Preview

Analyzing Willa Cather's 'One Of Ours'

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
388 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Analyzing Willa Cather's 'One Of Ours'
Carolyn DeGrazia
Professor Gerald
January 30, 2012
Character Analysis Willa Cather once said, “Where there is great love, there are always wishes.” She makes this quote relevant in her Pulitzer-prize winning novel, One of Ours. One of Ours is a story about Claude Wheeler, a young man from Nebraska, struggling to find his purpose in life. Throughout the entire novel, he only has one consistent presence in his life that truly believes in him and that is his mother. Mrs. Wheeler, a Protestant Christian, has been married to Mr. Wheeler for more than twenty years. Although she has birthed three boys, she has taken care of many others in her life due to the farm life of her husband. That’s exactly what she is-a caretaker. She was the perfect

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    The essays from Week Two and Week Three show many great techniques. These essays serve as models and give me great goals for my essay. In “One Afternoon” by John Rosenthal on page 174 when he is going through the records he talks about his feelings and his thoughts. This can be seen when he says “Patti Page’s ‘Doggie in the Window.’ I bought that? A small voice in the back of my mind said, Of course you did. And you still remember all of the lyrics.” Using this technique will help make my literacy narrative essay more interesting to read. In my essay I will use this method, when describing the first time I met my favorite author, Jamie Dodson, by saying, “He was sitting in a lawn chair outside of the shower building with his laptop plugged…

    • 192 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    After reading the novel, O Pioneers! it was hard to judge whether it was a tragedy or a triumph. The only way I see it as a tragedy is that Emil and Maria died. I knew, since page six of the book that they were going to be together. It kind of broke my heart to see later on that she had married someone else. But when her and Emil got shot, I thought it may finish as a tragedy. But overall, I would see it as a triumph in the way that the Bergsons finally got what they wanted out of their land. It made them rich. Also, Alexandra and Carl finally married. And being that the whole novel was basically based on the land, they were triumphant in getting what they risked, what they longed for.…

    • 907 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Janie was in an arranged marriage with Logan Killicks, a financially stable, crop-owning farmer. Janie believed love revolved around marriage, but she was greatly disappointed when she had realized what a fool she was to be so naïve. Logan was soon exempted from what Janie believed to be true love. “She knew now that marriage did not make love. Janie’s first dream was dead, so she became a woman” (Hurston, 25). After marrying Logan, Janie was forced to work like a slave because Logan viewed Janie as what a “typical wife” would do with and for their husband; work, clean, and cook. The internal racism led Janie to feel like a tool of her husband, to use and abuse only for his working matters. “Her [Nanny] dreams of a better life …ended…Nanny transferred her hopes to Janie” (SparkNotes Editors). Nanny believed a woman will become successful if she married a wealthy man and “sat on the front porch” all day. Nanny did not realize her mentality was battling reality. Nanny’s fantasy of good living contradicted with what Janie had to do; work alongside her husband in the…

    • 1236 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    She is a working mother, which is unthinkable during this era, considering that she is from old money. She has gone without fillings in her teeth, so that he could have straight teeth, and she has sent him to college; something that a single mother generally can not do, which is a huge success on her part. Although life has taken some negative turns, such as the death of her husband, she thinks of herself as a winner because she has been able to single-handedly provide a promising future for her child. It is evident that Julian is aware of his mother’s sacrifices when it is addressed that he “... did not like to consider all she did for him” (O’Connor, 1965, p, 909). Rather than being appreciative, he attempts to find flaws in her decisions, and scrutinizes her every action. He claims that she made “... a mess of things” (O’Connor, 1965, p. 913), and spends most of his time discriminating her life, although he claims that it would be easier to find faults within her if she had been a violent alcoholic. This unthankful characteristic is a widespread phenomenon in the new generation. Many young adults overlook the great sacrifices and obstacles that their elders have overcome in order to provide a better life for them. Rather than being acknowledged, the majority of these selfless acts go unnoticed everyday. This is tragic, because compassion should not become an endangered…

    • 1603 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Ethel Payne

    • 3055 Words
    • 13 Pages

    The Paynes were then forced to open their home to boarders, with two or three people sleeping in each of the bedrooms, and Ethel’s mother began teaching high school Latin and cleaning other people’s homes, but she still managed to encourage Payne’s early talent for writing. Payne’s interest in writing arose from nightly sessions where her mother read the Bible and literature to Payne, her brother, and her four sisters.…

    • 3055 Words
    • 13 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The author uses Faith, Young Goodman Brown’s wife, to represent the Brown’s faith in his religion, community, and family. Brown believes in the purity…

    • 507 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In ‘The drover’s wife’ Lawson creates powerful images by employing distinctively visual language that enables the responder to feel the hardships that others face. Concrete sensory description is effectively used to create a beautiful image when The Drover’s wife sits to watch the snake all night. ‘A green sapling club laid in readiness on the dresser by her side, together with her sewing basket and copy of the young ladies journal.’ The journal is symbolic of the approach she takes in not letting the bush take away her femininity. Juxtaposing to this, the club is symbolic of what she needs to do, it displays her innovative ways and her ability to be content with her lifestyle. The sewing basket acts as a ‘bridge’ between the two as it represents both sides of the woman. Images of a resourceful, cooperative and woman of sophistication are conjured up in the responders mind. One is able establish a relationship of commendation with the drover’s wife whilst despising the Australian Bush for what it puts her through.…

    • 769 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Rebellion In Pleasantville

    • 1183 Words
    • 5 Pages

    If these customs were challenged everything seemed to fall apart. Prior to David and Jennifer arriving, Betty Parker was a picture perfect house wife. When things in Pleasantville began to change Betty refused to cave in to the changing society and stuck with her, and her husbands, beliefs. However, not everything remained pleasant. Betty knew that it was terrible to go against the Pleasantville customs, but something inside her was telling her to change. Firstly, Betty was introduced to many new concepts from Jennifer such as sleeping in one bed, intercourse, and how to please herself. As Betty put her newly learnt knowledge to the test she began to see colour and a tree instantaneously burst into flames. The fire symbolized that this was just the start of something big and that there was much change, along with conflicts, to come. Spectators observed the fire in awe and no one really knew what was going on. This was the first time that something imperfect had happened in the town. Secondly, Betty forgot to cook dinner for her husband one night. “Where’s my dinner?”, was a phrase that caused panic in the community. Betty’s husband looked everywhere for his wife, but Betty was no where to be seen. The imagine of the perfect wife was shattered in Mr. Parker’s eyes when his wife left the house the next day…

    • 1183 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    2. Discuss what you think of Faith. How long have they been married? What could she symbolize? Why does the narrator keep mentioning her pink ribbons?…

    • 1001 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Mrs. Beazley's Deeds

    • 1400 Words
    • 6 Pages

    The story “Mrs. Beazley’s Deeds” is about how women were valued in the nineteenth century society. The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, moved to California at the age of thirty after divorcing her husband. “She lectured on women’s status and socialism, taught school, operated a boarding house, edited newspapers, and wrote articles and novels. Her articles on feminist issues are Women and Economics (1898), Concerning Children (1900), Human Work (1904), The Man-Made World (1911). Gilman’s novels are The Crux (1911), Herland (1915), Moving the Mountain (1911), and With Her in Our Land (1916)” (386). The latter three are feminist works. The author has an autobiography that was published in 1935, The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman. She was terminally ill with cancer and chose to end her own life in 1935.…

    • 1400 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dialectic Journal

    • 829 Words
    • 4 Pages

    “And Faith, as the wife was aptly named, thrust her own pretty head into the street, letting the wind play with the pink ribbons of her cap…”…

    • 829 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Effects of Loss

    • 1235 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Ian Christopherson, the son of Struan’s doctor, Dr. Christopherson, experiences the sudden leave of his mother, which not only affects him emotionally, but his lifestyle as well. Mrs. Christopherson had been Dr. Christopherson’s nurse as well as his wife, so when she left, Ian had no choice but to fill in her spot as his father’s assistant. Ian adapts to this new responsibility quickly, since “he still felt resentful whenever he thought about it, but he didn’t think about it much anymore” (97). This shows how his mother’s leave changes up his day-to-day lifestyle to the point where he doesn’t really mind it anymore. After his mother leaving and Ian seeing the kind of woman she had been all along, he makes it a personal code of behavior to never behave as she had done. For example, “in any tricky personal situation he had asked himself what his mother would have done, and then he had done the opposite. It seemed to him that she was the perfect anti-role model” (208). His mother’s past actions have an effect on Ian’s actions and how he should act in certain situations. This suffering also causes him to see women in a different light. For instance, in his eyes, Laura Dunn used to always be the image of the perfect mother, with no flaws whatsoever. However, after his mother’s leave, Ian’s image of Laura’s…

    • 1235 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A Mothers Day Kiss Off

    • 795 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Looking for the man of the house, he had already found the daily newspaper and engaged in reading it. Working so hard during the week and fixing Mother’s Day special breakfast, his day was over. The kitchen had to be cleaned; the children needed to be taken to Sunday school, and then picked back up from Sunday school in the afternoon. Grocery shopping needed to be done on Sunday’s due to the both of us working long hours 6 days a week and juggling dance classes for the girls there wasn’t any time to shop during the week.…

    • 795 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Boogeyman

    • 1026 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Lester and Rita Billings' marriage has probably never been characterized by equality. He is the kind of man who believes that women's station in life is to follow their husbands.(page 5.)…

    • 1026 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    After reading this story, I have gained an important experience which is that woman, herself, has to be independent and responsible because living in society is complicated as she might encounter many difficulties and cannot always depend on other people or men. As can be seen, although the bonny drover’s wife was left with four children and had to deal with the hardships of life, she independently strived to protect herself and children and overcame each challenge.…

    • 336 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays

Related Topics