Metaphors In The Glass Castle

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The Glass Castle works to set an enthralling and simultaneously horrific tale from the very start. Through tales of exploration and poverty, of hopes, dreams, and corruption. Jeanette Walls makes the writing seem effortless in the way it conveys the oxymoronic themes that run throughout the novel. A mutual apparatus Walls utilizes is metaphor. Metaphors help to convey the massive complexity of the upbringing she faced, through the good and the bad. Many things are repeatedly referenced throughout the novel, the nearly notable of which is the Glass Castle – Rex'south dream domicile which he had meticulously designed, just never constructed.

The castle represents all of Male monarch's hopes, dreams, and promises which he had spent years planning and discussing, and how a better life for the family unit could have easily happened. Just like the castle, his plans never come to fruition and not simply he, just his family, suffer for it. The castle represents the false hopes given to Jeanette past her father repeatedly over the course of the book. Jeanette hopes that one day her father will become better – building the castle, in the figurative sense – however he never does. It represents a life that is pleasant, living in the luxury of a castle designed by a genius, that never sees the light of day. His final endeavour at getting Jeanette to stay in Welch – bringing out the blueprints again, this time with more space on the floorplan for her room – and her refusal to remain shows that her hope in her begetter is gone, how she no longer believes in his power to make a better life for her and the family unit. "Go alee and build the glass castle, but don't do information technology for me" (Walls 238). The choice to brand the castle glass shows how fragile Rex's promises truly were in their extravagance, and how easy it was to topple the life they had built for themselves, even in the all-time of times.

However, the drinking glass castle is not the simply metaphor Walls utilizes repeatedly, and many more are found throughout the novel. An interesting and insightful case is Jeanette's nickname, Mount Caprine animal. Walls explains the moniker's origin, "He called me that because I never savage when we were climbing mountains – sure-footed as a mountain goat, he'd always say" (36). Equally an creature, mountain goats are extremely tough.This serves to compare Jeanette'due south resilience in a macabre situation that stretched her entire childhood and the mountain goat's resilience in harsh terrain. Through the hunger, molestation, injuries, fail, and bullying Jeanette keeps her caput held high. This is an case of a much smaller metaphor that still carries a significant amount of meaning; allowing us to grasp Jeanette's complex construction brought on past the many events of her childhood.

Third, the primeval metaphor we are introduced to, and 1 of the virtually recurrent, is fire. From the hotel the family rents in San Francisco to the horrific injury inflicted upon her, burn down follows Jeanette throughout the book, and her obsession with it transforms as she does. At 1 bespeak, her father tells her "… that zone was known in physics as the boundary between turbulence and guild"(Walls 61). This border between turbulence and order – and the lack of knowledge surrounding it – shows the ignorance Jeanette carries surrounding her childhood and the horrors within information technology. This serves as a sort of symbolism that represents both the bad and proficient her upbringing has inflicted upon her, also. While Walls definitely carries battle scars from her childhood, whether they be physical or mental, she also looks dorsum upon information technology through rose-colored drinking glass, and she did walk away with an immense knowledge of a variety of topics. Itself, fire can singe and destroy, but information technology can besides provide heat and protection. This parallels her father in a sinister mode; a man who is capable of endless feats of engineering and is rather pleasant when sober, but becomes a horrifying blaze of fury whenever he is drunk. This metaphor is the most complex and can be interpreted in many means.

Yet another metaphor from Wall'southward childhood is the Joshua Tree growing in Midland. The tree is described past Jeanette as "leaning over so far it seemed ready to topple, although, in fact, its roots held firmly in place" (Walls 35). This represents her family every bit a whole. Despite the inner dysfunction the Walls family faces, they stick together for many years. While they seemed from the outside like a family unit virtually to shatter into pieces, on the inside they are together always. From the Mojave Desert to New York Metropolis, they remain together and intact until Rex dies, at which bespeak the family is able to move on without him and brand lives for themselves.

In conclusion, The Glass Castle is a wonderfully sorry novel nearly the woes of growing up abreast irresponsible parents and through poverty and abuse. The book has a fashion of making itself seem like a thrilling roller coaster, illustrating beautifully the deceiving way Walls probable viewed her babyhood. That kind of writing takes time and effort, but with a father as smart as her own, is it really that shocking?

Metaphors In The Glass Castle,

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