Theme Of The Country Girls

    In the early twentieth century, Ireland, and more specifically Dublin, was a place defined by class distinctions. There were the wealthy, worldly upper-class who owned large, stately townhouses in the luxurious neighborhoods and the less fortunate, uneducated poor who lived in any shack they could afford in the middle of the city. For the most part, the affluent class was Protestant, while the struggling workers were overwhelmingly Catholic. These distinctions were the result of nearly a century of disparity in income, education, language, and occupation, and in turn were the fundamental bases for the internal struggle that many of Joyce's characters feel.

In 1999, American author Bobbie Ann Mason wrote the short story “Being Country” to satirize the notion that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Mason, who was the main character and narrator of her own story, was very unhappy with her life on the farm, as demonstrated through the discontented, critical tone of her narration. She insisted a countrywoman could only have an impact on the world if she took initiative and questioned her womanly duties.

“Girl” is a short story in which the author, Jamaica Kincaid, unofficially presents the stereotypes of girls in the mid 1900s. Kincaid includes two major characters in the story “Girl”, they are the mother and the girl. Although the daughter only asks two questions in this story, she is the major character. The mother feels like her daughter is going in the wrong direction and not making the best decisions in her life. The whole story is basically the mother telling her daughter what affects her decisions will have in the future. The mother believes that because her daughter isn’t sitting, talking, cleaning, walking or singing correctly it will lead her to a path of destruction. “Girl” is a reflection of female sexuality, the power of family, and how family can help overcome future dangers.

For a reader in 2017 “Girl” by Jamaica Kincaid might seems very surreal and harsh as a story; mostly because of the very grating and mean language that is used when the mother is talking. The mother’s heartless language makes is really uncomfortable even though at the end of the day, she speaks nothing but love into her daughter’s life. She is giving her daughter social and family teachings, sharing with her the cultural and social values that will help her girl to have a peaceful and respected household and a happy life.

Kiara Liz Correa English 221September 19th, 2017 Good Country PeopleIn the story, Good Country People written by Flannery O’Connor, Hulga Hopewell lost her joy at the age of ten when she lost her leg and was diagnosed with a heart condition. Hulga isa thirty-two-year-old woman who is over educated and spends the rest of her life being miserableand doing everything in her power to irritate her mother and everyone around her. Although Hulga seems to want acceptance from her mother and her environment around her, with close reading we find out that she really doesn’t care about anything or anyone. The only thing she wants is to be superior, immature and bitter. Hulga Hopewell is nothing but someone who thinks she is above everyone because she believes that she is superior. She never bothers in trying to get to know the others as real people, if she had she would have realized that there was more to them that meets the eye. Her lack of interest in the other characters effectively isolates her from any meaningful relationship with other characters especially her mother. Hulga is very versed, though perhaps not as smart as she thinks she is. While one is tempted to see view Hulga as a weak individual, she sees herself as a strong and powerful, even imagining seducing Manley Pointer. She sees herself in such a position of power and “worldliness” that she declares herself as an atheist, and chooses to believein “nothing” making her a nihilist. Hulgas life is turned upside down, as she is confronted with Mr. Manley Pointer who is the one that holds power over her, and later realizes that the “power” she had was nothing more than an illusion. Hulga Hopewell is also very immature. Her acts of rebellion can be seen as a way for her wanting to be accepted, but she really just wants to annoy her mother and anyone around her. Hulga uses her handicap, a leg partially shot off during a hunting accident, as an excuse for stomping loudly around the house in hopes of irritating her mother. She also spends her time making sly comments about her mother and Mrs. Freemans daughter’s, who she calls Caramel and Glycerin just to spite both women. She never really acts like a thirty-two-year-old woman and doesn’t dress like one either,

The lives of Suitcase Lady and Curley’s wife are full with feelings of loneliness and seclusion, eliciting feelings of pity in those who are reading. Curley’s wife lived during a time in which women had little rights and were considered to be the property of their husbands. The men on the farm would not allow her to talk to them as they feared how Curley would react to his wife talking to men other than himself, “I seen ‘em poison before, but I never seen no piece of jailbait worse than her. You leave her be (24).” George’s words perfectly describe the mentality of the men on the ranch towards Curley’s wife, they viewed her as a trap and piece of jailbait simply because she was a woman who wanted to talk to someone. Living on a ranch with only men who refused to acknowledge her because of her marital status was deeply troubling to both Curley’s wife and the readers, “Think I don’t like to talk to somebody ever’ once in a while? Think I like to stick in that house alla time? (55).” Similarly, Suitcase Lady is immensely isolated because comparable to

The Irish were promised the Home Rule Act, but it was taken away at the start of the Ester Uprising. “This modest promise was swept away the Easter Uprising of 1916, when a small band of rebels paralyzed the city and the Irish Republic was proclaimed from the steps of the GPO” (Hegarty). Padhraic Pearse led about 2000 people into the Easter Revolution, only a small fraction of the people that had lived in Dublin at the time. Most of the Irish were involved in World War I. “They had little support – many Irish volunteers had joined the war effort and the rebels were perceived to be traitors to the great cause” (Hegarty). It would take more violence and rebellion against the British to bring attention to their cause both locally and abroad.

Feminism and Historicism play a major part in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, “Good Country People”, first published in 1955. The story focuses on the importance of identity and the parallels between truth and deception. In “Good Country People”, the Hopewell family, maintain a small farm in rural Georgia with the help of tenants the Freemans. The pious Mrs. Hopewell’s mottos ‘nothing is perfect’ and ‘it takes all kinds to make the world’ are manifested in her unmarried thirty-two year old daughter, Joy who later changes her name to Hulga, wears a prosthetic wooden leg because of a childhood accident. Hulga who has a Ph.D. in Philosophy, cannot advance her academic aspirations because of a weak heart; because of this she must live in her

Irish independence has been fought for a long time ever since the British occupied Ireland in 1172. The King of England invaded and controlled Ireland. The invasion led to religious and territorial conflicts. There was an effort to create a church comparable to the Church of England in the 1500s. Catholics who live in Ireland were against the idea and a conflict for independence has emerged (Arena & Arrigo, 2004). The suppression of Irish nationalism by the British in the 20th century led to the creation of martyrs for the cause led by the Irish Republican Army (Combs, 2011).

In order to properly view a story from a feminist perspective, it is important that the reader fully understands what the feminist perspective entails. “There are many feminist perspectives, and each perspective uses different approaches to analyze and interpret texts. One is that gender is “socially constructed” and another is that power is distributed unequally on the basis of sex, race, and ethnicity, religion, national origin, age, ability, sexuality, and economic class status” (South University Online, 2011, para. 1). The story “Girl” is an outline of the things young girls

Girls, young women, and mature mothers. Society has consistently given women strict guidelines, rules and principles on how to be an appropriate member of a man’s society. These rules are set at a young age and enforced thoroughly into adulthood. When not followed accordingly, women often times too many face reprimanding through means of verbal abuse, physical abuse, or social exile. In the midst of all these strict guidelines and social etiquette for girls, a social rebellion started among girls and women and gender roles were broken, however the social rebellion did not and does not affect all girls and women. For instance, in less socially developed places, young girls on the brink of womanhood are still strongly persuaded to be a man’s idea of a “woman”.

Literature, apart from being a channel to depict the author’s work and thoughts on a particular subject, is also interpreted as a medium to reflect norms, values, customs, and so on from different times in history. As stated by Milton C. Albrecht, literature reveals “the ethos of culture, the processes of class struggle, and certain facts of social facts.” (425) Through literary works, authors may be able to reflect their thoughts on specific issues, such as social injustices, or just point out the inequity between different social aspects, such as gender, class or social status. This essay, therefore, focuses on “Wifey Redux” and “Fjord of Killary”, two of Kevin Barry’s short stories from Dark Lies in the Island as well as on “Death of a Field” and “Number Fifty-Two” from Paula Meehan’s Painting Rain to show how inequities of class and social status in Irish society are visible through indirect reflections onto the natural and material worlds.

Maureen and Mag are isolated because of their physical location and their relationship with each other. Maureen dreams of being free of her mother’s house and small town life in Leenane. She blames her mother and her sisters for her circumstances; however, she is faced with the hard truth that men don’t come to call. Farming towns like Leenane were previously communities built on supporting each other, but over time families grew more isolated from one and other, leaving people like Mag and Maureen without the help of friendly neighbours.

In Dubliners, women are victims indeed. They are victims of home, of the recognized virtues by society, of classes of life, of religious doctrines, and of women themselves. In this essay, we are going to analyze the portrayal of women in Dubliners in terms of the aforementioned aspects, namely home, the recognized virtues by society, classes of life, religious doctrines and women themselves.

James Joyce’s book of short stories entitled Dubliners examines feminism and the role of women in Irish society. The author is ahead of his time by bringing women to the forefront of his stories and using them to show major roles and flaws in Irish society, specifically in “Eveline” and “The Boarding House”. James Joyce portrays women as victims who are forced to assume a leading and somewhat patriarchal role in their families. He uses them to show the paralysis of his native land Ireland, and the disruption in social order that is caused by the constant cycle of abuse that he finds commonplace in Ireland. Joyce is trying to end the Victorian and archaic view of