Eugenia Collier uses diction and imagery to create the voice of her narrator, Lizabeth, in her short story “Marigolds.” Lizabeth has a negative tone in the beginning of the story. The imagery she stated, “When I think of my hometown, all that I seem to remember is dust- the brown crumbly dust of late summer-arid, sterile dust that gets into the eyes and makes them water (Collier)...” proves that she is unhappy to be in that place. There are a lot of reasons why she is unhappy in that place and one of them is poverty. Lizabeth hinted that one of their struggles was poverty when she said “Poverty is a cage in which we all are trapped, and our hatred of it was still the vague, undirected restlessness of the zoo-bred flamingo who knows that nature created him to fly flee (Collier).” Lizabeth established the juxtaposition when she said, “And one other thing I remember, another incongruency of memory-a brilliant splash of sunny yellow against the dust-Miss Lottie’s marigolds (Collier).” She is stating that Miss Lottie’s marigolds were the only beautiful thing in that unsightly place. Those marigolds did not give her a pleasant feeling because she thought that they were too beautiful to exist in that kind of place. Miss Lottie was believed to be a witch when Lizabeth was young but she knows she is mature enough not believe in those things anymore. Their first encounter resulted in Lizabeth and her company destroying some of Miss Lottie’s marigolds and they left Miss Lottie and John Burke, her son, enraged. When she got home and went to her room hoping to rest after a long day, she overheard her parents talking. She heard her dad say, “ Twenty two years, Maybelle, twenty two years…and I got nothing for you, nothing, nothing (Collier).” She then realized that her father got fired from his job and was not taking it too well after what they have been through. Maybelle, Lizabeth’s mother, attempted to comfort her husband by saying, “Honey, you took good care of us when you had it. Ain’t nobody got nothing nowadays (Collier).” After a while of discussion Lizabeth’s father began to sob, loudly and painfully. At this point, LIzabeth is confused because she never heard a man cry before. She did not even know that men cry.
Suddenly my eyes flew open, the coldness slowly lingered away. My body felt warm. Almost as warm as how my mouth felt the last time I had sipped on my grandmother's tea. My grandmother always told me to have faith and to believe in the end everything would be alright. I felt the frigid saltwater against my skin. “Where am I?” I thought to myself. I couldn’t quite recall what had happened nor where I was. All that I could recall was hearing screams of innocent children and parents trying to comfort
The air was crisp and without a sign of clouds in the sky. Orange and yellow leaves blew to and fro, and despite it being late fall, it was hot, and the girl was lightly sweating. As she was walking to her car to get to her English class at another school, she enjoyed the warm and fresh air that only happens right before the cold, freezing winter. Because of the school’s miniscule parking spaces, the girl had to park further away in order to fit her moss green truck she drove, but she did not mind the extra walk in the bright afternoon. Inside her truck, she was met with musty, hot air. Instead of turning on the air conditioning, the girl decided to open her windows, to let the fresh air ventilate the truck and cool it off. As she drove out of the parking lot and stopped at a stop sign to turn right onto a busy road, a man noticed her from across the
Today April 10, 2016. This spring I have watched with awe the breaking through of the flowers that have been out of sight all winter. It is almost as if they have been in reserve for several months waiting for a call to come out of the ground. They have been frozen, drenched with water from the winter rains, and snow piled on top of them for days. Yet, when the time of their arrival comes from that bulb or seed, suddenly that green stem begins to emerge. As it emerges it begins to transpose into its own personal flower, the lilies do not look like the irises or the mums, the peonies take on their own special look. One flower in peculiar I was watching for was a peony. We have two rows, one has four large peonies in it the other has seven. All
At a young age, children do not understand the importance of having compassion as for they hold innocence within themselves. Growing up and maturing into an adult, children begin to progressively lose their innocence as they become more of a compassionate person because one can not have both innocence and compassion simultaneously. In fact, a coming of age short story called “Marigolds” written by Eugenia Collier, tells about a young girl named Lizabeth who grows up to become a compassionate person. For the most part, Lizabeth tells her childhood experience in a flashback on how she mostly remembers Miss Lottie’s marigolds. Ultimately, Lizabeth decides to destroy Miss Lottie’s marigolds out of anger because she hears about her parent's economic struggles. Shortly after Lizabeth realizes what she had done, she realizes the meaning of why Miss Lottie plants the marigolds. Throughout the short story, “Marigolds,” the characterization of Lizabeth helps develop the author’s argument that one can not have both compassion and innocence. The three events that show this is, when Lizabeth hesitates before throwing the rocks at the marigolds, hearing the sounds of her father’s sorrowful cries, and eliminating Miss Lottie’s marigolds.
Writers are able to leave their personal fingertips on their pieces, which is why writing is such a beautiful hobby. Whether one is writing poetry, short stories, novels, scripts, articles, etc., the diversity and uniqueness is absolutely amazing. In order for writers to keep their pieces original, they use literary devices such as imagery, juxtaposition, and diction. These devices help create something called voice, which is essentially the special way an author writes, including word choice and the way the author communicates his or hers ideas. These three literary devices are used frequently in the short story “Marigolds,” and each of them contribute to the author’s voice.
All the Marigols And The Migrant Mother The Great Depression Era,a time in American history when the nation feel into a time of poverty and hopelessness. People standing in lines for hours for a bowl of soup and a piece of bread.When jobs were few no matter how desperatly people looked for them.Doing without and wondering if or when a better time would come. The story "Marigolds"by Eugenia Collier is the memories of Lizabeth, a fourteen year old black girl in rural Maryland.When I think of that time and place ,I only remember the dry September of the dirt roads and grassless yards of the shantytown where I lived.Memory is an abstract painting - it does not present things as they are,but rather as they feel. Another inconsistency of memory, a brilliant splash of sunny yellow against the dust, Miss Lottie's marigolds. Lizabeth has a lot of memories.Fishing for minnows with cupped hands just to have them slip away.Loafing around trying to find something to do.The Childrens favorit thing to do was to annoy Miss Lottie.An old Indian woman they called a witch. Why ,when her shack seemed like it would fall down at anytime would she have beautiful mounds of
One night, thoroughly past her bedtime, Georgiana crept stealthily downstairs to sneak a bite of pie, even though her mother would never approve. She immediately realized a heavy drape of desolation. The only noise was her heart beating to the rapid rhythm of the twitching fan. Georgiana thought that no one would be awake at one in the morning. She slipped through the doorway into the kitchen. For an instant, her heart stopped. A dreadful sight stood in her way. An innocent and isolated individual lay with his hand grasping for life, but it was already over. Taking a step back, she
The day I planted my marigolds was when I was little there was this really nicely colored blanket that my cousin got the day before. He loved it so much he would take it everywhere; So one day I decided I wanted it one too so I took it, I would sleep with it and it had colorful designs on it, also I knew it was wrong but i was so mad that i wasn't thinking about it.
Three days earlier on a wintery morning. I walked out of my warm apartment, as the cold breeze instantly smacked me in the face, even with my woolly, Christmas themed sweater and thick, quilted coat I was still cold. The sky was washed with grey clouds, as the ground was covered in crisp, white snow. The wind whooshed and whistled past my ears giving me the shivers; I quickly ran through the deep,
The room is too cold, yet too hot and Eleanor wants to scream. Her eyes are closed, but she can feel the room spinning. There’s no air and Eleanor’s panic shifts from her past to the present. She can’t get air, air that she needs.
It was a pleasant fall Tuesday when Stephanie went to work. Her day normal consisted of writing reports, and filing paperwork for her office. She turned on the television to see if there was anything alluring in the news. “NEWS FLASH: MAN CONVICTED OF MURDER HAS ESCAPED PRISON.” The warning did not phase her, considering the jail was far from her office. She concluded that she was safe. By four o’clock, it was time for her to travel home from a laborious day of work. She arranged her things into her bag, and began her trek. Walking out the door, she was met with warm rays from the sun. It was an astounding way to end a strenuous
The knight loaded the bow directed at her heart. She closed her eyes scared to open them, scared to see the arrow lodge its self in her chest. She took her final breath......
“It is a shame that her father left her...this happened because her mother failed her job as a wife...she is so young...what was her father thinking?”, my relatives whispered as they sipped their tea. My cousin’s face turned pale like the white blanket of snow falling outside the lodge at the camp in Lake Tahoe. Her expression held so many emotions as if it was a canvas of a painting to be gazed upon. I could see that she felt frustrated and tired of these rude remarks, and all I did was just stand there and caressed the back side of her hands, so I could comfort her. Suddenly, it felt like the air had thickened so much that even a hammer could not slash it into tiny bits. My cousin had not yet known why her father left the house yesterday.
According to your agency’s website you’re actively seeking a wide range of fiction, so I would like to present my novel, A Flower for You, for representation.