Rebecca Chua
10 Honors Summer Assignment: The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
“Like build the Glass Castle. All of Dad’s engineering skills and mathematical genius were coming together in one special project: a great big house he was going to build for us in the desert. It would have a glass ceiling and thick glass walls and even a glass staircase… All we had to do was find gold, Dad said, and we were on the verge of that. Once he finished the Prospector and we struck it rich, he’d start work on our Glass Castle.” Pg. 25
Analysis: Here, Jeannette is commenting on her dad’s engineering skills and ideas. At this point in the novel, Jeannette and her family have moved around a couple of times. Often, her dad would tell stories about his …show more content…
You could see hundreds, maybe thousands or even millions, twinkling in the clear desert sky…There was one in particular, in the west above the mountains but low in the sky, that shone more brightly than all the rest. ‘I want that one,’ I said. Dad grinned. ‘That’s Venus,’ he said.” Pg. 40
Analysis: On one special Christmas Day, Jeannette’s dad’s present to her was a star. Since they almost never had enough money for the basic living essentials, they rarely had any money to buy presents. Sometimes the presents were little things found in dumpsters or lying around on the ground. The stars are a symbol of her dad’s love for them. He tries to give them something that they will always remember, even if they can’t exactly own the stars. Also, Jeannette will sometimes stare up at the desert sky, looking for all the stars and constellations and be reminded of her present, Venus.
“A few months after Maureen was born, a squad car tried to pull us over because the brake lights on the Green Caboose weren’t working. Dad took off. He said that if the cops stopped us, they’d find out that we had no registration or insurance and that the license plate had been taken off another car, and they’d arrest us all.” Pg. …show more content…
Jeannette wanted to paint the house to make them fit in a little more, but everyone else didn’t feel like wasting the energy to. So Jeanette started painting the front of their house by herself and started to build a ladder so she could reach the high spots. Unfortunately, the rest of the paint froze and could no longer be used. It was then that she realized she shouldn’t have started the paint job at all, because now just a part of the house was painted, leaving a poor impression. Truthfully, she really did want to “fix it up but lacked the gumption to get the work done.” Through this, we can see that the rest of her family didn’t really care about fitting in, but just living life day to day. Also, their economic situation didn’t allow for them to follow through with any of their
10 Honors Summer Assignment: The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
“Like build the Glass Castle. All of Dad’s engineering skills and mathematical genius were coming together in one special project: a great big house he was going to build for us in the desert. It would have a glass ceiling and thick glass walls and even a glass staircase… All we had to do was find gold, Dad said, and we were on the verge of that. Once he finished the Prospector and we struck it rich, he’d start work on our Glass Castle.” Pg. 25
Analysis: Here, Jeannette is commenting on her dad’s engineering skills and ideas. At this point in the novel, Jeannette and her family have moved around a couple of times. Often, her dad would tell stories about his …show more content…
You could see hundreds, maybe thousands or even millions, twinkling in the clear desert sky…There was one in particular, in the west above the mountains but low in the sky, that shone more brightly than all the rest. ‘I want that one,’ I said. Dad grinned. ‘That’s Venus,’ he said.” Pg. 40
Analysis: On one special Christmas Day, Jeannette’s dad’s present to her was a star. Since they almost never had enough money for the basic living essentials, they rarely had any money to buy presents. Sometimes the presents were little things found in dumpsters or lying around on the ground. The stars are a symbol of her dad’s love for them. He tries to give them something that they will always remember, even if they can’t exactly own the stars. Also, Jeannette will sometimes stare up at the desert sky, looking for all the stars and constellations and be reminded of her present, Venus.
“A few months after Maureen was born, a squad car tried to pull us over because the brake lights on the Green Caboose weren’t working. Dad took off. He said that if the cops stopped us, they’d find out that we had no registration or insurance and that the license plate had been taken off another car, and they’d arrest us all.” Pg. …show more content…
Jeannette wanted to paint the house to make them fit in a little more, but everyone else didn’t feel like wasting the energy to. So Jeanette started painting the front of their house by herself and started to build a ladder so she could reach the high spots. Unfortunately, the rest of the paint froze and could no longer be used. It was then that she realized she shouldn’t have started the paint job at all, because now just a part of the house was painted, leaving a poor impression. Truthfully, she really did want to “fix it up but lacked the gumption to get the work done.” Through this, we can see that the rest of her family didn’t really care about fitting in, but just living life day to day. Also, their economic situation didn’t allow for them to follow through with any of their