Rachel's Emotions In The Short Story Eleven By Sandra Cisneros

In the piece Eleven, a young girl Rachel uses specific choice of words as well as some figurative language to show her strong feelings towards the old ragged red sweater that was mistaken for hers. When her teacher Mrs. Price had mistakenly assumed that the sweater was hers, and placed the sweater on her desk. Rachel looks back on the incident and exclaims “Only today I wish I didn't have inky eleven years rattling inside me like pennies in a Band-Aid box. Today I wish I was one hundred and two instead of eleven because if I was one hundred and two I'd have known what to say when

Eleven is a story that talks about a little girl named Rachel who turns eleven, but feels as if she is anything but. She says it takes her months before she can remember that she is in fact, eleven. The author also says that we will never just be one age we will be three sometimes and cry and cry until our hearts ache no more. Or sometimes you need someone to hold you and tell you everything is okay, this part of you is five. In the short story ‘Eleven’ the author uses many literary devices like figurative language, imagery, and repetition.

The most important lesson for Rachel that comes out of this situation is that after wearing the disgusted sweater she has become even older, and it was tied to the experience instead of the birthday itself. She understands that it is the challenge she needs to grow up faster as she will receive additional benefits of behaving the way she wants and resisting to the outside irritators. As for the literature techniques, the author applies language, diction and symbolism to reveal the issues of experience, aging, knowledge, power, authority and freedom. The discovering is gaining age are conveyed with the help of the memories of eleven-year-old girl on her birthday. Rachel resists her humiliation from Mrs. Pierce, and that is the exact moment when her “smart eleven” comes as well[2].

In the story “Eleven”,Rachel is forced to wear and ugly burgundy-colored sweater,by her teacher, that symbolizes lack of maturity,weakness,and power. There are multiple lines in this story that

Many people have heard the saying “act your age.” When our birthdays come around most people think that they will fill more mature and act older; yet when our birthdays come around do we really feel any older? Sandra Cisneros remonstrates this in her short story “Eleven,” About a little girl name Rachel on her eleventh birthday. This short story discusses the events that go on during Rachel’s birthday and the emotions that go through her mind during all the experiences that she has on the day of her birthday. In Sandra Cisneros’ outstanding short story, “Eleven,” Cisneros, using characterization and conflict, shakes up a simple and predictable story to show reality rather than stereotypical ideas. Through these two literary devices, Cisneros demonstrates that even though people grow older they do not always feel older and act their age as viewed through the theme.

Written in 1894, “The Story of an Hour” is a story of a woman who, through the erroneously reported death of her husband, experienced true freedom. Both tragic and ironic, the story deals with the boundaries imposed on women by society in the nineteenth century. The author Kate Chopin, like the character in her story, had first-hand experience with the male-dominated society of that time and had experienced the death of her husband at a young age (Internet). The similarity between Kate Chopin and her heroine can only leave us to wonder how much of this story is fiction and how much is personal experience.

In “Eleven”, written by Sandra Cisneros, Cisneros uses literary techniques such as diction and imagery to characterize Rachel’s character during her transition from age ten to age 11. These literary techniques help to describe how Rachel feels in certain situations while also explaining her qualities and traits. Through the use of these literary techniques Cisneros also collaborated on Rachel’s feelings when she was other ages and how she felt at that time during her life.

Sandra Cisneros writes a memoir through the eyes of an eleven year old. Turning eleven happens to be a tragic day for the main character, Rachel. Through various literary techniques such as hyperbole, simile, and syntax, Rachel is characterized. Rachel is a fresh turning eleven year old who finds herself in an awful situation on her birthday. Forced to wear a raggedy old sweater that doesn’t belong to her, she makes it defiantly clear her feelings towards the clothing item, and we see this through use of hyperboles. Rachel describes the sweater as ugly and too “stretched out like you could use it for a jump rope.” This extreme exaggeration demonstrates

Cisneros benefits from her usage of voice to show how Rachel, the main character, struggles with growing up and to help readers relate to her. Rachel describes that “when you wake up you expect to feel eleven, but you don’t” (Cisneros 1). Explaining how she doesn’t feel a year older on her birthday, she says that she expects to. This shows how eager she is to grow up, but she’s impatient at the thought of it. However, although she wishes to be older, growing up doesn’t happen all at once. Rachel also illustrates how she’s eleven, but she says “I wish I was one hundred and two” (Cisneros

Rachel is at the earliest stages of her coming of age, going through what may be one of her first painful rites of passage, and already she is changed. Rachel loses her initial innocence, and is in the throes of developing la facultad, because of the behavior of her teacher, faculty. Cisneros’s protagonist is the embodiment of a character at the early stages of obtaining la facultad. In the “foundational and historically significant text” (Saldivar-Hull, p.1) on the Border, Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza, author Gloria Anzaldua defines la facultad as, “…the capacity to see in surface phenomena the meaning of deeper realities, to see the deep structure below the surface. It is an instant “sensing.” A quick perception arrived at without conscious reasoning.” (Anzaldua, p. 61) Rachel has learned, that none has told her, that “when you’re eleven, you’re also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven…” and she wishes she was one hundred and two, “anything but eleven.” Rachel, is as Anzaldua posits regarding a person gaining la facultad, “excruciatingly alive in the world,” (Anzaldua, p. 61) and “the pain makes us acutely anxious to avoid more of it,” (Anzaldua, p. 61) which is why Rachel wishes she was one hundred and

In the short story, “Eleven” by Sandra Cisneros, a young child named Rachel experienced her eleventh birthday in a classroom. As the story progresses there is a change in the tone- from nonchalant to sadness to anger. Cisneros uses various forms of figurative language throughout “Eleven”, such as repetition, metaphors and similes, and symbolism.

When someone goes through a time of grief, it is only natural to find a way to deal with the hardships and until it eventually goes away, but people may come to realize that the loss can never be forgotten. This process of grieving and fighting through hard times to finally come to peace and accept reality is also reflected in literature such as “Hold Tight”. The short story ¨Hold Tight¨ by Amy Bloom shows that when people deal with grief, people may try to find ways to cope with the pain by letting out their anger on others or becoming self-destructive, even though it may not be possible to completely forget the woe.

The author uses pathos, or emotions to make their point. Katie describes the transformations that she sees in the children she gets to care for, “This child, whose eyes were once empty with hunger and dark with sadness, now shines and radiates life and vitality.” (Davis 201). The way that Katie uses emotions to help her express her point, is to describe what the children were like before, their hunger and sickness. Then she explains how joyful and healthy the children are after they have been able to be cared for. The writer’s most convincing appeals to prove her point were, when she uses extremely descriptive words to have the reader be able to feel like they are in Uganda with her, and like they are seeing the pain and hunger themselves.

Angelina Weld Grimké’s, Rachel, portrays an African American family’s experience and development over the course of several years during the segregation era. Act one begins in a domestic setting, introducing the main character, Rachel Loving. Rachel is eighteen, living with her mother, Mrs. Loving, and brother, Tom. Notably, the Loving household is presented as a cheerful and affectionate place, full of laughter and lightheartedness. In a like manner, Rachel emerges as warm and cheerful, yet overall naive; never once questioning the absence of her father and brother, who passed ten years earlier. Initially, Rachel is lively and passionate, bearing a deep infatuation for motherhood and constantly proclaiming her dream to raise a child. Nevertheless,

Write a critical analysis of any aspect of "The Story of an Hour" which you found of interest and significance.