Evelyn Tooley Hunt's 'Taught Me Purple'

The Poem, “Taught Me Purple” by Evelyn Tooley Hunt demonstrates the difficulties and emotional stress of sustaining and improving their lifestyle while in poverty. Hunt discreetly entails the hardships of a struggling mother and her child. Despite their desperate position, her mother must strive for a better life, teaching her daughter more about the world outside their own. Although her mother works days and nights while teaching her daughter about the wealthy lives they could soon be living, but sadly her own outcome couldn’t be achieved. Because her plan did not work she absolutely did not want fail like that again, so instead of trying again, she gave up, leaving her daughter to fend for herself.
Both Hunt and her mother living in poverty and their plethora of challenges are expressed with many keywords to describe and reveal her …show more content…
For example, Wash gray was used in the poem as, “Wash-gray was her circle”. This line was referring to the mother, meaning that her mother is a worn out person. Being a worn out person color indicates that they are poor. Another example of symbolism using color was purple and golden. Both colors can represent a positive feeling or a sense of wealth and royalty, but they do have their differences. Purple is most of the time more dominant and gold is more of a color of hope and generosity. Purple and golden both are being taught by the mom, which ultimately means that Hunts being taught about the different people and lifestyles there are other than their life in poverty. (Concluding Sentence)
The poem “Taught me Purple” shows the many difficulties and emotional stress, that was hidden throughout the poem using multiple literary devices and keywords. Using imagery, symbolism, and repetition, she slowly describes her life as she was living in poverty with her mother trying to overcome