Fundamental Differences between ‘The Glass Menagerie’, ‘Her First Elk’ and ‘Dusting’
Families are often predisposed to various social factors that in turn influence their dynamic and outcome. The social factors influence the path through either success or strife that a family goes through. Tennessee William, Rick Bass and Julia Alvarez present a vivid portrayal of these factors in The Glass Menagerie, Her First Elk and The Dusting respectively. The three literature works delve into the concept of family dynamics. The context that follows provides a discussion on the aforementioned literature works. The selected works have themes that centre on family relationships and evolving family dynamics predisposed to socio-cultural influences.
The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee William is a dramatic play based on a recollection by the lead actor Tom Wingfield. The author creates an ambiguity between perceiving the play as reality or imagination through an initial understanding of it being a memorial account or narration that one can alter to meet the narrator’s likes or dislikes. Again, the extensive use of symbolism in the play also gives a fictional demeanor to the play. However, the narration and symbolism further aid in portraying the theme of play as being a shift between reality and imagination within the characters.
The plot revolves around social interactions between four characters in the play: Tom Wingfield, Amanda Wingfield – the mother, Laura Wingfield – the sister; and Jim O’Connor – a workmate. A fifth individual, M. Wingfield – an absentee father – serves as the silent antagonist in the play (Williams 6). The play does indeed conform to a theme of failure in family structure. The absence of the father in the family setting seems to be the reason why the family is currently undergoing strife. Amanda’s somewhat constant reference to M. Wingfield as a previous beacon to their family’s success and his absence as a reason for their plight highlights this realty.
However, a closer analysis of the play reveals that individual aspirations by all five characters in the play may be the reason behind the family discordance observed in the entire context of the play. The father leaves to pursue his own individual goals, Tom is a warehouse employee who appears torn between his aspirations to be a writer and an obligation towards ensuring financial stability of his family. The author portrays Amanda as a socially adept individual who strives to ensure the success of her family – her daughter – despite the financial burden they face. She ironically seems rather nostalgic about her previous life as opposed to her present. Laura, Tom’s partially handicapped and shy sister has an attraction to Tom’s workmate and Laura’s high school acquaintance is the embodiment of her present desire. Jim O’Connor also serves as the embodiment of Amanda’s future prospect to financial security for the family. Due to his situation at the time, he cannot marry Laura. Therefore, the play displays discordance in family dynamic through portraying a clash between individual imagination (desire) and perceived reality.
Unlike The Glass Menagerie, Her First Elk by Rick Bass utilizes symbolism to describe family. The plot of the story centers on describing a hunting experience. The title selected for the story is rather ironic since the author indicates at the very beginning that she had hunted elk before. Rather than immediately developing the concept of family, the author instead seems to give a vivid description of the hunting scene before eventually providing a somewhat metaphorical reference between the hunt, the elk and Jyl. Therefore, Her First Elk and The Glass Menagerie both utilize symbolism and metaphorical depictions as a way of highlighting the theme perceived by the authors. However, Rick Bass appears to limit the use of vivid imagery as he concentrated more on symbolism. In retrospect, one may have to finish the entire story before exactly understanding how the theme of family comes into play within the literature context.
In Her First Elk, the author displays themes of individual isolation, distance from family, and reconciliation. The author begins by painting Jyl as an isolated picture within the woods, the appearance of the elk and her encounter with the two brothers as a path towards reconciling with her family after long while. “…Jyl sometimes looks down at her body and considers the mix of things: the elk becoming her, as she ate it, and becoming Ralph and Bruce, as they ate it (did this make them somehow, distantly, like brothers and sister, or uncles and niece, if not fathers and daughter?)…” (Bass 8)
One can view Her First Elk as a story that highlights the ever-evolving roles of individual family members. The context of the story portrays Jyl as an adept hunter despite the fact that she is a young lady. At one instance, she amazes Ralph and Bruce with the kill she had made. Adopting a chauvinistic stance may imply that this may be an example of family discordance. This argument however may best be looked at through understanding Jyl’s untraditional prowess as portraying the growth of modernity in society. In retrospect, the reader observes a theme of development of feminine identity within family contexts.
The Dusting by Julia Alvarez is a two-stanza poem that seems to depict the theme of female identity within family contexts more vividly. The Dusting describes an interaction between a daughter (the author) and her mother. In the poem, the author describes her mother as always erasing marks left by her on surfaces within their house. This could be taken to depict the mother as constantly ‘erasing any mark’ left by her daughter within society.
The reader can immediately see the theme of family disunity or discordance through the actions of the two characters within the poem. The mother seems to disagree with her daughters actions.
“Each morning I wrote my name/on the dusty cabinet… She erased my fingerprints…” (Alvarez 8). One can take the poem to imply rebellion from normal family values. The child seems to rebel against her mother.
Alternatively, the daughter seems to deviate from her mother’s norms, with an aim of carving out her own. The Dusting then seems to portray a theme of making an identity for one’s self. In the poem, the girl seems to crave an existence better than her mother currently lives in. The child again seems to portray her need to carve out her individual identity; one that is different from that of her mother, which se seems to think is unfit. In retrospect, the child’s rebellious demeanor highlights the themes of self-definition and individual appreciation as a part feminine identity.
In conclusion, the literature contexts discussed have fundamental differences in one being a poem (The Dusting), the other a play (The Glass Menagerie) and the last an oral narrative (Her First Elk). However, the thematic content is somewhat similar. All three contexts of literature display forms of discordance in family dynamic. As discussed the discordance noted is predisposed to factors present in particular social settings. In all three, absence of a male (paternal) figure in the present setting seems to alter the family dynamic. Eventually, the roles taken to achieve success by key female figures in all three stories highlight feminine identity.
Works Cited
Alvarez, Julia. Homecoming. New York: Plume, a division of Penguin USA. 1996. Print.
Bass, Rick. The Lives of Rocks. New Jersey: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007. Print.
Williams, Tennessee. The Glass Menagerie. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1996. Print.
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