Writing A Character Analysis: Jake Grimes
Writing Center
Tidewater Community
College
Phone: 757-822-7170
Fax: 757-427-0327 http://www.tcc.edu/writing December 18, 2006
Guidelines for Writing a Character Analysis
Essay
Characters are the essence of a work of fiction. Fictional characters are portrayed through the characters’ actions and reactions as well as other characters’ actions and reactions to them. You develop a character by telling the reader about that character, what he is doing or thinking. You reveal fictional characters by the way they appear, by what they say, by what they do, and by what others say about them.
In developing a character analysis remember that a character analysis presents the reader with a critical view of either the protagonist or antagonist, …show more content…
Grimes has been trapped in a cycle of exploitation.
As an orphan, she became a “bound” girl, legally contracted to work as slave labor for a farmer who terrified her with his lust, and for his wife, who frightened the girl with her jealousy. The girl’s only escape from this prison was marriage to Jake Grimes, a shiftless farmer who beat her and expected her to work the farm alone. When the couple’s son grows up, he joins the father in abusing the mother. They demand that she feed them, and somehow she must also sustain the animals of the farm:
How was she going to get everything fed? – that was her problem. The dogs had to be fed. There wasn’t enough hay in the barn for the horses and the cow. If she didn’t feed the chickens how could they lay eggs? Without eggs to sell how could she buy things in town, things she needed to keep life on the farm going?
Her life is nothing but an endless battle to meet the demands of the animals – and men – who devour her strength and youth, turning her into an “old woman when she isn’t even forty yet.”
Trapped by life, Mrs. Grimes never thinks of fighting back. Because she had always been brutalized by the world, she learns to expect nothing from it. Life, to her,
Tidewater Community
College
Phone: 757-822-7170
Fax: 757-427-0327 http://www.tcc.edu/writing December 18, 2006
Guidelines for Writing a Character Analysis
Essay
Characters are the essence of a work of fiction. Fictional characters are portrayed through the characters’ actions and reactions as well as other characters’ actions and reactions to them. You develop a character by telling the reader about that character, what he is doing or thinking. You reveal fictional characters by the way they appear, by what they say, by what they do, and by what others say about them.
In developing a character analysis remember that a character analysis presents the reader with a critical view of either the protagonist or antagonist, …show more content…
Grimes has been trapped in a cycle of exploitation.
As an orphan, she became a “bound” girl, legally contracted to work as slave labor for a farmer who terrified her with his lust, and for his wife, who frightened the girl with her jealousy. The girl’s only escape from this prison was marriage to Jake Grimes, a shiftless farmer who beat her and expected her to work the farm alone. When the couple’s son grows up, he joins the father in abusing the mother. They demand that she feed them, and somehow she must also sustain the animals of the farm:
How was she going to get everything fed? – that was her problem. The dogs had to be fed. There wasn’t enough hay in the barn for the horses and the cow. If she didn’t feed the chickens how could they lay eggs? Without eggs to sell how could she buy things in town, things she needed to keep life on the farm going?
Her life is nothing but an endless battle to meet the demands of the animals – and men – who devour her strength and youth, turning her into an “old woman when she isn’t even forty yet.”
Trapped by life, Mrs. Grimes never thinks of fighting back. Because she had always been brutalized by the world, she learns to expect nothing from it. Life, to her,