Symbolism In 'The Grave' By Katherine Anne Porter

It has often said that “A child become an adult not only when he is right, but when he is wrong.” This is evident in the historical fiction novel, The Watsons Go To Birmingham, 1963, by Christopher Paul Curtis when he talks about coming of age. The author uses symbolism to convey the message that growing up means facing reality.

The transition from childhood to adulthood is a very essential stage of human development. This stage is when the child leaves their roles as a child and takes on new positions and responsibilities. John Updike, author of “A&P”, writes stories of initiation. In this short story, “A&P” you meet a young protagonist, Sammy, who experiences the change from being a youthful child to the start of his journey to become a mature adult. The story takes place just like any other day for Sammy working as a cashier for A&P. However, after certain events that happen in the store Sammy realizes a major change not only with himself but his confusion of entering adulthood. The two themes I will discuss from the short story “A&P” are power of desire fueled by attraction and the dull conformity of many hometowns.

In the following stories the authors dramatize the transition to adulthood through different symbolic objects and experiences. The authors use different types of literary elements to portray different experiences and feelings to the reader. I think the authors chose to use symbolism in their stories so that they could help the reader understand the different elements that are happening within the story.

Growing up and learning to be an adult is part of everyone’s life. Emotions run rampant with love, anger, and uncertainty. Short stories Araby by James Joyce and A & P by John Updike create perfect examples of coming to age experiences which individuals can relate to. The array of emotions and hardships we experience throughout youth aid in creating a culturally advanced and diverse society.

These young protagonists in coming of age stories seem to feel like they are treated like kids and want to act more like adults to show they are more mature than the adults think. Evidence of this is in short stories like Through the Tunnel, The Intruder, and The Grave. The Grave is a story about a brother and sister at the ages of nine and twelve hunting in the nearby woods where they find some graves and shoot an animal. The Intruder is about a brother and his older sister, where the sister invites the boyfriend over to hang out. The boyfriend will leave and the siblings will head to bed, where young Kenneth shoots what he thinks is a intruder. The last story Through the Tunnel is about a young boy who wants to be able to swim like some

Stories we have read such as The Hills like White Elephants and the Birth-Mark are filled with symbolism. These stories use different physical objects or features and give them a deeper meaning. In these stories, the characters get overwhelmed with something (the operation in the Hills like White Elephants and the mark on the woman’s face in The Birthmark), which is an important thing to consider when reading these passages. These people are facing challenges and trying to find some way to overcome it. These stories present terrific examples of symbolism throughout both of the stories.

The Coming of Age “Discern of the coming on of years, and think not to do the same things still; for age will not be defied.” (Francis Bacon) In Treasure Island the young boy Jim ventures away from home to help find a treasure on an island. As Jim losses his child like dreams into a role of a sailor pirate life he transitions from child to adult like. "I began to feel pretty desperate, for I felt altogether helpless" (Stevenson 53).

“The Funeral” by Band of Horses, written by Ben Bridwell, is about a man troubled by his past who drinks to forget, becomes a drunk, and in the end, end his life in a car accident. The photo I have chosen comes from this song “The Funeral” and it is of a man sitting alone at a bar. In the lyrics the double meaning “mourning to wake you” calls to mind the terms “mourning” and “wake” both strongly associated with funerals. “It’s really too late to call so we wait for morning to wake you, it’s all we’ve got” meaning, his family members should have done something earlier but didn’t, and now his addiction is stronger than ever. They wait each day hoping that the person will get better and change his life.

“These Shallow Graves,” is a novel by Jennifer Donnelly. The book is a mystery set in a time period where women weren’t allowed to anything but housewives. It is set in New York, and the main character’s family is very rich. The interesting part comes in when you find out the main character and protagonist, Jo, or Josephine Monfort is a woman who only wants to learn, but women were discouraged of doing anything of the such during this period. She loves to write, and while in high school she tries to write a controversial article, and gets in trouble by the headmaster. After finding out, her friend Trudy replies, “I merely wish to smoke. Sparky [the headmaster] can forgive that. You, on the other hand, wish to know things. And no one can forgive a girl for that.”

Life is a process where the most unexpected happens. When growing up you face many problems, and later accomplishments, but the hardest part of life is having to cope with the transition from childhood to adulthood. Many people fear the fact of them having to take on various responsibilities and not having the same support or dependence as they when they were a child, but those encounters are the ones that shape you and help you become a responsible and independent individual.

In the Newberry awarded book The Grave Yard Book by Neil Gaiman is a mystery about a boy named Bod who lives in two worlds.The living and the dead . His parents were murderd by a misterius man named Jack. He is raised in a grave yard by ghosts . As Bod gets older he learns about Jack and how and why his parents where murderd.He soon wants revenge.As he ventures out into living world he soon demonstrates his unique abilities of fading and instilling fear in people that try to harm him. He also makes friends in both worlds along the way.

According to American industrial designer Adam Savage, “ one of the defining moments of adulthood is the realization that nobody’s going to take care of you.” This statement caused me to cogitate the potential aspects that cause one 's shift from childhood into adulthood.Within the four short stories “Initiation”( Plath, Sylvia.) by Sylvia Plath, “Araby”(Joyce, James.) by James Joyce, “ Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” (Oates, Carol Joyce.) by Joyce Carol Oates, and “The Stone boy” (Berriault, Gina.) by Gina Berriault, each of the authors conveyed the theme of coming of age to shed light on the varying forces that evoke one’s initiation into adulthood. These different forces lead one to change from who they once were, to undergo a

Through stories told by the different characters through fragmented narrative, Generation X opens the world’s eyes to the struggles of “overeducated and underemployed” twentysomethings. His vivid diction is a large part of the excellent word quality. Compelling issues that Gen X kids are “tired” of, most noticeably consumerism and materialism (a chapter in the book is titled “I Am Not a Target Market”), are discussed with informal but thoughtful language. The author’s own neologisms, or newly coined words or expressions, can be seen in the margins of the pages. This inventive component is eye-opening and helps the reader understand and enjoy the book better. In one case, the definition of a “Mid-twenties Breakdown” is given after the narrator notes that one of his friends has already had his: “A period of mental collapse occurring in one’s twenties, often caused by an inability to function outside of school or structured environments coupled with a realisation of one’s essential aloneness in the world. Often marks induction into the ritual of pharmaceutical usage. Another creative aspect of this book is the inclusion of cartoons to better illustrate a point. For example, the most well-known drawing from this book is of a woman saying, “Don’t worry, mother… If the marriage doesn’t work out, we can always get divorced.” These interesting traits make Generation X a more

In the short story "The Dead" , the character Gabriel, is expressing how he truly feels about his wife and how their life together. Gabriel shows and explains how he feels, now that his wife is asleep. Him sitting next to her and just starring at her eyes and hair, realizes that he is the one that delt with the most pain, because of their marriage. He felt that the marriage was in a way, toxic. These feeling on known to the readers because of the imagery used in the story. For example, the story talks about the color of the clothes that Gabriel was wearing, which were black. However, he thinks that by her being asleep is the only time that they do not argue with each other. Joyce also uses symbolism. She uses it in the beginning of the

The main theme in this short-story does also circle about the big leap from, in your adolescence, relying on your parents to, in your adulthood, become an independant individual with the right of