Share your literary essay with the rest of the students that chose this short story. Take some time to read 2 or 3 other essays. Comment on them. Your comment should be about something you noticed them doing well from our lessons. For example, "You did a really good job explaining your evidence."
Pt. 1
ReplyDelete“The Flowers” is a short story by Alice Walker that takes place in the past on a farm, during or after lynching times. The story focuses on Myop, a ten year old girl of color that lies on the farm. She’s enjoying the sunny morning and is playing on the farm. She knows nothing but the sun and flowers, and has no knowledge of real life problems. The author uses this to teach us lessons about innocence; innocence can be lost in an instant
Myop’s day was filled with joy. She skipped all over her farm with a stick in hand. She greeted chickens as she tapped and sang a little tune along the fence. Alice writes, “She felt light and good in the warm sun.” She also informs the reader that Myop is ten, “and nothing existed for her but her song, the stick clutched in her dark brown hand, and the tat-de-ta-ta-ta of accompaniment.” Alice uses these quotes to help the reader visualize the setting and Myop’s actions. The setting seems to give a warm feeling that can portray Myop’s feelings as well.
Myop soon decided to go further. She ventured past the spring, to the woods behind her house. Alice writes that she was usually accompanied by her mother. “Today she made her own path, bouncing this way and that way, vaguely keeping an eye out for snakes.” IN other words, Myop is skipping through an unknown part of the forest without a care in the world. These actions illustrate the theme by conveying Myop’s innocence. On her way, she collects various plants.
On her way home, which happens to be at noon, she stumbles upon the body. She first lodges her foot into his skull, although she doesn’t notice until she looks down. The body was old and already decaying. There was also a flower. Around it was the remains of a noose. Noticing this, Myop leaves her flowers and returns home.
Pt. 2
ReplyDeleteThe end of the story has a lot of symbols to her innocence. The first is the last sentence, “And the summer was over.” In the beginning, she’s enjoying her summer, which is a symbol of her innocence. But, when she found the body, she lost her innocence. That’s when Alice writes this sentence, summer representing Myop’s innocence to indicate her losing it.
Two others could be the body and flowers. The body once was a man that possibly lived on the farm. Him dying is a symbol of Myop losing her innocence. Although it could be argued that the man portrays the theme of “all good things come to an end it means “innocence can end in an instant” because if you see the body as innocence and death as loss, it then becomes “loss of innocence” which is another way to phrase the theme. The flowers that Myop picked are, too. Before, she held on to them, like her innocence. However, when she found the body, she dropped them and it all ended there. Her picking the rose could also be her attempting to hold on to her innocence, but she dropped it as well. Alice also uses tons of imagery throughout her story. In the beginning, the reader could almost see this ten year old girl skipping “...from hen house to pigpen to smokehouse...” and “...[striking] out at random chickens she liked, and [working] out the beat of a song on the fence around the pigpen.” with a “...knobby stick...”. The descriptive words from the sound of the stick against the fence to the color of Myop’s skin helps the reader imagine what she was doing and what it must’ve been like.
Towards the end, Alice helps the reader imagine the body and forest as well. “It seemed gloomy in the little cove in which she found herself. The air was damp, the silence close and deep.” She writes to give a visual of the area. Myop begins to return home when she lodge her foot into his skull. Alice’s description of his height and even the fact that his head lay beside him helps give the image of a tall, headless skeleton laying in the dirt. Alice also describes the noose in great detail since it’s very important.
At the end of the story, Myop’s world seems to unravel as she realizes there are also bad things that can be hidden by the good. Mop had spent all morning playing in the sun. Once she finds the man, she understands the world’s problems. They are unlike her own. Her innocence was the barrier between herself and the world. She lays down her flowers and returns home. The reader is not told what happens next, as Alice ends the story there. What the readers do know is this: once Myop found the body and realized what was happening in the world, she lost her innocence instantly.
Literary Essay
ReplyDelete“Flowers” by Alice Walker
Griffin Garrigan
“Flowers is a short story by Alice Walker that takes place in the summer, down south during the lynching times. What makes this story so unique is the fact that it takes place in the south during the lynching times in the southern part of the United States. The short story focuses on a young girl named Myop on a nice summer day. Myop was having a great time running around in the summer weather when she decided to pick flowers. As she was picking flowers she found herself deep in the woods. As she starts to head back, she stumbles upon a dead body. As she moves on towards her home, she finds a noose near the body. Since Myop has found this dead body her life has changed. She realizes that this man has been murdered and that the world can be a dark place. She also knows that her life will not be the same. The author uses this to show that she has lost her innocence.
When Myop begins to pick flowers she is having a great time. She is having fun in the summer weather. As she is picking more and more flowers, she finds herself deep within the woods. As she went to grab more flowers she found her foot lodge between something. As she looked to see what it was, she saw that she had her foot stuck in the man's face. As she investigates more, she finds a rotted piece of rope that was used as a noose.
This negatively impacts Myop’s day since she has found the body, she has been exposed to the real world. She has learned that the world is not as great of a place as she thought. Had Myop never came across the body her life would have been very different. Myop would still be the same girl she was before. She would not have known about the bad in the world and would have continued her life clueless.
In the story, Alice Walker uses figurative language to strengthen the readers' understanding of how horrific this was. At the beginning of the story, Walker describes the summer day. She writes “that the days had never been as beautiful as these.” Walker does this to show how great the day is for Myop. She does this so the reader can see that the day was going great from the beginning.
Walker also uses Imagery to describe the dead body. Walker writes “He had been a tall man. From feet to neck covered a long space. His head lay beside him.” Walker wrote this so that the reader could put themselves into Myop’s shoes. This made the reader feel like they were experiencing this scene in the first person. As Walker describes more of the body, the image becomes even more clear for the reader.
Walker also uses Symbolism in her story. At the end of the story, Walker writes “Myop laid down her flowers.” The actions illustrate the theme by showing Myop set her flowers down. Walker uses this symbolism to show that Myop is setting down her innocence and her childhood. Since she has found the noose she now knows what has happened to the man.
Alice also writes, “And the summer is over.” This sentence symbolizes how Myop’s life will never be the same. She will never see the world the same as she had before. Although it could be argued that this text supports the theme of all good things coming to an end, the text is showing that her life will still go on just without her innocence.
At the end of the story, Myop realizes that the world she lives in is not perfect. Myop has spent the last few hours picking flowers and running in the sun, but after finding the body she realizes that her life will never be the same. Since Myop is so young, she needed to have this experience so she could see more clearly, and this is where Walker ends the story. The readers are left wondering how Myop’s life will change and how she will adapt to the world without her incense.
In my short story “The Flowers” it gives a type of chilling theme. I believe that the theme of my short story is an accumaltion or build up of an emotion can be shattered in seconds. I chose this theme because the author chooses to adress it by showing how the characters develop, using the setting, and the figurative language that is being used throughout the text.
ReplyDeleteCharacter development is a contributing factor of my theme. In the story it talks about how Myops character is currently 10 years old. This one detail can already make the entire a little more dramatic. This detail shows the audience just how young she is to already be experiencing this. It also states how she was still unable to be completely aware of her surroundings. For example the line, “and nothing existed for her but her song, the stick clutched in her dark brown hand and the tat-de-ta-ta-ta of her accomaniment” this really shows how young and freespirated she was feeling. It continues to talk about how she had previously been in woods behind the house many time. This time it was different. The author chooses a change and adds conflict to the story. Many other times she had always gone with her mother. Her mother would always lead her the same way evertime they went to the woods. The only difference now is that Myop is now by herself and she is creating her own new path. By doing this the author already gives the sense that Myop, though still a little kid, is beginning to feel as if she is ready to become a woman and face the risk of a new reality. This is one of the supporting factors of the theme
The next idea in the story that is contributing to the central theme is the setting. The author begins with a very bright happy mood. In the Introduction the author says that, “The air held a keeness that made her nose twitch.” In this sentence it already gives a nostalgic feeling to the audience. It previously states that this time she making her own path. Myop has been this far but something seems to shift about the tone of the story. It shows subtle details of Myop being scared and a little creeped out because the mood of her setting chages, it starts becoming strange gloomh, damp, and dark. Myop is slowly beginning to drift and turn away from the cave that she was in. I believe that this quick turn of events slightly fore shadows something bad is about to happen. I believe that in order to fully understand the theme all three main aspects need to be viewed at from all 3 perspectives.
I think that my final topic would be the figurative language that is being used throughout the story. The author uses a good portion of imagry an symbolism and tells the story in a linear structure to make the audience feel almost as if they are also experiencing what is going on throughout the story. In a sense it almost paints a picture like we are actually going through this right now. A phrase of imagry the authour uses is the days never being as good as these. As it progresses it paints a brighter happy image,”the air held a keeness that made her nose twitch”. The author goes out of their way to in depth withe extension. The author also states that she is 10, and only caring about her and the beat of her sticks. When they say this you can picture a arefree resilliant person who seems just about ready to take on anything. Not too far after she stumbles into a cove, turning her back on it, she turns around and walks home. Soon she finds the traumatic horror awaiting her just steps away. She finds a dead body laying in front of her own eyes. It’s almost as if everything that she had feared had been laying right in fron of her. She was only 10 and everything is still a bit eeary and hard to understand. Myop lays down her flowers which could be interpreted as a child leaving their entire childhood behind, and slowly started to discover a new womans mind.
Overall I believe the subtopics in the text clearly state why my theme is best suited for the story. It goes in depth and talks about how myop is leaving a childhood behind and seeing the truths of reality.
“The Flowers is a short story by Alice Walker, where a little girl, Myop, finds a dead body in the woods. The author teaches us that innocence doesn’t last forever. The next few paragraphs will say how the author says this.
ReplyDeleteSymbolism is where someone or thing symbolizes something else. In “The Flowers”, the author uses this to create the theme. One of the symbols is the dead body Myop finds. What the author is trying to symbolize is that the dead body is Myop’s innocence; dead. If you found a dead body in the woods at such a young age, you’d probably be scared out of your mind.
The other symbol in this book is something at the end. At the end, the short story says: “And the summer was over”. What the author is trying to symbolize is that the summer isn’t really over; rather than that, it’s saying that Myop’s innocence to the world is over. The reason I know this is because you don’t find bodies littering the street. Although it could be argued that the theme is the happiest of mornings can reveal the darkest of nights, the text supports my theme more than that theme.
Another way the author shows the theme is characterization. Characterization is where what a character does or says something that contributes to the theme. One of these examples is where Myop “struck out at random at chickens she liked.” I don’t know about you, but I would only do that if I was extremely happy. Because of this, she still is probably innocent.
Another way the author shows characterization is when Myop steps on the dead body and yelps. The story says: “It was then she stepped smack into his eyes. Her heels became lodged in broken ridge between brow and nose, and she reached down quickly, to free herself. It was only when she saw his naked grin that she gave a yelp of surprise.” Here, clearly, she was not expecting him to be there. Yeah, she is ten, but some ten year olds are still pretty happy.
The last way the author shows the theme is imagery. On the first page, it says: “It seemed to Myop as she skipped lightly from hen house to pig pen to smokehouse that the days had never been as beautiful as these.” It almost radiates happiness, showing that Myop is still pretty innocent in the beginning, not having a care in the world. Little does she know, her day is going to take a sharp turn down.
When Myop finds a dead body, the author really does show that innocence doesn’t last forever. Whatever happens after the “summer” was over, we won’t know. You may have to figure that out by yourself.