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A Worn Path Research Paper Essay Example

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A Worn Path Research Paper Essay Example
Heroic Efforts Of Phoenix Jackson In “A Worn Path”
In Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path,” the character Phoenix Jackson is introduced. Phoenix Jackson is an uneducated, African-American woman without any family besides her sick grandson. Phoenix is the hero of this story and fits the role well by delivering much-needed medicine to her grandson. Phoenix shows many distinct traits that reveal her to be a hero to her grandson. The heroic feats she accomplishes pave a path that leads to her satisfaction as well as protection of her most beloved asset, her grandson. Throughout the story, Phoenix’s humble, caring, and determined character is displayed through her actions. Phoenix Jackson displays a humble, Southern attitude. As an African-American woman during very racially-divided times, she was not able to receive much of an education. She uses very simple grammar in her communication to others that would be quite normal to her peers. Jackson’s humble nature is also seen through her playful monologues with various inanimate objects and animals. Jackson’s simple dialect can be seen when she states, “My senses is gone. I too old, I the oldest people I ever know. Dance, old scarecrow while I dancing with you”(Welty 139). Jackson’s simple, humble nature is clearly seen through her speech. This humble nature gives Jackson a modest attitude that adds a local feeling to the story. Jackson conveys her humble elegance again when she asks a young lady to tie her shoe for her before entering the healthcare facility. “Phoenix wants her laces tied not because she fears that she might trip over them and fall; she has walked the long path over hills and through bushes and thickets and over the creek on a log with these laces flapping. Here Miss Welty conveys Phoenix’s sense of place which demands that the laces be tied,” Mary Ann Dazey explains very clearly. Jackson was reared in a disadvantaged manner and did not have an extraordinary grasp of the mannerisms of the much more

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