Alice Malsenior was born in Eatonton Georgia on February 9, 1944 she being the eight and youngest child of Minnie Tallulah grant and Willie lee walker, her parent were sharecropper. When she about eight years old her and brother were playing with BB guns her brother accidently shot her in the eye, leaving her blind in her right eye. Considering that happening, she became a shy person and she felt like individuals really did not understand the person she was. In result to that, she fell in love with ready and writing, especially poetry. As she got older, she went on to Spellman College in Atlanta Georgia.
Maggie in Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use” plays the role of being the nervous and ugly sister of the story, however she is the child with the good heart. Maggie was nervous ashamed of her scars “Maggie was nervous… she will stand hopelessly in corners, homely ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs”. Living in a house with a pretty sister and being the ugly sister with scars could be the reason why she picked up on a timid personality, being ‘ashamed’ of her own skin shaping her in a way that she degraded herself from everybody else. Maggie was not this way before the fire, her mother stated, as it is quoted that she had adopted to a certain walk ever since the fire.
Maggie is also oppressed by society and Dee, and, though to a further degree than her mother, her view of herself attacks her equality compared to the rest of the world. The subject is immediately introduced. The story begins with Maggie and her mother waiting for Dee. They waste their time in order to be available to Dee as soon as Dee
The author uses imagery as one literary device to showcase the overall theme of the story. Mama describes the burning of their house, “as she watched the last dingy gray board of the house fall in toward the red-hot brick chimney,” (Walker, 487). Walker also uses imagery to describe the other characters, “It stands up straight like the wool on a sheep, (488). In the essay, “Walker’s Everyday Use” by John Gruesser, it states, “Mama frequently describes Maggie as a docile, somewhat frightened animal, one that accepts the hand that fate has dealt her and attempts to flee any
Maggie has a very bad relationship with her bigger sister Dee with jealousy and hatred. Mama always thinks that Maggie lives an unfair life but Maggie never said that. “Maggie asked me mama when Dee ever had friends” (Walker, 317, 14), this quote shows how Maggie is jalousie from Dee, actually dee has friends. When Maggie sees stuff she doesn’t like she hides it and doesn’t talk but when she knew that Dee wanted to take the quilt that mama promised to give her she dropped the plates and smashes the kitchen door very hard.
The short story "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker is a story based on a mother and her two children, Dee and Maggie. Mama 's two children are night and day, you have the outspoken Dee and Maggie who is very meek. There are several different dynamic characters in this short story, but today I will be discussing only one, Maggie. Although we all see Maggie conveyed as a meek character throughout the story, she is clearly more than that she is the bearer of the family tradition and culture sacredness. How long ago was it the house burned?
The point of view in the story “Everyday Use,” by Alice Walker plays a big part. Throughout the story, one of Mama’s daughters came to visit. The way Mama and Maggie see her is not in a very pleasant way. In fact, they are scared to tell her no when it comes to anything. From Mama’s perspective Dee seems like this rude, stuck up, spoiled child because she had the opportunity to go out and expand her education, while Mama and Maggie continued to live their lives on the farm.
“Everyday Use” by Alice Walker Literary genius is a term thrown around often in this day and time. Many might say that the literary world has been diluted. However, if there is one who deserves that title, it is Alice Walker. It is especially so for her piece, ‘Everyday Use’. The short story was first published in 1973 as part of the author’s short story compilation.
As we read the similarities in the lives of both the daughters and Alice Walker, like Maggie after being burned, Walker was disfigured growing up and she could not see through one eye after getting shot by a BB gun (p. 2714). For this reason, Walker stays away as much as possible from society and so does Maggie because of her burns. While with Dee, which is oldest sister, compares to Walker because they make it to college and start a new life on their own away from racially separated neighborhood. (p. 2714) Maggie was just a girl who lived with her mother and not looking to have more in her life.
Everyday Use by Alice Walker, emphasizes how different socioeconomic statuses view items, through a story based on the 70’s culture of an African American family. As an illustration of this, through literary analysis, will explore Everyday Use of how, low class, middle class and upper to wealthy class views items. In order to find out, how classes affect the usage of household items. Specifically, that based on class, how it will affect the perceived appropriate use of an item.
Maggie personifies repression, having suffered “burn scars down her arms and legs” from when their old house burned down (1531). These physical scars have left her with emotional scars, turning her into a closed-off figure, afraid of her outwardly successful sister, Dee. However, it is important to take into account that this is the way Mama perceives Maggie, and not necessarily the way Maggie feels about herself. Even more significantly, this is Walker exploring the Southern Grotesque, physically damaging Maggie in order to allow Mama to hold her daughters as opposites and perhaps even to justify her ultimate confrontation with Dee. Maggie’s entire persona—from the vantage point of her mother—ultimately stems from the seemingly inflicted damage of the fire. Dee, on the other hand, is “lighter…with nicer hair and a fuller figure” (1532).
A simple powerful story of a rural family that contains a returned changed daughter leaves a family in surprise. “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker demonstrates that the theme of the story that consists different views of heritage by using literary elements like characterization, imagery, and settings. Each literary element holds a strong value to define the meaning of heritage from different perspectives of the characters. Alice Walker demonstrates it by Mama, Maggie, and Dee by how they each value their heritage by the things that they have left from their ancestors. To start of with, characterization is the highlights and explanation of the details of a character (“Definition and Examples of Literary Terms Characterization”).
Characterization in “Everyday use” In “Everyday Use” Alice Walker creates the characters of Mom, Maggie, and Dee in order to explore the appreciation and values of African American culture and what it stands for. The story grows around one daughter Dee coming back home to visit her family. As one is introduced to the characters in “Everyday Use”, it becomes noticeable that the two sisters, Maggie and Dee, are very different. Maggie is portrayed as a homely and ignorant girl, while Dee is portrayed as a beautiful and educated woman.
Walker introduces Maggie as a character who feels ashamed of her body because of the scars she has on both her legs and arms. The low self-esteem causes Maggie to show this concept through her actions, like the way she walks or stands. According to Walker’s story, the narrator describes Maggie’s actions as the following, “[…] perhaps a dog run over by some careless person rich enough to own a car, sidle up to someone who is
“Everyday Use” is one of the most popular stories by Alice Walker. The issue that this story raises is very pertinent from ‘womanist’ perspective. The term, in its broader sense, designates a culture specific form of woman-referred policy and theory. ‘womanism’ may be defined as a strand within ‘black feminism’. As against womansim, feminist movement of the day was predominately white-centric.
