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A Different Perspective on Sylvia - "The Lesson" - Toni Cade Bambara

In reading “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara I am instantly reminded of a quote by Galileo: “You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him find it within himself”. “The Lesson” is a perfect example of this in how Bambara uses Miss Moore’s ‘lesson’ to enlighten the seemingly resistant and grudging student Sylvia into a deeper awareness of herself, her plight and ultimately her future. Though on the surface, Sylvia appears to be a highly disinterested and an unwilling participant, on a much deeper level she is ripe for receiving a message that is possibly too profound for the other students. Beneath the façade of the oblivious, aloof and abrasive leader that Sylvia tries vehemently to display, is an extremely aware, critical thinker who is fearful of her own consciousness. She uses her bravado as a defense mechanism to avoid facing what her awareness is relaying to her – her position in the world and her inability to fully live up to the image of herself she tries to portray. ...
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It's All in The Name (or Lack Thereof) - Hills Like White Elephants

     A subtle yet necessary aid in reinforcing the characters' qualities in Ernest Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" in is the selection of their 'names'. It is in their names that theme is reinforced cueing you into their personalities and how they are to be perceived. It is yet another way that a story with so little direct information assists you in understanding who the characters are and why they behave as they do.       In this story we are introduced to three characters, The American, the girl (who we later learn as 'Jig") and the woman set against the backdrop somewhere in Spain. There are immediate assumptions that can be inferred solely by the title given to the man in story, 'the American'. The first and most obvious - foreign, adventitious. This is supported by his attitude toward to the abortion, how Jig is processing the ordeal and his inability to understand and communicate beyond his own lens of the world. Throughout the...
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"The Story of An Hour" by Kate Chopin - Parallels

 I found two interesting parallels within the text that reinforce the theme. The first being the window and the second being Louise's death.  The window served as the door to her freedom. Looking out of it, seeing the beginnings of spring, the blue sky and clouds, proposed a new beginning for Louise. It was then that she knew something was coming to her, a thing she did not immediately know, yet when fully realized, it was her freedom. The window represents the escape from the world she knew; the room, her home, a place of binding - to her husband and perhaps even her illness, into a place of newness, hope and possibility. The window acted as the catalyst and vehicle to finding hope through despair - in death and in a marriage that was consider death for many women during that time. Louise found her personal silver lining through that window - figuratively and literally ("the delicious breath of rain..." and "patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clo...
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