Good Country Girls

Improved Essays
Women share many things and common bonds through out life, and even though they are all different, they have understandings with each other. Several girls have links between them because they feel like their mothers do not understand the way they think or the way they wish to dress. Some females of the human species have the bond of wanting to be admired or needing attention, and it does not matter if they have a PhD or if they are fifteen years old, they still want to be admired or they seek attention. There are also many ladies in the world that have been betrayed or hurt by men, so they also share a tie because of this reason. Even though their situations vary some, the female characters in the stories “Good Country People” by O’Conner and …show more content…
In Connie’s case her mother is always comparing her to her sister, Jane, and her mother says things, such as ‘“ Why don’t you keep your room clean like your sister’” or ‘“ Hair spray? You don’t see your sister using that junk’”(Oates 1872). Connie also has to deal with the fact that her mother is always harassing her to do different things. Oates describes this situation by saying “ …Connie’s mother kept picking at her until Connie wished her mother dead and herself dead and it was all over” (1873). Joy/ Hulga’s situation is slightly different because her mother does not understand her and the way she thinks. An example of this can be seen when Mrs. Hopewell picks up one of her daughter’s books and “ [the words] worked on Mrs. Hopewell like an evil incantation in gibberish”(O’Conner 1635). Another problem Joy /Hulga faces is her mother still thinks of her as a child rather than a grown woman in her thirties, “ Mrs. Hopewell thought of [Joy/Hulga] as a child though she was thirty- two years old and highly educated”(1632). According to Margaret Bauer “…Mrs. Hopewell’s effect upon her daughter—that is, the consequences of her failure to recognize her daughter’s value, untraditional though it may be—has to a great extent been ignored.” Both of the mothers do not treat their daughters the way they should have, and that leads them to crave and want other

Related Documents

  • Great Essays

    In the Movie, ‘Smooth Talk’ the relationship between Connie and her mother is much worse than the story ‘Where Are You Going Where Have You Been’ because in the in the movie Connie is more disrespectful to her mother. Connie is more rebellious and self-centered so this makes the relationship between them worse. The way that Connie interacts with her mother is different because she is more defiant in the movie than in the book. In the movie, Connie’s mother also treats her worse than in the book. Her mother tries to embarrass her in front of her friends for forgetting to get some supplies she was supposed to pick up from the store. This shows that the two mothers are very different in the way that they handle situations. In the movie, Connie and June have a very strong…

    • 1167 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The 4 authors wrote short stories, such as “My Father Writes to My Mother,” “Another Evening at the Club,” “The Women’s Baths,” and “From Behind the Veil.” In these stories, they are all related because the women in the stories do not have a strong role in society. In fact, they are treated lower than men, while men have the leading role. In “Another Evening at the Club” for example, the women’s husband is in control, basically not able to speak or think for herself. The maid was also had no rights, because she was lower class than the husband and wife, and because she was a woman. In “The Women’s Baths,” the narrators mother does not approve of the narrators grandmother, but because the mother’s husband says it is okay for the grandmother…

    • 581 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    With Connie 's personality and the way she carries herself before she meets reality, she 's not the ideal domesticated lady. Connie had a very particular family, her mother was jealous of Connie 's youth, “ Stop gawking at yourself, who are you? You think you 're so pretty?...she would say (Connie 's mother), '” (Oates 323). “ 'Hair spray? You don 't see your sister using that junk, '” (Oates 323). Connie 's sister was a twenty-four year old women named June working in Connie 's high school as the secretary. Unlike Connie, June fit in the domestic cult like a glove, need to say Connie was not too fond of June. June and Connie 's father played a small yet big role in Connie 's life simply because he was never there, never tried to get involved but with absence Connie seeks male attention elsewhere, “away at work”...”didn 't bother talking much to them” (Oates…

    • 1312 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Joyce Carol Oates’ story, growing up is considered a violent act through characterization. The protagonist, Connie is described as a narcissistic…

    • 1062 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For example, “Miss Hancock had presents of giving hope to write, to connect, to make a plain piece of paper into an appealing or in some way fascinating form” (217). In fact, Charlotte and the students were very welcoming and inviting towards Miss Hancock during middle school years. As for her high school years, Charlotte went to a different district and realized that Miss Hancock was her English teacher. As a matter of fact, the students were discouraging and not friendly towards Miss Hancock; one of the students laughed at Miss Hancock, while she enter her English class the first day. This shows, “it was in such a way that she prevailed a signal of destructive bees ready to have an outbreak” (228). But this did not change Charlotte’s point of view regarding her teacher. On the contrary, Charlotte’s mother worked in the community and a lot of people knew her. By all means, “she lead committees, ran exchanges, call on boards” (225). Therefore, the community viewed Charlotte’s mother as a mature woman and well-kept; when in fact, she was not in the eyes of Charlotte. Also, Charlotte despised her mother as she mocked her in the metaphors she wrote. For example, “this modern, this simple, this developed woman she had become and is Charlotte’s mother; however, her community thought Charlotte’s mother was a woman who built this town on stone” (225). In other words, these…

    • 825 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The constant scolding from her mother only makes Connie frustrated, and just at the beginning of the story, Oates writes that "around his bent head Connie 's mother kept picking at her until Connie wished her mother was dead and she herself was dead and it was all over ". This quote demonstrates how Connie could get to the point of wishing her own death just so she can be free from her mother, to stop being under her rules and her constants screams and vain hopes to become young again. The author doesn’t write this literally, but it is not difficult to find out the enormous jealousy that Connie’s mother had for her beauty and youth, since she used to be also beautiful and young, but that was all back in…

    • 1098 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The book explains to us how she treats her children and makes them love and listens to her. The mother takes full responsibilities of her children; she feels they are part of her life. She cares about the school they attend, and she sees class, students, and school system. She wants to put their children in a place that help her children and teach them. She does not want any school. She entered them in private school. Most people want this type of attention from their mom. I totally agree with her respect and concern for their children. I’m one of the people who have a great mom like this. I know mom is not everything and it is hard to raise children alone, but sometimes mom can be your dad too. On the other hand, Mary is busy the whole time with her work. Her children live separately from each other. That is not a good thing that to raises two brother apart like that. Sometimes the child needs a brother to rise with him. That’s can cause the bad influence on children. A child will look for a new friend from school or neighbors; that’s what Wes and Tony did. They found bad friends and made them their life friends. They were not good, so they became an alcohol drinker, marijuana smoker, and other bad stuff. So what we can understand from that is mothers have a good influence on their children. Mary did not care about her child and was busy all the time. Children were separated from their parents, one with the mother, the other one with his father. They did not care about their future children or friends and education, so they got bad results. Their children were not obeying their talks and use bad stuff comparing to their age. On the other hand, Joy loved her children and looked after their future. She wanted her children to be perfect and the most successful students in the world. Moges and Weber claim in the article, Parental Influence on the Emotional Development of Children (2014) that the…

    • 634 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The mother has three boys, but they have a different father than the one she had. These boys have a much closer relationship to the mother and it seems to be like the mother loves the brothers more than she loves Jamaica. The relationship that shows the mother’s “babyish” like love with the most is towards her youngest son Devon. Devon has become infected with AIDS and his mom will do anything to try to help him overcome this disease. Throughout his time at the hospital his mother would do everything for him. Some of the chores she would do was to clean his clothes, make his bed, and even make him food and feed it to him, “she helped him to eat his food, the food she had prepared and brought to him” (Kincaid 15). Even though his brother was in the hospital with a terminal disease this love his mother gave him led to his demise. At this point in the hospital it was too late to change what she had already done. To have prevented or helped the situation she should have been more of a leader with her kids and not have just shown them love when they were in a tough situation. They were babied so intensely that this is the only thing that they know how to do. She talks about one time she how she was assigned by her mother to watch Devon and forget to change his diaper the whole day because she was preoccupied reading a book. As a consequence, for doing so her mother went on to burn all of her books “she gathered all the books she could find…, she doused them with kerosene and then set fire to them” (Kincaid 134). The result of this action sets her on the path to becoming an author and in a way can be thankful that her mother did this. Although Jamaica was able to change this misfortune later on in her life, her and her siblings still had a hard time dealing with the effects from their mother’s…

    • 2005 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Lori idolizes her mother and always sympathizes with her. When Lori says her mother has got it rough, Jeannette breaks the news and says she doesn’t have it any harder than them. She tries to show Lori that her mother needs to act right. She knows that her mom isn’t being responsible and wants to show Lori this. Not only does she say that, but she gives a way for her mom to do better with handling the family. Jeannette tells that her mother needs to, “be firmer, lay down the law for dad instead of getting hysterical all the time” (208). She knows that if her family is going to get better, something needs to change between her parents. The reader is surprised by this because Jeannette shows how she really feels about her parents and how they are being negative towards the family. The truth is coming out, Jeannette is losing faith in her parents and she is taking the responsibility. It was surprising to the reader that of all the kids Jeannette assumed…

    • 736 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the story, Connie is at odds with her mother, who was once known to be beautiful. Her mother, now not much of a beauty like before, is jealous of Connie and how beautiful she is. It is hard on her mother to look at her knowing that she was once that beautiful as well.…

    • 1207 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Connie admires herself in the mirror every time she walks by one and her mother scolds her for doing so but Connie ignores what she says. Her mother wants her to be like her older sister which means to be responsible and mature. June seems to be the favorite daughter of the family Connie’s mother is always comparing her to June she is always praising June and frowning upon Connie in the story Oates Connie’s mother complains saying “why don’t you keep your room clean like your sister? How’ve you got…

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    No matter what era we are in, we can’t deny the fact that there are some fundamental similarities and differences between a woman and a girl. With that being said, the authors have successfully showing how both Katherine Ames and Jig faced their partners’ selfishness, and how the two female protagonists were different in making decision based on their man. Although Katherine Ames and Jig had different characteristics, they both failed to communicate with the male protagonists efficiently.…

    • 1082 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The narrator and her sister, Vanessa appear to be good children who listen to their parents commands, and we can see that from “Mum hisses, “Try and look hungry kids.” I suck in my belly as far as possible,..., Vanessa sinks her head to her chest and shrinks with not-wanting-to-be-here.”(5-9) Both the narrator and her sister do not question their parents and do as needed. We can also determine that the father is the man of the family, meaning, he is the leader of the family and both the children and the mother follow him. “If Dad starts tearing tickets and his face becomes folded and deep, we feel ourselves become quiet and wishing-we-weren’t-here.”(31-32) Further more, we can see that the Mother is an obedient figure towards her husband, she respects him. We can also analyse that the Dad is the final decision maker in the family, he is the authority figure. As a family they seem like they have gone through a lot and all of the events that took place before they got to this situation formed their family structure. Due to the author's great use of words we get to evaluate the characters for who they…

    • 1102 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the short story, “Roman Fever,” by Edith Wharton, the audience learns about two characters whom share a long and complicated past. Wharton’s tone is harsh when illustrating Slade’s relationship with her daughter, Jenny. She states, “[Slade] wished that Jenny would fall in love- with the wrong man, even; that she might have to be watched, out-maneuvered, rescued.” (Wharton). This exemplifies Slade’s judgemental attitude towards her “boring” and “annoyingly perfect” daughter. It further explains why Slade might be jealous of Ansley’s daughter, unlike Ansley who is very proud and content with her daughter. Wharton uses this harsher tone to paint a picture of the detached, exasperated, and ungrateful mother who comes across as a tricky, vain, and cold woman.…

    • 404 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Upon a first look at the text, her lack of motherly intentions is not apparent. The text uses keywords such as “forced,”…

    • 491 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays

Related Topics