Eudora Welty

In Chaucer’s satirical comedy The Canterbury Tales, and Shakespeare’s play King Lear, women are portrayed in a negative light. In both time periods, female characters are supposed to be submissive and obedient to their husbands; furthermore, as seen in the text, women are frowned upon for being knowledgeable and independent. Each author uses his work to promote their opinion on gender roles in society. In the fourteenth century, society was based on hierarchal status and women were at the…

“The Lottery” is a short story written by Shirley Jackson. This story takes place in a small town on a clear sunny day on the 27th day of June. The children of the town arrive first and begin collecting stones and piling them together until their parents call them to order. Mr. Summers calls each head of the household to come forward to a black old wooden box, where each select a slip of paper. Once the men of the house have chosen a paper slip, Mr. Summers allows everyone to open the paper and…

Courage to Pursue Your Goals Courage is the ability to do something out of your comfort zone that you know is difficult or dangerous. Discoveries, edited by Harold Schechter and Jonna Gormley Semekis, contains many stories written about characters going on a quest. These characters could be on a quest to find their personal call, could be on a journey with many obstacles in their path, or could be on a quest to find a type of treasure. There are many important characteristics that these…

In Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell the protagonist Ree Dolly journeys through the stages of a Hero's Journey as defined by Joseph Campbell. An atypical hero, the 16-year-old young woman begins her quest in The World of Common Day. The reader is introduced to Ree, “She stood tall in combat boots, scarce at waist but plenty through the arms and shoulders, a body made for loping after needs”(3). As she is physically built to travel the Ozarks searching for her father, Ree is still burdened with…

A Worn Path In Eudora Welty's “A Worn Path,” an elderly African American woman named Phoenix Jackson sets out on a familiar journey to retrieve medicine for her sick grandson. Set in Natchez, Mississippi, she undertakes many obstacles along her routine path. The story was written in the 1940's, right after World War II and the historical plot includes racial prejudice, lack of education for the poor, and lack of transportation. In “A Worn Path,” racial prejudice in the 1940's was rampant and…

In William Sydney Porter’s (pen name O. Henry) novel The Gift of the Magi, (1906), the young married couple, Jim and Della, the setting takes place during Christmas. The force that makes it difficult for the couple is having one dollar and eighty seven between the two of them and trying to find more money and of buying gifts for each other. The setting takes place during Christmas holiday. Jim and Della both admire what they possess already and want to enhance their worldly possessions (Jim’s…

It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s Phoenix Jackson? Many heroes are shown as strong and powerful warriors that save a kingdom from monsters and destruction. Not all heroes are that way however. Some heroes seem to be the opposite of heroic as well such as Bilbo Bagons from “The Hobbit” or Daniel Crawford from “Asylum”. Out of all the heroes one seems to stand out the most. Phoenix Jackson from “A Worn Path” is an elderly woman who travels a far distance alone to get medicine for her grandson.…

An anonymous writer once said, “Is there anything more wonderful than a grandmother’s love for her grandchildren? It is just pure love nothing but pure love". In Eudora Welty’s short story, “A Worn Path”, Phoenix Jackson embodies a loving grandmother that would do anything for her sick grandson. While the difficulty of her unexplained journey her body and her mind never pleads her to stop. Phoenix’s perseverance is demonstrated by the meek fact that she keeps walking. She encounters many…

Phoenix is the main character, and protagonist of Eudora Welty’s short story “A Worn Path”, Written in 1941. Throughout the story, we follow Phoenix on a long journey that she is taking through the woods, for which we are at first given no origin point or destination. On her journey, we see Phoenix display a memory both with incredible ability, and with faults of old age. We also see her encounter and overcome many obstacles set by both her environment, and her poor eyesight, a symptom of old…

Jessica LaGue Professor Cave English 1B 12 February 2015 Symbolic Representation of the Phoenix The symbolism in “This Is What It Means To Say Phoenix Arizona” is what adds depth to the characters and events that take place in the story. Accompanied by his childhood friend Thomas Builds-The-Fire, our protagonist Victor embarks on a journey to Phoenix, AZ to retrieve the ashes of his estranged father. However it is Victor that will rise from the ashes, and be reborn from the flames of his own…