Leaving Gilead: A Brief Analysis

Suicide can sometimes feel like the only way to pacify the pain. It is as if something is eating away parts of you slowly and intently and the only way to relieve the constant pain, is to die. Tiffany Hunter and Pierre L’errant are two very different characters with both equally unique yet queer personalities. Although Pierre and Tiffany are not the best of friends, their contrasting characteristics somehow complement each other. They both have similarities in their plans of suicide as well as differences that help them make the correct decision on where they want their life to go in future. Although they both made different decisions at the end, they assisted each other to settle on the right choice. Drew Hayden Taylor develops a theme of despondency and isolation from peers and loved ones in the novel “The Night Wanderer.”

In contrast, at the end of the story, Jane’s shocking proclamations of, “I’ve got out at last,” and, “In spite of you (John) and Jane. And I have pulled of most of the paper so you can’t put me back,” (336), mark Jane’s final mental collapse. The changes that Jane’s mental state go through are made more powerful by Gilman’s use of interior monologue, which allows the reader to experience the change first hand through Jane’s thoughts.

Robin Jenkins effectively conveys loss of innocence and ant war through sophisticated symbolism in the short story “Flowers”. It tells the story of a young girl, Margaret, who was evacuated from the city of Glasgow to the highlands of Scotland in an attempt to avoid the inhumanity of war, but it is in the highlands where she truly witnessed the brutality of war.

From the moment Mary Anne arrives at the base, the other soldiers know that this was a mistake. But Mark Fossie, blinded by love, doesn’t realize this. He believes that Mary Anne’s innocence could be preserved. But oh how he was wrong. In perhaps the greatest mistake in the entire Vietnam war, a soldier brought his girlfriend to Vietnam. Quickly her innocence disappears, and she turns into something wicked. She wears a necklace of human tongues and begins to take risks not even Ethan Hunt would. She behaves dangerously; she refuses to carry a weapon. This wickedness fundamentally changes Mary Anne’s personality and her attitude toward life. While she feels that she is finding herself, she is instead losing herself. May Anne loses herself to the jungle and the war. Like a hyperbole of the entire Vietnam era, Mary Anne loses her purpose. Around this time, some might say so did the American Dream. Contributing to the entropy of the American Dream, soldiers felt lost, confused, and in a metaphorical fog. Soldiers stopped thinking of the war as just good and bad, and instead as one of lesser

The short stories, “Turned”, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and “The Good Corn”, by H.E Bates provide strong examples of how the representation of characters influence’s the reader’s perception of a text. Both stories depict similar characters: a middle-aged, childless wife, her husband and an 18-year old girl who works for them. They are both about a similar situation: man cheats on wife with girl and girl falls pregnant. However, the author’s of the text are from very different backgrounds and this is reflected in their stories. Although there are many similarities between “The Good Corn” and “Turned”, the values reflected in these stories, their resolutions and the reader’s perception of them are vastly different due to the contexts of

Like all characters throughout literature, Gilman’s narrator undergoes a journey of sorts, or a quest. However, her journey is all in her head, for she is battling a mental illness. Her husband, a

Mary Anne is first presented as a “seventeen-year-old doll in her goddamn culottes, perky and fresh-faced”, which brings about an image of the innocence and an American Dream-esque teenage girl (92). By presenting her as such, O’Brien illustrates the naiveté of someone who is being introduced to war, yet has no experience. She shows up on the first day with no understanding and therefore no knowledge of the severity of war. However, within a page and a half, Mary Anne changes into a girl who could “clip an artery and pump up a plastic sprint…[and who] cut her hair short” (93-94). Like a soldier, Mary Anne did not complain nor shy away from the trauma; she embraced it and fully immersed herself in it. Though she was trying to prove that she was tough and could handle Vietnam, she slowly became more and more invested in the gore and horror of war. After disappearing for days at a time, abandoning her boyfriend, and associating herself with the mysterious “Greenies”, Mary Anne was finally seen “wearing her culottes, her pink sweater, and a necklace of human tongues” (110). Although she retained her classic all-American outer appearance, her personality became polar opposite. This is a reality that many soldiers experience, where they turn into shells of their former selves, left with the abyss that war created. While the character of

Mary Anne’s sudden changes in demeanor, presence, and her rigor to learn about the war are highly characteristic of the effects of war. She manages to stay happy and curious about the world, but through her exposure to primal culture she’s become harder, more in tune with her primitive side. The last time Mary Anne is seen, she is found in a hootch surrounded by dead animals and villagers, wearing “a necklace of human tongues” (110). She goes on to explain her attachment to the war and its macabre attributes and explains that in Vietnam she knows “exactly who she is. You can’t feel like that anywhere else” (111). Throughout the chapter, we see the sweetheart of the medics become the sweetheart of the war itself. Vietnam changes her, only leaving behind the dedication of the high school girl Rat Kiley first spoke of.

Flannery O’Connor’s “Good Country People,” describes the lives of a mother, Mrs. Hopewell and her daughter, Joy and the irony of their relationship. This passage from the short story expounds on their character development through details of their lives. The selected paragraph uses a matter-of-fact tone to give more information about Mrs. Hopewell and Joy. Flannery O’Connor has given an objective recount of the story, which makes the third person narrator a reliable source. Mrs. Hopewell’s feelings are given on her daughter to examine their relationship. It is reader who takes these facts to create an understanding of these women and their lives. This part of the story illustrates the aspects of their lives that they had little control

George, unlike the reader however, is unaware of Editha’s dishonest reasons for her support of the war and ignorantly goes off to war with the innocent belief that his girlfriend actually cares about the outcome of the war itself and not that it might potentially shape him into the man she secretly wishes he was. Howell’s use of Editha and her deceitful motives for supporting the war add a layer of realism to the story, as peoples’ motives in real life are not always pure.

Flannery O’Connor’s novel Wise Blood is set in the small 1950’s southern town of Taulkinham. The main character Hazel Motes, a war veteran, arrives trying to figure out what to do with his life. He experiences different events which trigger in him a spiritual change, helping him discover what he believes. However, O’Conner leaves it up to the reader to decide whether Haze was a comedic or a tragic character. In this paper, I will examine Hazel Motes to determine if he controlled his future or had a tragic flaw that lead to his downfall.

In the story, The Leaving, by Budge Wilson, Elizabeth, a wife and mother of 4, reads a book, named The Feminine Mystique, were it inspires her to do some thinking. This text reaches out to her and touches her heart, resulting in her to decide whether to leave her husband for good, due to her power of inspiration and perseverance.

Janie’s journey sets off when her grandmother, Nanny, insists she marries Logan Killicks, a man twice her age. Because Nanny’s experience with slavery, her worldview has been about financial security for Janie. Like all elders they hope that their children and grandchildren have protection and stability so they can ease. “Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have, baby, it’s protection… (Hurston 15)”. With Janie rebellious young age, she does not realize what her grandmother went through. Janie knew she had to obey her grandmother so she can give her Nanny assurance that she would be taken care of before she dies. But not long after the Nanny’s death, Logan Killicks starts to treat her like a “mule” a free work of labor. Because of Janie status she ought to speak for herself.

by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a story of a woman, her psychological difficulties and her

Finally, the reader is introduced to the character around whom the story is centered, the accursed murderess, Mrs. Wright. She is depicted to be a person of great life and vitality in her younger years, yet her life as Mrs. Wright is portrayed as one of grim sameness, maintaining a humorless daily grind, devoid of life as one regards it in a normal social sense. Although it is clear to the reader that Mrs. Wright is indeed the culprit, she is portrayed sympathetically because of that very lack of normalcy in her daily routine. Where she was once a girl of fun and laughter, it is clear that over the years she has been forced into a reclusive shell by a marriage to a man who has been singularly oppressive. It is equally clear that she finally was brought to her personal breaking point, dealing with her situation in a manner that was at once final and yet inconclusive, depending on the outcome of the legal investigation. It is notable that regardless of the outcome, Mrs. Wright had finally realized a state of peace within herself, a state which had been denied her for the duration of her relationship with the deceased.