Loss of innocence in Alice Walker’s The Flowers
”The Flowers” by Alice Walker Summary: “The Flowers” 1973 is written by Alice Walker who is an Afro-American author. “The Flowers” is a short story about a girl named Myop. Myop is a black 10-yeard old girl who lives on a farm with her poor sharecropper family in the countryside. She staggers around and plays with animals and discovers beautiful nature in her pleasuring never-ending childhood. But while exploring the land she lives near with flowers in her hands she accidently discovers a horrible crime. The remains of a hanged man reveals in the soil.
She lays down her flowers and the summer was over. Analysis: When the ignorance of an innocent child collides with the harsh reality of the miserable slave-history, will the idyllic life, flourishing hopes and dreams of the little ones, soon be gone and forgotten. But this loss of innocence is likely to be replaced by maturity, which makes a clear distinction between child and adult. The story is written as a 3rd person omniscient narrator. The harvesting of corn, cotton, peanuts and squash indicates that the story takes place in the Southern states since these crops were commonly harvested there. Myop and her family live in sharecropper cabin with rusty boards that could indicate that they are poor. Therefore it’s likely that the story is taking place in the 20th century where racial discrimination was at its peak. In the beginning of the story there is dominating use of positive phraseology and the environment is described idyllically. “… Made each day a golden surprise that caused excited little tremors to run up her jaws. ”3 This idyllic description is also equivalent to how peaceful Myop is enjoying her childhood.
She seems to be unaware about her presence in the American society where there was an explicit difference between the black and white. The author tries to describe this racial problem symbolically when she mentions how “tiny white bubbles disrupt the thin black scale of soil... ” But the idyllic setting drastically changes at line 18 when Myop finds herself more than a mile away from home. She is walking further away from her secure surroundings. Now the there is negative use of phraseology such as; Strangeness, not pleasant, gloomy, cove, damp air, silence, close and deep etc.
Order custom essay Loss of innocence in Alice Walker’s The Flowers with free plagiarism report
450+ experts on 30 subjects
Starting from 3 hours delivery
She is no longer secure. When trying to escape the strangeness she steps on her history and reality and she is forced to face the suppression for her first time, this is the symbolic meaning of the corpse she steps on. The man is obviously black since he has been lying there rotten and totally forgotten. His blue denim overall cloths also indicates that he was a black poor farmer or slave. Back in the 1960’s the Ku Kux Klan (KKK) executed a lot of executions where they hang black people in the woods.
She tries to ignore this ‘reality and suppression’ when reaching out for a pink flower that she associates with her secure childhood. When she notices the hanging noose spinning restlessly in the breeze she lays down the flowers – laying down the flowers symbolizes Myop letting go of her innocence and secure surroundings. “And the summer was over" means that her childhood is over and she is entering the life as an adult. T Note 1: Line 1 Note 2: Line 2-3 Note 3: Line 2-3 Note 4: Line 10-11
Cite this Page
Loss of innocence in Alice Walker’s The Flowers. (2018, Jun 09). Retrieved from https://phdessay.com/the-flowers/
Run a free check or have your essay done for you
