Angels, Spider-girls, and Faith~

Faith: firm belief in something for which there is no proof

In "A Very Old Man, with Enormous Wings", the theme of loosing ones faith is a very subtle, yet central point in the story. When the news that an 'angel' had come to earth spread, masses and masses of people filled the owners court yards. They came to watch the angel preform great miracles. However, when the angel failed to preform miracles to the grand extent that the spectators had hoped for, they went about looking for something else that was unique and supernatural and fulfilling, which came about in the form of the  spider girl.

This scene is a great representation of the way people look at faith today-- in a faith, one begins to look for a tangible way to prove that their faith is real (the angel) or justify it (the expected miracles). However, when the proof of the faith does not come in the exact way that one seeks, that person grows tired and unsure (people beginning to question whether the angel really was an angel). Often, they turn away from their faith an go seek something else that is more concrete and tangible to place their faith it (leaving the angel to go and look at the spider girl).

Overall, the ability to wholly trust something that is unable to be seen or proven is an ability that is becoming less and less coming among people. Humans would rather place their faith in something that they can see, or something that is predictable and relates to them, then something that 'does not listen' or makes no logical sense or cannot not physically be seen. "A Very Old Man, with Enormous Wings" illustrates this concept very well.

Pink Ribbons~

“So they parted; and the young man pursued his way, until, being about to turn the corner by the meeting-house, he looked back, and saw the head of Faith peeping after him, with a melancholy air, in spite of her pink ribbons.”

Pink Ribbons. Often seen worn in the hair of little girls. Pink is the color of princesses, the color of the cheeks of little children, the color of every wall of every one of my rooms growing up. Ribbons are cute, they are frivolous and flouncy. Together they are a symbol of childhood of innocence and of purity. This is why Faith, Goodman Brown’s wife, has them laced through her hair in the beginning of the story. Faith, already an early symbol of goodness, kindness, gaiety and purity, is depicted wearing these so that the reader may envision her as the ultimate symbol of the puritan lifestyle, she embodies purity almost in an Angelic way.

When Goodman Brown leaves Faith to begin his journey into the forest towards a demonic gathering, the pink ribbons do not disappear.  They reappear in the story, but within a much different context. While Goodman Brown is deep into his journey, he encounters a man who is presumed to be the devil, and throughout the conversation held between Brown and the devil, Brown continuously claims that he will return home... “for Faith’s sake.” However, once the devil leaves, he hears voices of various people that he knows from his village-- one of the voices he recognizes belongs to Faith. Goodman Brown screams her name in a state of total brokenness, and as he does this, pink ribbons flutter down from the sky. Here the pink ribbons take on a new meaning- as they have literally fallen from the sky, they represent the fall of innocence, as even the most beautiful and pure object has now fallen from its place of glory, and into sin. Additionally, in this case the color pink also represents the mixing of both good and evil. White represents everything good and pure, red represents everything stained and evil. A mixture of these two colors creates the color pink.

Finally, the pink ribbons make their final appearance at the end of the story, when Goodman Brown returns to his home and sees Faith. She has pink ribbons still in her hair, which represents the illusion of innocence- a facade- that masks reality and evil and deception. Pink ribbons represent everything pure and innocent and lovely, yet the also represent the fall from grace and entrance into sin. This awkward understanding of both symbolic meanings forces one to wonder what truly is pure, what really is innocent, what can truly be defined as lovely and untouched by evil? If not even Faith could resist the pull of evil, and if pink ribbons really cannot symbolize innocence in its truest form, then what can?

Deep, Selfless Love~

"A Worn Path" is a deeply moving short story by Eudora Welty. The story follows and aging woman named Phoenix, as she travels to the town of Natchez in order to obtain medicine for her grandson, who swallowed lye. The story is captivating, because it depicts an elderly woman who encounters many difficulties, obstacles, and trials as she treks her way through the forest and into the town-- all for the love of her grandson. That love is what makes the story so beautiful. "A Worn Path" captivates the theme that, deep love for another enables a person to defy age, struggle, danger and morals.

For the majority of the short story, Phoenix battles many obstacles. In the beginning of the story, she struggles with a thorn bush that snags her dress, a barbed wire fence that she must crawl under, and the chance of being stopped and hurt by a wild animal. Through all of this, she remains positive, and continues on her way. Another major difficulty that Phoenix encounters is that of herself. She often momentarily loses her memory, and must force herself to continue forward by remembering where she is going and why she is going there- bringing her back to the love she has for her grandson. As her journey continues, Phoenix meets a scarecrow, who she fears is a ghost. Her fear is not long standing, however, and she ends her 'visit' with the scarecrow with a dance. Soon after, a wild dog knocks Phoenix off of her feet, and unable to raise. A young hunter helps her up, but when he drops a nickel, Phoenix quickly snags it without his knowledge. Though she feels guilty, this is an example of how deep love can enable to a person to defy their morals. In this case, even though Phoenix is guilty for stealing the nickel from the hunter, she does it for her grandson. When Phoenix finally reaches the town, and receives the medicine for her grandson from the clinic, the woman that assisted her offers her a couple of pennies. Phoenix instead asks her for a nickel, noting that she already has a nickle, and that another would give her ten cents. As she leaves the clinic, Phoenix decides to buy her grandson a pin-wheel as a present, “He going to find it hard to believe there such a thing in the world. I’ll march myself back where he waiting, holding it straight up in this hand.”

In conclusion, even though Phoenix is old and worn, even though she faces many struggles along her path and that at times her journey proved to be quite dangerous, even though her memory struggles to remain with her, even though she is a poor, and even though her good-natured morals tell her not to steal, the deep and selfless love that Phoenix has for her grandson goes beyond all of these factors, and ultimately, allows her to complete her journey.

Araby~

This week in literature class, we read the short story 'Araby' by James Joyce. When I first read the story, I did not understand the complexity behind it- I did not understand why it was so great. However, after I read it again (and after we discussed it in class), I began to realize how true and beautiful the story was.

'Araby', being a 'coming of age' story, has at first glance a very basic and predictable story line. There's initial innocence, innocent love, desire, disappointment and a realization of the triviality of ones actions, which concludes with a jump to maturity. Typical. However, 'Araby' is not just your average coming of age story, such as 'Hercules' or the 'The Lion King', which possesse happy endings despite all of the trials the protagonist encountered in order to achieve maturity in the end. 'Araby' looks at a young boy, so mentally captivated by his infatuation with a girl, that every waking moment he spends thinking of her or trying to catch a glimpse of her. When she states that she will not be attending the local fair, Araby, but asks the boy if he will be going, he declares that if he does, he will buy her something. The idea of being able to give the low of his life a gift from an exotic event weighs so heavy on his mind that he is unable to focus on anything else. The night of the fair, however, his Uncle comes home late (drunk) which means the boy will arrive at the festival late. The train he must catch to go to Araby is then late also, and by the time he arrives, most places are closing. He stops at one stand, but the lady running it is in the middle of a conversation with two men. The three others at the booth are British- killing for the boy the sense of 'exoticness' that Araby was supposed to have. The boy walks away, utterly defeted, realising that he had been solely a creature of vanity.

The significance of this story lies in the way the main character reaches maturity. Instead of overcoming many difficult task and the rewarded and instantly matured (like we see in many coming of age Disney movies), this boy had no happy ending. He realized that not only had all his efforts to please this girl been absolutely idle, but he also realized that he had been a person living only out of their vanity. He does not get rewarded for this realization, and he will never get to go back to being an 'innocent kid in love' ever again. Rather, a fog has been lifted from his eyes, and for better or worse, he will never be the same.

Shame~

Shame is a fear that is ever present in our lives. Whether it is the shame we feel when we do poorly on a test, the fear we have of disappointing our parents, of not making a sports team, of not being accepted into the school of dreams. No matter what, the fear of being a failure, a disappointment, or in other words, shameful, is always there. When we experience the feeling of shaming ourselves, families or friends, we often are consumed with guilt and regret. However, that shame passes and we are able to continue our lives without a huge cloud of guilt hovering over us. In cultures that differ from that of the United States, shame is dealt with in a much different and in extreme way.

In the short story, 'A Family Supper', author Ishiguro describes how shame is dealt with in the Japanese culture. He begins with a brief overview on the fish called fugu- a Japanese delicacy that is extremely risky to prepare as it contains two 'poison sacks' that need to be gutted specifically and so that the deadly poison does not kill the fish's consumer. In proceeding with the story, it is important to understand that in many Asian cultures in particular, a person's entire life is consumed with the intense drive to bring honor to the family name, but also and equally intense fear to bring shame to it- this way of life is part of the Japanese culture. In the beginning of the story the narrator refers to his father as 'being very proud of his Samarai blood'. Back in the day when Japanese Samarai soldiers were 'active' and highly regarded, shame brought about by a Samaria was worse than death. Because of this, the shameful Samaria would slice his stomach open (much like slicing open the stomach of the fungi fish to remove its poison), letting all of his insides fall out as he bled to death. This fact is important to know because the narrator's father had a business that closed down, and his 'very honorable' business partner killed his whole family, and then himself by slicing open his stomach. It is clear by reading the story that shame is the worst thing you can cast upon yourself and your family in the Japanese culture, and that shame is so untolerated, that it drives people to the point of suicide.

As the story draws to an end, the narrator and his Father and sister conclude their family supper with a delicious fish. When asked what the fish was, the Father replies, 'just fish'. The story ends with the narrator and his Father sitting and talking, and the sister in the kitchen making tea. The reader never finds out if the Father was also so overcome by shame that he decided to kill himself and his family by feeding them the poisonus fugu.