Barbara Henry

For a full year, Henry and Ruby sat side by side at two desks, working on Ruby's lessons. Henry was very loving and supportive of Ruby, helping her not only with her studies but also with the difficult experience of being ostracized. During the first few weeks at Frantz School, Ruby was confronted with blatant racism in full view of her federal escorts. On her second day of school, a woman threatened to poison her. After this, the federal marshals allowed her to only eat food from home. On another day, she was "greeted" by a woman displaying a black doll in a wooden coffin. Ruby's mother kept encouraging her to be strong and pray while entering the school, which Ruby discovered reduced the intensity of the insults yelled at her and gave her courage. She spent her entire day, every day, in Mrs. Henry's…

From hermit crabs to Hawaiian Islands, Barbara Kingsolver’s collection of essays, High Tide in Tucson: Essays from Now or Never is a read to remember. Though it is a collection of different essays spanning multiple different themes, an important one spans the entirety: Humans come from nature, and nature is chaotic in and of itself; people cannot expect life to be as calm and controlled as they would like. She uses many different examples throughout the book to help prove this point. Not only…

“If you have a dream, don’t just sit there. Gather courage to believe that you can succeed and leave no stone unturned to make it a reality”-Roopleen. This quote relates to both Ben Carson and Taylor Greene from The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver during their journey on accomplishing their goals. Gifted hands by Ben Carson is an aspiring story of how he started from Detroit and made his way to be an astounding pediatric neurosurgeon at John Hopkins by the age of thirty-three and never seemed…

In the book Anthem by Ayn Rand, Equality 7-2521 is a young man who struggles to find ways to show his true self because he lives in a society based on conformity. Ayn Rand uses the symbols of the light bulb, the Uncharted Forest, and his new name to demonstrate the conflict of individuality versus conformity in order to demonstrate the importance of individuality and self-discovery. Thus, through the use of these symbols, Ayn Rand is able to integrate the theme of individuality versus conformity…

Amy Nguyen ENGL 1002 Paper #1 As humans, we grow up in a community of family and friends. They provide the learned values and direction that allows us to become functioning members of society who are able to help others and ourselves. It is the basis of society. Community presents itself as an interwoven network of various part and sub-parts, and every small action can create a ripple effect that may go unnoticed by those immediately surrounding it, but more clearly seen as the waves spread. In…

Orleanna’s House of Guilt In Barbara Kingsolver’s novel The Poisonwood Bible, Nathan Price, the father to four daughters and husband to Orleanna Price, brings his family on a missionary trip to the Congo. Their daily routines of residing in the Congo require hard work for survival, whereas in Georgia, life necessities like water and food are easily given. Although the Price family has left their home in Georgia, it is Orleanna who believes that as long as she is able to care for her family, she…

The Construction and Meaning of “Home” in Nadine Gordimer’s Tale of Postcolonial Africa, “The Ultimate Safari” Nadine Gordimer’s “The Ultimate Safari” takes the reader on a journey as the main character, a little girl, flees from Mozambique with her brothers and grandparents. Throughout the short story, the girl describes her trek out of Mozambique and through Kruger Park into South Africa, and details the hunger, loss, and overall feeling of deprivation that came with the unavoidable…

Throughout history, many cultures have seen women’s primary role as the reproducer and caregiver. What happens when a woman doesn’t fit this mold of dutiful wife and mother? Barbara Kingsolver analyzes this circumstance in her novel Animal Dreams through her childless and unwed protagonist in the fictional town of Grace. Kingsolver’s works tend to critique the accepted and expected roles of women in society and evaluates the previously endorsed notion that women’s worth lies in their fertility…

Bush family was their family traditions. This exhibit gave detailed background information over the household that George Bush was brought up in. In this exhibit I learned that George has four other siblings, attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, attended Yale University and joined the navy. I also learned that he married the love of his life, Barbara Pierce. The museum did an excellent job of giving detailed description of the early childhood of George, and providing pictures,…

A Turtle and Some Beans Anais Nin, a renowned author, once wrote, “And the day came when the risk to remain a tight bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom” (“Quotes About Growth”). In the story, The Bean Trees, by Barbara Kingsolver, the courage to bloom is one of the many themes. Taylor, a young woman travelling westward, is unwillingly given a child. Taylor and the child, Turtle, eventually settle in Arizona. They live with a woman named Lou Ann, and Taylor works at an auto…