a boy, and afraid for Janie, she arranges for Janie to be married to Logan Killicks, who is an older man with vast property to his name. Nanny, as Janie calls her, is unable to wrap her mind around the idea of marrying for love and mocks Janie saying, "So you don't want to marry off decent like, do yuh? You just wants to hug and kiss and feel around with first one man and then another, huh?" (Their Eyes Are Watching God, 13). Her grandmothers’ gift of life is different from the life that Janie wants to live. She tells Janie, “De nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see.'” (Their Eyes Are Watching God, 11). Nanny doesn’t believe that trying to find love and make a better life for you will succeed, she tells Janie that marrying and older man with land to his name will bring security, and she shouldn’t want more than that. Because of this Janie agrees and goes along with the plan. She is depicted as very compliant and rarely speaks her mind, even saying “But Ah hates disagreement and confusion, so Ah better not talk. It makes it hard tuh git along” (Their Eyes Were Watching God, 90).

James M. McPherson sets out to discover what motivated the Confederate and Union soldiers to continue fighting in the Civil War in his book What They Fought For. McPherson analyses nearly a thousand letters, journals, and diary of Union and Confederate soldiers to determine what urged them to fight is this defining American Conflict. McPherson reads and groups together the common thoughts of the everyday soldier, from their letters and journals that none of which had been subjected to any sort of censorship, in that time period. He then generalizes the motivations that they used to fight for their country. Whether it be for slavery or for the Union, the author views both sides of the fighting to analysis their ideological issues, how deep their belief coursed through their veins to continue fighting, and how the soldiers held their convictions close to heart in the time of war.

The characterizations of Connie’s family members have great effects on Connie. And Connie’s mother’s characterization is the main motivator for Connie’s rebellion. She always compares Connie with June, who is the “ideal daughter” in her eyes, and blames Connie for some little things, such as improper dressing and not having a tidy room. Oates suggests that the reason for Connie’s mother prohibiting Connie to dress up like an adult is that “ Her mother had been pretty once too” (Oates 1), but now “her looks were gone and that was why she always after Connie” (Oates 1). Therefore, she is jealous about Connie’s beauty and feels uncomfortable when seeing Connie wear beautiful outfits. Meanwhile, she likes June so much because June is obedient and plain, which makes her feel that she is dominant in the relationship. In the short story, Connie’s father is not given much description by the author, but

The characterizations of Connie’s family members have great effects on Connie. And onnie’s mother’s characterization is the main motivator for Connie’s rebellion. She always compares Connie with June, who is the “ideal daughter” in her eyes, and blames Connie for some little things, such as improper dressing and not having a tidy room. Oates suggests that the reason for Connie’s mother prohibiting Connie to dress up like an adult is that “ Her mother had been pretty once too” (Oates 1), but now “her looks were gone and that was why she always after Connie” (Oates 1). Therefore, she is jealous about Connie’s beauty and feels uncomfortable when seeing Connie wear beautiful outfits. Meanwhile, she likes June so much because June is obedient and plain, which makes her feel that she is dominant in the relationship. In the short story, Connie’s father is not given much description by the author, but his characterization has an effect on Connie as well. The irresponsible father spends little time with family and seldom has conversations to his daughters. When hearing his wife’s complain about Connie, he just bends his head with saying nothing, which makes Connie feels ignored and lonely. Urbanski states that “The father, who spent most of his time at work, is weak” (Urbanski 200) to reveals the father is not an active figure in his daughter’s life. Therefore, lacking of the company and communication of family members, Connie becomes upset. In addition, Connie’s sister June, who has the opposite characterization, is also one of the reasons for Connie’s rebellion. In Connie’s eyes, June is a

First, as mentioned, also she did have prestige with Jody, that came at a cost for her, as she was unable to connect and communicate with the townspeople, which in turns meant that she lacked friends, one key component in advancing. However, this no longer seems like a significant problem as she has Pheoby, a loyal friend that had obviously earned her trust as she discussing her life story with her. Nonetheless, while with the mayor, she lost the sense of her real self and from Jody’s perspective, she becomes a proper wife to a mayor. Accordingly, with Jody’s death, she is freed from her oppressed social life and carried on with life with the ambitions that she has. Additionally, and most importantly, she reflections upon her relationship with Tea Cakes. Unusually, her relationship with him was unlike all others she had previously because she enforces that in order for two people to have a truly loving bond, they must have mutual feelings along with civility between each other. Therefore, she realized what happened was ultimately fixed, as it was not something that Tea Cakes would do but due to the certain circumstances that were in place, it just happened like that. Therefore, she does experience that she truly was in love unlike the rest of the previous men, meaning her relationship with Tea Cakes was satisfactory. As a result, she feels like inspired by this particular relationship and feels safer than those preceding, as he was the only one to treat her how she should be treated. Accordingly, she makes amends and is at peace with him, allowing her to illuminate her path to self-success and accomplishment that is

James M. McPherson, author of For Cause and Comrades, uses more than 25,000 unaltered letters and closely 250 private journals from Civil War soldiers—both Union and Confederate—in his attempt to explain what possessed these men to endure the roaring, gruesome chaos of war. What better way to express the motivation behind fighting than words straight from the pens of the men who were physically there and experienced the Civil War to its fullest? I personally feel as though McPherson succeeded in his explanation of the different driving forces that kept each man going during these difficult years of battle. The Wall Street Journal describes McPherson’s work as “an extraordinary book, full of fascinating details and moving self-portraits.”

Ignatius J. Reilly is the main character in the humorous book Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole, which is set in the city of New Orleans in the early 1960s. Ignatius is an educated man of thirty who lives in Uptown New Orleans with his mother Mrs. Irene Reilly. Throughout the book Ignatius searches for a job and encounters many difficulties while roaming the city. His insatiable appetite, overpowering laziness, and outlandish personality adds a comical view of him which builds throughout the novel. Ignatius J. Reilley can best be described in three words which dominate his character throughout the entirety of the novel: disrespectful, idealistic, and arrogant.

A Mother’s Instinct In Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle, Rose Mary Walls, the mother, lacks maternal instincts based on her selfishness, immaturity, and apatheticness. A maternal instinct is a generalized term for the way a mother is supposed to act, and is usually defined as a mother being selfless, mature, and emotional caring for her children. While the Walls are living on Little Hobart Street in Welch, West Virginia, they are very poor and there is little money for the necessities, let alone any kind of indulgence. Rex, the father, is gone most days, out drinking and gambling, whereas Rose Mary stays at home painting or writing.

Over 150 years, the Civil War had been the bloodiest war in the American history, also known as “The War Between the States” or “Brother Against Brother”, it was fought between the Union or the United States of America and the Confederate States of America. The war lasted four years from 1861 to 1865. What motivated these men to fight and what is the cause of the Civil War is a subject that many historians tried to find out.

In A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole describes Ignatius J. Reilly’s adventures in New Orleans. Ignatius is an overweight thirty-year-old still living with his mother after years of college education. When his mother forces him to find a job, Ignatius’ life changes drastically. Throughout the story Ignatius is illustrated as lazy and gluttonous.

In the novel Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole there were many themes. For instance racism, family, fate, education, wealth, and laziness were just a few. The theme I would like to focus on being the theme about family. This novel was not very family oriented, everyone seemed to just argue all the time about the littlest things. It made it seem like bickering was easier than just getting along at times.

Why did Ignatius act like he didn’t care nor love his mother or anyone around him? Why are there so many different roles in this story but seem to have little or no connection? Who is Ignatius and why should I read a whole novel mainly revolving him? It was disconcerting at first, it was difficult to maintain interest but as the story progressed you saw deeper into the intricate mind of this strange gentleman named Ignatius. You began to see that the lack of social skills was rooted from scarring incidents in his childhood. That he wasn’t a cold and unappealing man as he first appeared; he felt true feelings for his ex-girlfriend, he feared being judged as crazy and entering a mental institution, and he actually could be affected by the actions of his mother. We also learn that Ms. Reilly was not only looking for her well being, but that there were strands of love for her son and wanting to see him succeed in life, in whatever sense that may be. Another very interesting part to the way of Ignatius in Toole’s writing is the dominant voice throughout the story. This can be rooted from the fact that it is said that the story is a loose version of his own life experiences. Toole’s way of presenting a very disturbing, controversial, and difficult to relate to protagonist, was my main discomfort in the novel. Discomfort doesn’t necessarily mean bad though; reading the

Mother is a very hot tempered and impatient person. These traits made it very difficult for her to take care of Christopher because she would get easily annoyed with the way he acted. One example is in Mother’s letter to Christopher, where she brought up the story of how Christopher got overwhelmed by all the people during Christmas shopping and ended up knocking down mixers from a shelf. Mother explained how mad she was since there was nothing she could do, when she tried to move Christopher he would scream and she had to walk home with him knowing that he wouldn’t take the bus again. All in all, Mother is very aware of her limitations and that is part of the reason why she had to leave Father and

John Kennedy Toole’s novel A Confederacy of Dunces, set in New Orleans in the 1960s, features a unique main character named Ignatius J. Reilly. Ignatius, whose father passed away when he was still young, struggles to find and maintain employment to support both himself and his mother, Mrs. Reilly. He spends his days attending movies and searching for work, which he finds at Levy Pants and again at Paradise Vendors. During Ignatius’s journey, he exhibits many negative qualities and refuses to change them. Two of these qualities particularly stand out with respect to his character: gluttony and feebleness.