Fire Motif In The Glass Castle By Jeannette Walls

In the novel, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, the author uses the fire motif to assert that attempts to control the uncontrollable will leave scars. For example, when cooking hot dogs Jeannette “Watched the yellow-white flames make a ragged brown line up the pink fabric on my skirt and climb my stomach”(11). The fire grows bigger and bigger with Jeannette stunned until Rose Mary puts it out showing that Jeannette is not scared of fire but in awe of it leaving her in a state of shock. Although because of this Jeannette will carry scars wherever she goes reminding her of what happened when she tried to control fire. After Jeannette asks herself about her experience with fire she thinks “I didn’t have the answers to those questions, but I did know that I lived in a world that at any moment could erupt into fire”(34).

She is in the grasp of her problem-inducing parents and will not know when another fight will break loose. She will live with a paranoia of constant fires and outbreaks prompting her to deal with her situation. After Rex burned the tree and presents “No one tried to wring Dad’s neck or yell at him or even point out that he’d ruined the Christmas his family had spent weeks planning”(115). The Walls bite the urge to speak out because they know that it will only add fuel to the fire and result in an even greater reaction. Because when Rex is drunk he is an uncontrollable beast with no boundaries like fire. And even though Brian emptied the remaining supply of beer bottles to keep Rex sober for Christmas they instead were left with a painful memory of what would have been the best Christmas they had ever