The Grave

Katherine Anne Porter's "The Grave" is a story of childhood innocence that many people can relate to. In this story Miranda seems to be the main character, even though it is told from a third person point of view, you can see that she was the person being followed. This story starts off telling the story of a woman who moved her husbands dead body around to different cemeteries while she tried to find a place where she herself would like to settle after death. After her death in Texas her land is sold which moves her husband yet again next to her in a public cemetery. When her grandchildren, Miranda and Paul are out hunting they stumble across the empty graves of the past.

Inside these graves they find "treasures" that fascinate them. Paul takes from Miranda a dove shaped coffin screw, which he declares as being rare. Paul gives Miranda a gold ring that he had found. Being a girl who is always scolded for wearing overalls rather than dresses at some points, she finds joy in the ring. The ring makes her want to put on a nice dress with a sash and sit under a tree in a wicker chair. The ring represents a kind of lifestyle to Miranda that she knows is out of reach, since her father was shorted on the family will and her mother has passed away.

Miranda is too distracted by the presence of the gold ring on her finger to continue hunting, and Paul kills a rabbit he finds to have babies in her stomach. He puts the babies back inside the dead mother and hides it in a bush, making Miranda promise to never tell of what happened. Miranda keeps her promise, and one day enters a market street where suddenly all of these memories are brought back to her of the day her and her brother were still youths looking for adventure. But what sticks out most is the way her brother turned the silver dove over in his hand.

I think that the purpose of this story is to show how much meaning a small thing can have to a child, and how childhood memories of innocence are most clear in times of excitement. Miranda and Paul were excited to have found such simple things from the past in a hole in the dirt where their grandfather had once been burried. Porter shows in this story that no matter where your station is in life you can find small things to make you happy. While Miranda is happy with a gold ring that makes her seem more girly than what she would prefer to be seen as, she is excited and wants to look pretty and enjoy being a girl. Enjoying the smaller findings in life is something that everyone should take the time to do, no matter how busy your days are.

Dry September - William Faulkner

In this story Hawk is a barber in a presumably small southern town. While working one day Hawk faces an inner struggle that many of us have faced at one point in our lives. A black man is going to be murdered for an attack on a local unmarried older woman, Miss Minnie Cooper. The black man, Will Mayes, is accused of these acts but something in Hawk tells him that Will Mayes is innocent. When he starts to tell the customers in his shop of this they get enraged, even going far enough to call Hawk a "niggerlover". Because of this Hawk must make an important decision. Does he speak up about what he thinks is right only to be ridiculed, or does he let them go on and murder a man who he believes is innocent, solely because the color of his skin.

There may be a few reasons why Hawk did not speak up and save the mans life. At one point everyone is put in a situation where they must choose between what is right to you, and what is right to everyone else. It is always easiest to just go along with the majority, especially in a situation where your loyalty to a certain group of people is being questioned. In speaking up he only angered his customers, which is never good in the past as being a business person in a small town. Your whole career is based on reputation and when this story was written in the south the last thing a white man wanted to be called was a "niggerlover". So Hawk goes along with everyone, all the while knowing it is wrong.

Being from a small town where politics is everything it is understandable why he didnt want to risk his job, maybe even his life if things got to serious to save another man. Of course in no way does this make it alright that he didnt speak up, because its better to speak your mind than whats on the mind of others. This story made me think of many situations where I was forced to choose. Looking back I realize that I did not always make the right decisions, and often went along with the crowd. Faulkner made me realize how much of a struggle it is, in the past and today, to speak your mind while going against a crowd.

In the end Will Mayes ends up being lynched like many black people in the south without a fair trial like one a white man would receive. Which disgusts me in the end of the story when the men responsible for his death make it obvious that they were on Hawks side as well. The story says " Shhh! Shhhh! they said, freshening the icepack, smoothing her hair, examining it for gray, 'poor girl!' Then to one another: 'Do you suppose anything really happened?' Their eyes darkly aglitter, secret, and passionate. 'Shhhhhh! Poor girl! Poor Minnie!'"Basically in the end you realize that the men killed Mayes solely for the reason that he was a black man being accused of a crime, they didn't care if he was innocent, as they all figured he was. This is just another example of the fact that not all things in life are fair.

At the 'Cadian Ball *

At the Cadian Ball was my favorite of the readings this week from Kate Chopin. Her stories were shorter than most of the ones we have been reading, so it kept my mind from wandering during the reading. At the Cadian ball is a story that sets up the scene for its sequel "The Storm". In this story they are setting up the scene for what will in the next story become two different marriages. When Alcee leaves to attend the ball his cousin Clarisse asks his slave where he went, and when he tells her that he left and probably will not be returning for a few weeks she panics. Meanwhile he is at the ball trying to convince the object of many mens affection Calixta to go back to the Assumption with him. While they are talking a black man interrupts to tell Alcee that someone needs to speak with him but they laugh it off until Clarisse appears. She tells him something has happened and he needs to go back, which sets the stage for Bobinot to enter and talk to the object of his affection Calixta. When Alcee and Clarisse return Alcee realizes that Clarisse is in love with him and wanted to avoid losing him for weeks, at the same time Calixta promises marriage to Bobinot. Both of these situations will later lead to unhappy marriages, in which is seems Alcee and Calixta are in just to avoid the situation of getting out.

I liked the way that Kate Chopin set up the scenes so that it is as if you can picture the ball they were at. Like something out of a movie about the Disney princesses. Her description was really good and kept me interested throughout the whole story. I think that her portrayal of Calixta was a way of putting herself into a story. While she may not have been as bold and sexual as Calixta I think that it portrays her opinion on how a woman should be. Calixta knows exactly what she wants, and realizes that Bobinot is lucky to have her, and makes that evident to him and anyone who reads Chopin's story. After reading the pieces by Chopin I think I would like to read more of her work to see if there is a similiar portrayal of strong women characters.