Alice Walker 3
In life people face various obstacles and must somehow tough their way through them. In literature authors create characters with problems and lives that can be very difficult at times. It is up to the author to decide how the character will turn out in the end. In Alice Walker's works, the female characters often have hard lives, but they always triumph in the end. Walker takes her characters on very harsh paths throughout her stories, but she always finds a way for them to learn, grow, and surmount. Alice Walker also shows her style in non-fiction pieces based on her life experiences. In "Beauty: When the Other Dancer is The Self," she tells the story of her childhood devastation. This consisted of her becoming blinded in one eye while playing cowboys and Indians with her brothers. She began her essay by telling the audience of her incredible childhood before the accident. She shows us that she was happy, energetic, and worry-free. "It was great being cute. But the one day, it ended." (Beauty 2) This is when she begins to tell her story, and we see that she does rise above in the end. Alice and her brothers were playing like they always did. Alice was standing watch on the top of a roof when she felt an incred
Your stepdaddy been dead over a week, she say. When us want to town to hear the will read yesterday...Your real daddy owned the land and the house and the store...When your mama died it passed on to you and your sister Nettie...(Purple 206) This quote shows her hostility toward the family. She did not want to live with these strange, white people, even though she lived in the slums. The family was very hospitable but she did not fit in their way of life. She would not allow the family to touch her, and she would not talk to them. She was very quiet and withdrawn. In this silence she creates a ghost in her mind, which causes the family many disturbances. She finally comes to grips with herself and faces the ghost. But this would not have been possible without the help of Mrs. Mallory. This is expressed in the following quote: Through this horrifying journey she eliminates her fear of the white Mallory family, and finds the value of friendship. She takes this new value to her home in the slums. This quote clearly illustrates the girl's triumph:
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1970
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)
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