St. Lucy's Home For Woman Character Analysis

In every good initiation story the protagonist experiences a range of changes. In Karen Russell 's story “St. Lucy 's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves”, the protagonist Claudette is quickly submersed in a new world. She and her pack go from living with their lycanthrope parents in the woods, to being raised by nuns and taught to act human. She has to learn a whole new way to exist. She learns what to do, how to think, and how to become an individual. Karen Russell effectively shapes Claudette as a dynamic character. Throughout the story Claudette experiences changes in her personality and behaviors, producing a stark contrast in the end.

In Karen Russell's short story, “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves”, a pack of wolf-girls are sent to a church to transform them into human-girls. As they journey through their transformation there is a guide called, The Jesuit Handbook on Lycanthropic Culture Shock that helps the nuns running St. Lucy’s. The book describes the transformation in stages to help determine the girls’ place as a human. Russell uses the stages as an epigraph to start a new part of the girls’ journey. In stage one, the girls first arrive at St. Lucy’s to begin their transformation.

In the excerpt “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves” by Karen Russell the narrator speaks as a half wolf half human mind set. She discusses the improvements and difficulties of living in captivity after being free and wild their entire lives. There are three (3) main characters, Mirabella (youngest), Claudette who is the middle child of the three (3) sisters, and last but certainly not least, Jeanette. These girls are few of an entire “pack” of half human half wolf. The pack is referred to as a whole throughout the duration of this excerpt. They experience difficulty in the transition of the “wolf-identity” into more of a “human-identity”. This short story exemplifies how the difficulty of change after being exposed to ones “tradition” for so long differs for each “person” wolf or not.

In Karen Russell’s “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves,” Mirabella shows signs of resistance. Mirabella is expected to conform to a foreign, civilized society through assimilation and to eradicate her lycanthropic culture. However, Mirabella withdraws from the foreign culture, that is human, by expressing her animalistic behavior and choosing on her own behalf to not listen or follow what is expected of her. Mirabella shows resistance and hesitancy to adapt, comply, and be restrained through a culture that is not hers. Throughout stages 1 and 2, Mirabella displays resistance to conform or adapt to the foreign, human culture.

In summary, Wolf girls are being forced to learn human life. Mirabella is having a hard time adjusting successfully, like the other sisters. Even though they're wolves, their parents want them to live a better and normal life for them. In stage 2, girls start feeling uncomfortable but there is nothing they can do but keep adjusting. In stage 3, Russells excerpt from text,

St. Lucy’s home is a home for girls to go to when they have been raised by wolves. They go there to gain skills and manners that they weren’t taught growing up. During their visit, they go through five stages to become more human. Some girls change and improve, but others do not and they stay the same. Something happens with Mirabella and she did not improve during her visit.

For example, throughout her childhood she never had a truly stable home. Her family was constantly moving from place to place around the country, and as her father said, “doing the skedaddle” whenever inconveniences arose, like debt collectors catching up to them or getting into trouble with the law. Second, her father always spent the majority of their money on beer and other alcoholic beverages at bars, and they frequently had no food to eat and were starving. The children often had to fend for themselves to find food when they were hungry without the assistance of their parents. Jeannette often subdued her and her siblings’ difficulties by taking charge of herself and her siblings to acquire food and by standing up for herself whenever it was necessary. For example, she stood up for herself whenever her mother was being selfish and pompous. Her mother would hide snacks and eat them secretly without sharing, and she would also spend days sobbing and complaining about how she had to do everything. During those times, Jeannette often took charge and directly criticized her mother about not doing her job. After her dad whipped her, Jeannette vowed to escape Welch for good and began saving up money to leave and move away. As a result of her struggles, over the years Jeannette had become very hard-working and diligent at whatever work she did. This lead her to become very successful in the future. She

Describe Jeannette’s childhood, specifically her socialization or the process by which she acquired family values, information about social expectations, and survival strategies.

Whether one would like to admit it or not, change is a difficult and not to mention uncomfortable experience which we all must endure at one point in our lives. A concept that everyone must understand is that change does not occur immediately, for it happens overtime. It is necessary for time to pass in order for a change to occur, be it days, weeks, months, or even years. The main character, who is also the narrator of “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves”, realizing that “things felt less foreign in the dark” (Russell 225), knows that she will be subject to change very soon. The author makes it evident to readers that the narrator is in a brand new environment as the story begins. This strange short story about girls raised by

In this paper, I will explain how the article “The Lady and the Tramp (II): Feminist Welfare Politics, Poor Single Mothers, and the Challenge of Welfare Justice” by Gwendolyn Mink relates to the thematic focus of working women and the Marxist and socialist branch of feminism. In Feminist Thought: A More Comprehensive Introduction, Rosemarie Tong explains that Marxist and socialist feminists understand women’s oppression as a labor issue. Women’s work is not viewed as a productive contribution to society. One of the ways Marxist and socialist feminists sought to improve women’s oppression was through the wages-for-housework campaign of the 1970s, which fought for work done in the domestic sphere to be paid and respected by society. In this same vein, Mink’s article can be viewed as a continuation of sorts of the wages-for-housework campaign. Mink suggests that poor single mothers have the right for their work to be recognized by society and supported economically like the Marxist and socialist feminist in the 1970s.

Mirabella is the youngest of the wolf girls. She has the quickest reflexes, but is the slowest at coming to terms with leaving behind her old ways. While the other girls are working on their speech and walking upright, Mirabella is still chewing on church pews, barking, and sleeping under her sister’s beds. She also continues to keep her fist in tight balls, despite the nun’s best efforts to stop her. By stage three, her teeth have become nubs, her hair is falling out, her ribs are sticking out, and her bright eyes have become dull, but Mirabella seems to keep her childlike attitude.

(B) This article also serves as a great source of supporting evidence for Louisa suffering from obsessive compulsive disorder. This is done by pointing out how Louisa often has to restore order in the house by, for example, restacking the books that Joe rearranges, rearranging the workbasket that he knocks over, as well as sweeping up the dirt he has tracked in. The article is able to outline how Louisa’s routines are not only obsessive but also provide her control over her environment. The article is also able to examine how her husband is the complete polar opposite of who she is by showing his clumsiness and disregard for domestic order. This source will be used towards my last body paragraphs.

Upon first reading “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves,” it might seem like an imaginative fantasy and nothing else. The story focuses on the daughters of a pack of werewolves, and it takes place in a world where the werewolves and their daughters are nothing out of the ordinary. But upon closer examination, this is a story rooted in reality. This inventive tale parallels several real world phenomena. Karen Russell uses allegory in “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves” to objectify western society’s views of people outside of that society and of outsiders in general, and compare them to the views that people have of wild animals.

In the novel Legend by Marie Lu, there is one character in which I would be delighted to be my friend. Day is everything you ask for in a friend. He is an honest and humble person. Day has a charisma as well as a loving personality to him that makes his loved ones like to be around him. If there were two words to describe Day, it would be daring and caring. Day completes all of these stunts to annoy and anger the Republic. He gets hurt sometimes, like his three story fall out of the hospital, but always springs right back life. Day is a caring person because of his actions towards his family and dearest friends. In the book on page 6, Day shows that he cares for his family. “I dig through the little pile of goodies inside the bundle, then hold up a used pair of goggles. I check them again to make sure there are no cracks in the glass. ‘For John. An early birthday gift.’ My older brother turns nineteen later this week. He works fourteen-hour shifts in the neighborhood plants friction stores and always comes home rubbing his eyes from the smoke. These goggles were a lucky steal from a military supply shipment.” Even while Day is constantly living on the run and off of his steals, he still manages to take care of his family. John is the messenger that gives most of Days care packages to the family. No one else knows in which Day is still alive and that he is now the Republic’s most wanted criminal. While living on the streets with Tess as his only company, he still cares about

In Lucy, Jamaica Kincaid explores the disillusionment faced by the eponymous character upon immigrating to the United States. The novel's style of narration allows Lucy’s thoughts and emotions to remain hidden. Despite this intense privacy, Lucy's disillusionment is clear. She had hoped that moving around the globe would solve her problems but she still struggles with homesickness and her relationship with her mother. Her move is disappointing. The erasure poem And Coldest also engages disillusionment. The poem suggests the speaker has become disillusioned by observing the world, and indicates their plan to be “shut tight.” The poem inspired me to consider the causes of Lucy’s disillusionment, and her failure to address her own emotions. As a recent immigrant, the causes of Lucy’s disillusionment are somewhat obvious. More enigmatic is her self-avoidant, “shut tight” attitude. In this paper, I argue that Lucy’s disillusionment causes her to avoid the discomfort that comes with self-reflection.