Lucy Grealy's Autobiography Of A Face

Throughout the novel, Autobiography of a Face, Lucy Grealy reveals that her mother's angry demeanour is only due to her fear for Lucy’s life. Lucy’s mother is first mentioned as Lucy describes the tolls her sickness has taken on her parents. Lucy states that “the whole family shared the burden of [her] mother’s anger”(Grealy 9) displaying that her mother holds an angry outlook on life. Lucy feels responsible for this anger as it seems to correlate with the issues her family faces regarding money and payments for Lucy's treatments. In reality these emotions are really just her mother's way of dealing with Lucy’s sickness. Lucy’s mother was “the only one in the family who faced facts” (19) implying that she was the only one who grasped how

In this letter, a very similar sentiment is conveyed as in her other letters. In this situation, the reader can also see that Mary is curious as to whether or not her brothers are still alive. The local newspaper has reported that one of her family members died in a recent battle. This shows the sentiment of civilians living anxiously on the home front and how they are impacted by news of their loved ones. Moreover, Mary also states that she waits for her husband to return every night until she cannot stay awake anymore, showing the extent of her emotions, even if her words do not convey them.

In the poem, “Anxiety,” the author D. H. Lawrence expresses the fear inflicted in a person after facing a trauma, similar to how Marie Marquardt shows the same fear in the book The Radius of Us. The narrator of the poem faces a trauma and then stands at her window and watches with “a thaw of anxiety” as she waits “for the boy to leap down at our gate. He has passed us by; but is it relief that starts in my breast?” (Lines 7-10). In this quote the narrator feels so much fear as she waits for the boy to come. But when he doesn’t, she doesn’t feel the relief she should. Instead, she still is anxious and frightened, with the thought that he, or someone else, will come back and hurt her again. In Marquardt’s book the main character, Gretchen, struggles

Loss can change a person’s life and alter the daily routines of individuals and families. Humans are very social creatures and rely on each other for support, and suddenly losing a loved one can disrupt the wholesome state of an individual. In the passage, Charna Posin goes through a year of cutting herself away from others as she dealt with the pain of the death of her husband. This vulnerability comes from the loss of strength that her husband probably gave her. Her love for him can be seen by how much the loss has affected her through her emotional sorrow, grief, and isolation. She had a sort of emptiness as she conveyed how she did not feel loved or understood by those around her.

Lucy Grealy talks about her fourteen year old self, and how working at the stable of Diamond D and conducting pony parties has created an uncomfortable environment for her. She explains that she has gone through chemo therapy and half of her jaw is missing, giving her an unusual, but a distinctive look. She states that as her hair grew longer, she would use it to her advantage to hide her face, like a curtain. She knew people would stare, and that meant everything to her. Validation meant a lot, she depended on it. Especially during the times when pony parties are hosted, children would forget about the ponies and instantly have their attention on her. Grealy then states that she actually enjoyed her time with the horses however, because she felt that they were better at understand her as a person.

                They stop and stare, take one look into her eyes and realize they hold their own story. She's the type of girl people would look at and think, "Wow, she's beautiful. I wish I was her." But, little did they know that this beauty was on the outside, but pain was killing her on the inside. She faked a smile, day by day, but she often wondered if people ever noticed her silent cries for help. Along the way, she realized she forgot how it felt to be happy.

She “had been made to memorize it, verse after verse, and then had recited the whole poem to an auditorium full of parents, teachers, and [her] fellow pupils” (Page 18), even though she would not see such a flower until becoming almost twenty years old. Lucy sees the daffodils Mariah shows her as reminder of her colonial education. Upon close examination, one notices a parallel between the interactions between Lucy and her mother, and Lucy’s colonized country and its colonizer or “mother country,” England. The presence of her mother haunts Lucy’s mind while she is in America. She cannot seem to escape the traits she has inherited from her mother. Although Lucy’s mother seems to allow some kind of separation by allowing Lucy to travel to America, she has no intention of making it permanent and completely letting go of Lucy. She consistently writes her letters. Similarly the legacy of colonialism is almost impossible to escape from. It has woven itself with the ways of the country and the people of the country and it takes great effort to escape. Lucy struggles to reconcile what she has internalized from her mother with what she discovers about herself:

Lucy Westenra is young, innocent, beautiful, and at most times some would say she had a child’s mind, but she was still adored by all. Lucy was sweet, she never met a stranger, and she loved everybody, three in particular are the men who cherished her so much, they all proposed to her: Arthur Holmwood, Quincey Morris, and Dr. Jack Seward. Even her best friend Mina Murray expressed continuously on how gorgeous Lucy was. The only fault Lucy had was that, she was vulnerable. Lucy was not as strong and independent as Mina, she depended on everyone to protect her because that was everyone’s natural instinct towards her. And she let them because she did not want to disappoint anyone. In the story she even said, “Why can’t a girl marry three men,

In this book Samantha Jane is a little girl that loses her father and when she loses her father she loses the smile she used to carry when he was alive. Samantha is sitting on her steps sad when her neighbor sees her that’s where the healing process begins, her neighbor helps her express her grief and emotions and help her find her father in the things around her. She explains to Samantha that it is okay to cry because it would let some of the sadness out and that her father would not want her to be sad, Samantha fears that if she smiles or is happy then people will think that she does not miss her dad but her neighbor reassures her being sad wouldn’t be something her father would want. Samantha was also afraid to go to her mother because she didn’t want to worry her but after the talk with her neighbor her mother comes outside and lets her know that it is okay to come to her and they can deal with their emotions together. They use tools in the book like Samantha writing a letter to her father and her neighbor and her mother being there to support her

Only a fool would believe that cancer patients have it easy in life. That same fool would also believe that adolescence is not challenging. Contrarily, both are difficult circumstances and when combined it would be an unfortunate situation. John Green’s novel “The Fault in Our Stars paints the life of Hazel Grace Lancaster, Augustus Waters and many other teenage cancer patients tackling big themes of self- awareness. The movie adaptation of “The Fault in Our Stars” is an inaccurate representation of the novel because it does not portray the major themes of self-awareness shown through the characters. The film fails to accurately portray the themes of isolation, identity and morality.

Have you ever wondered what a person was actually feeling? Are they actually happy or was it all just a show, a figurative mask? In the story “The Interpreter of Maladies” by Jhumpa Lahiri, many topics, including that of appearance, are generated. On the topic of appearance, everyone, including those around you, puts on a figurative “mask” to cover or hide their true emotions. Characters in this story use objects, ranging from cameras to a rear view mirror, to hide their feelings from those around them. The central theme of this story is that things aren’t always as they appear and this theme is developed using characterization and the motif of sight.

Dr. Wilson opens her book by stating, “It’s true, isn’t it? Hurt people hurt people.” (2001 pg.9) It is Dr. Wilson’s belief that by shedding light on Hurt People Hurt People she shows a cycle that can be broken. Wilson explores unseen wounds, how they are created through childhood, and caretakers within our lifetime. Dr.Wilson exhaustively demonstrates the help there is for the different wounds

Michelle, an eleven year old girl, enjoys the typical activities a girl her age would like to do. That is why I thought going to the mall with Michelle, her mother and her little brother would be a good idea. During our day at the mall and our talk after lunch, I was able to get an insight into her psychological development as a pre-teen. Not only was Michelle dealing with the transformation from childhood to teenage hood, but was also struggling with understanding her medical setbacks as a child. At age 3 Michelle’s parents found out that she was suffering from leukemia. This changed majority of Michelle’s childhood. By age 5 Michelle was free of her cancer and able to continue most her life normally. In reality, Michelle will never be able to live her life normally because she will always live the fact that she had an illness. Because Michelle had leukemia as a child, it seemed that her awareness of herself wasn’t the same as other girls her age.

Facing the death of my sister from a terminal illness altered my life in myriad ways—for evermore. It challenged every platitude—life is fair, everything happens for a reason, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger—I think not. As the illness consumed her, I grasped at ways to imbue her soul with my unfaltering love, and the pure delight we shared in being sisters.

There is a picture on the wall of a room I share with my sister. In the picture a man is leaning over a frail boy, tenderly holding his head. The boy’s face is scarred with lesions; he was dying from cancer. I will never know what words may have been exchanged in that moment, but could clearly see great care and compassion the man showed the boy. Looking at this picture made me want to show that same care and compassion to someone who was suffering—I wanted to be like my grandfather.