Summary~

Everyday Use by Alice Walker is a story about a single mother (who is the narrator), and her two daughters Maggie and Dee. In the beginning of the story the Mother and Maggie, are awaiting Dee’s arrival, Maggie inside nervous about her sister’s visit. Dee arrives wearing long earrings, many bracelets and a long, crazy colorful dress, she is also accompanied by an Arabic man, “Hakim-a-Barber”, who is supposedly either her husband or fiance. The mother and Maggie are surprised by Dee’s appearance, she changed since the last time they saw her. Dee also changed her name to ” Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo”, which the mother was not pleased with because Dee was named after her aunt, grandmother and many other  family members. Dee starts noticing many beautiful things around the house, such as the benches, as they sit down to eat. She begins to ask her mother for things she wants to take to her house, the turn top, the quilts. Her mother is hesitant to give her the quilts because she saved them for Maggie, which makes Dee very angry. She doesn’t believe Maggie can appreciate and savior something so precious. The story ends with Dee and Hakim leaving, but before they leave Dee tells Maggie to make something of herself. As soon as Dee is gone Maggie and the mother are once again happy.

Quote~

“She gasped as if a bee had stung her. “Maggie can’t appreciate these quilts!” She said. “She’d probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use” (432). I chose this quote because I think it expresses the meaning Walker was trying to get at the most. This story is rich with meanings, but I believe it talks about the importance of family and heritage the most. Walker wrote this story at the time when the civil rights movement was going on, she herself was an African American, her parents were sharecroppers who raised cotton. I would believe that traditions, culture, heritage meant a lot to her, she had children and probably wanted to pass on her culture to them. In this story she expresses the importance of this through the quilts, through the relationship of the family. The quilts are very symbolic in this story, when African Americans were slaves they used quilts to send messages, some quilts mapped escaped routes out of a plantation or county, now quilts retain the culture and historical significance. When Dee returned home she was already different, she was becoming modern, accepting new ideas, and the mother didn’t like this. She was used to her family’s traditions and culture, that’s what the quilts symbolized. So when Dee asked for the quilts, yes the mother already decided to give them to Maggie, but I think she also didn’t want to give them to Dee because she was changing, she wouldn’t continue their culture, the culture that the quilts held. This quote is also important because it shows how low Dee thinks of her sister, she doesn’t believe she could keep something so sacred save.

Response~

This quote and story caught me off guard, it was very interesting yet hard to understand before I knew some background information of the author and the time this story was written. It was interesting to see how Dee changing impacted the mother and Maggie, nowadays this is very common in families. Personally in my family, my oldest sister left to college and when she came back she had different views on religion, culture and our traditions. My parents didn’t react well to this because they were used to their ideas, to their views and expected her to follow along the same lines, in this aspect I can relate to how Maggie felt. I also, stepped away from my parents views on religion and culture, so to speak “I became modern”, so I can relate to Dee and how it impacted her to step away. I believe each culture needs to grow in their ideas and views, the rest of the world is growing and changing, we also need to grow and change. That doesn’t mean leave behind the values of our heritage, our traditions and even our religion, instead just be open to more ideas and views.

 

Summary~

The short story, “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver, is a story about a husband, a wife and a blind man. The Narrator who is the husband begins the story by telling us that his wife’s blind friend, whose wife has just died, is going to spend the night at their house. He starts telling us that he isn’t happy about this visitor and the man’s blindness unsettles him, he explains that his wife met the blind man ten years ago when she worked for him as a reader to the blind in Seattle. He says that on the last day of her job there, the blind man touched her face and she wrote a poem about the experience over the years she and the blind man kept in touch by sending tapes back and forth to each other throughout her marriage, and she told everything to the blind man on tapes. The narrator then tells us about his wife’s past, she married her childhood sweetheart and became an officer’s wife, she was unhappy with her life, and tried to commit suicide one night by swallowing pills, but she survived. Once Robert comes it’s a little awkward, the wife is all happy and laughing with him, while the husband is not happy because Robert is blind and he doesn’t act or look like the way he thought. They ate dinner then went to the living room to watch TV, the wife went upstairs for a long time it was just Robert and the Narrator. The Narrator offered Robert some weed, and they got high, that’s when the wife came back and also got high. The wife fell asleep almost immediately, Robert and the Narrator sat watching TV and after a while the program stopped talking and was just showing images, which made the Narrator uncomfortable so he started explaining what was happening on screen. A cathedral came on, Robert never saw one so the Narrator started describing one to him. He was having a hard time so Robert asked him to find some paper and a pen. He made the Narrator draw a cathedral with his eyes closed as he had his hand on the Narrator’s hand, once he finished he didn’t want to open his eyes, he thought he out to keep them closed for a little longer.

Character Analysis~

The character I have chosen is the Narrator. A couple of things that stood out to me throughout the story about him was his relationship with his wife and his arrogance toward Robert. Throughout the story I noticed he and his wife didn’t have the loving relationship we all expect from a married couple, the type we see in the movies and little girls dream of. They always seemed displeased with each other, angry at what the other had to say, “”Are you crazy?” my wife said. “Have you flipped or something?” She picked up a potato. I saw it hit the floor, then roll under the stove. “What’s wrong with you?” she said. “Are you drunk?”” (437). The reason his wife reacted this way was because he asked if The Blind man’s wife was a Negro, on both parts we can see how they seem to just bite at each other, first off it is very obvious from the beginning of the story how important Robert is to the wife, so the comment would surely upset her. On the other hand the husband was relatively confused, he didn’t know much about the background of Robert’s wife and genuinely thought her name sounded like one of a colored woman. Many times throughout the story the wife and the Narrator have such disputes that could be avoided if they attempted to understand each other. Right from the beginning the Narrator had a dislike toward the Blind man, I can only predict why because no real reason was said, but he seems to be jealous of the relationship between Robert and his wife, even the way she seems to like Robert more, “My wife finally took her eyes off the blind man and looked at me. I had the feeling she didn’t like what she saw. I shrugged” (439). In the story the Narrator believed many stereotypes about blind people, so when Robert was around it was hard for him to get past that, and throughout the story he really got on his nerve. However, toward the end when Robert asked the Narrator to explain what a Cathedral looked like, he had a very hard time explaining it, “”I’m not doing so good, am I?” I said” (444). In this quote we see the Narrator actually trying, he starts changing, starts actually talking with the blind man and I believe even sympathizing for him during their bonding moment when the Narrator closes his eyes an draws a cathedral for Robert. Carver states, “So we kept on with it. His fingers rode my fingers as my hand went over the paper. It was like nothing else in my life up to now” (445). This quote is very important, because it is a changing point in the Narrator, this is where he takes a 180 degree turn. In the last view lines of the story he seems so kind and compassionate, like he really starts caring for Robert, he begins to understand him.

Response~

This character makes me think about people I have encountered personally in my life that have the same altitude and negativity. I usually try to stay away from these type of people, but sadly they exist in today’s society. I think of myself as someone who is positive, kind, caring and compassionate toward others’ feelings and I truly don’t find it difficult to be considerate of others, yet people who are like the Narrator really upset me because on the contrary being rude is difficult, you really have to try. I think the author included this character in their story because this is not something unfamiliar to us, it’s definitely relevant today. When I was reading the story I was honestly uncomfortable, when a person has such an altitude toward someone they are suppose to love, toward someone they are to respect, it makes me wonder do they really respect and love them? A question that I kept asking myself throughout the story, was does the Narrator really want to be in the relationship he is? Does he really love his wife? Is there another reason he is marries, maybe he was raised in a culture that pressured him to get married?

Summary ~

This story is about two Native American men; Victor and Thomas Builds-the-Fire who live on a reservation in Spokane, Washington. In the beginning of the story, Victor finds out his father died of a heart attack in Phoenix, Arizona and needs money to fly there and make arrangements. Victor went to the tribal council, but they were only able to give him 100 dollars and nobody else at the reservation had that kind of money, except his childhood friend, Thomas Builds-the-Fire, who is a storyteller and for that reason nobody liked him. Thomas was willing to loan Victor the money under one condition, he gets to go along with him to Phoenix. Victor agrees and they begin their journey to Phoenix, they get there by airplane and find their way to Victor’s father’s trailer, which has a stench from the fact that Victor’s dead father’s body was in there for a week in 100 degree temperatures. At the trailer Victor looks for anything valuable such as photos, letters but didn’t find much. At the end of the story Victor claims his father’s savings of 300 dollars and get’s his father’s ashes in a wooden box  and the rest in a cardboard box.  They make it back to the reservation as the sun is rising on Victor’s Father’s pickup truck , and Victor decides to give Thomas the cardboard box with his father’s ashes.  During the trip Victor sympathized for Thomas’s misfortune with everyone at the reservation, as he was not liked by anyone, the men left off on a good note, Victor promising to listen to Thomas’s story just once.

Literary Analysis ~ 

The Genre of this story is Fiction/short story and the convention is a quest or journey because in the story the main goal was for Victor to journey to Phoenix, Arizona and bring back his dead father’s ashes, and it was a challenge for him to get there. In the beginning of the story Sherman Alexie writes, “”Listen,” Victor said. “My father just died. I need money to get to Phoenix to make arrangements” (p. 279). This quote is the beginning of Victor’s journey in the story, here he is challenged by finances to get to Phoenix, and he is trying to find a way to accomplish his quest. Later on in the story Alexie writes, “Victor paid for the taxi, and the two of them stood in the hot Phoenix summer. They could smell the trailer” (p. 282). In this quote we see how they make it to their destination, the trailer, after they overcame the financial challenges standing in their way, in this part of the story they are halfway through their journey. Lastly, at the end of the story we see Victor and Thomas Builds-the Fire accomplish their quest as Alexie writes, “Victor’s father, his ashes, fit in one wooden box with enough left over to fill a cardboard box” (p. 284). In this story I noticed that Alexie used flashbacks in this story, it made the story so much more interesting because without them the readers wouldn’t know as much about the history between Victor and Thomas. Also, it gave the story more dept, it made the characters seem more real.

Response ~ 

Although this story was about Victor getting to Phoenix to get his father’s ashes and it doesn’t seem like there’s much to it, but to me it was about friendship. Throughout the story Thomas would have flashbacks to when he was younger, to the days when he and Victor would play in the dirt, it was almost as if these were his good memories, at those times he was seen because someone played with him. It was a hidden message but I believe Alexie was trying to touch base on the importance of friendship, not only do we humans want friendships/relationships but we need them, those friendships make us feel important and needed. I wonder if Sherman Alexie put that message in his story because he’s felt that way, I wonder if there’s more to it? I know I’ve experienced loss of friendships in my life, so this subject touched me. Especially when a person stops being your friend because of your personality, such as Thomas’s storytelling habits, it affects you as a human into your adult years. I enjoyed reading this short story, it was very interesting to try to interpret all the possible meanings and hidden messages!

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton