Describe The Relationship Between Elaine And Cordelia By Margaret Atwood

However, Cordelia’s reckless behaviour gets her in trouble, and she moves away so her performance in school can improve. When Elaine and Cordelia meet again, Elaine is surprised to see Cordelia’s current state. She is described as “a wreck. Her hair is lusterless, the flesh of her face pasty. She’s gained a lot of weight, not solid-muscled weight, but limp weight, bloated and watery. She’s gone back to the too-vivid orange-red lipstick, which turns her yellowish.” (275) Cordelia still maintains her carefree attitude, but seemingly desperate to return to how things were in the past. She knows she’s fallen, but refuses to dig herself out of this rut, and continues on to think about how great things were, without realizing that she’s going to eventually hit rock bottom. This signals the end of …show more content…
The entire story seems to be driven by her characters, and the conflicts, and relationships were all affected by the characters in the story. She’s extremely descriptive about the reactions and thought processes of certain characters, and really strives to make realistic characters with realistic issues. Elaine says, “Not giving a hoot would be a luxury. It describes the fine, irreverent carelessness I myself would like to cultivate, in these and other matters.” (229) She describes Elaine’s problems effectively, making the audience really relate and understand the character. She also uses an extensive vocabulary, and also seems to write in a similar fashion with older books. The story is in fact, quite an old book, and the author’s age might’ve influenced this, but the writing style is definitely affected by the setting of the book, or even the age of the author herself. This creates a unique writing style that helps develop her characters, as well as letting the audience relate to the characters and feel the impacts of the character’s