The Glass Castle Resilience Quotes

The Glass Castle Essay

Wesley Murray A3

8/28/16

In Jeannette Walls’s book The Glass Castle, there are many examples of what is called human resilience. No better quote describes human resilience better than, “No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That’s the only way to keep the roads clear.” Which was said by Greg Kincaid. This point is very emphasized in the book in most of its plot points from the burning of Jeannette’s body from the hot dog accident to finally running away to New York from her irresponsible parents.

The first scene where human resilience is demonstrated is when Jeannette is cooking hot dogs and lights herself on fire. This demonstrates human resilience because she presses on with her life, despite being badly burned and being in a hospital for several weeks. She even gets on her feet and leaves the hospital with her father, despite not being completely healed from her burns. She also has the resilience to deal with her father’s irresponsible behavior when he refuses to pay the bill (Walls 14).

Another part of the book where her resilience is demonstrated is when Walls’s family is traveling through the desert after refusing to pay the hospital bill. She has to put up with her father’s bizarre phobia of the government, as well

The quote “No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That’s the only way to keep the roads clear.”, which was said by Greg Kincaid, perfectly describes how human resilience, specifically that of Jeannette Walls, was portrayed in the book. There are many examples of this throughout the book, including at the very beginning when she lights herself on fire cooking hot dogs, her family constantly moving from town to town because of her father’s strange paranoias, her long suffering in the impoverished West Virginia town of Welch, and her move to New York in spite of all that she has