Thursday, November 20, 2008
A Worn Path by Eudora Welty
First, I liked the fact the story contained a lot of detail and imagery, although I found that made it challenging to seperate sceneary from symbolism. The "granny" Phoenix Jackson is a very stong woman who has a strong since of self, yet is "old" and suffers from things that average old people suffer from such as memory lost and sliping away into their mind. She was most likely born and raised and has lived in the same area all her life, being she was coutning on her feet to know there own way into town. I believe the man in the story to be a typical "man not of color" during "back in the day" times. I was a little bothered by the way he spoke to "granny" but being she wasn't I say she was either around during enslavement or had immediate family who was. Overall I enjoyed reading the story.
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2 comments:
I think that the man she meets in the woods, though he helps her get up, represents the way society is treating her. He is very patronizing and treats her as an inferior creature. He even says that he would have given her a dime if he had one, which we know he had. Later in the doctor's office she is treated the same way by the receptionist and the nurse (charity case). Yet ol;d Phoenix keeps on going, doing what needs to be done
Yes, there is social commentary/criticism there. RE: symbols: yes, in good stories, the line between what is just an image and a symbole is a fine one, since, in a well written story, there are no wasted words--something said, done, described, will have significance, and usually be part of a larger pattern.
See my comments on this story on the "English 40" blog under "Blogs from previois classes"
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