Loss Of Innocence In The Flowers

Death will eventually affect everyone, but the significance of death is the influential factors that follow. Death can be an exceptional or dreadful event, in the short story “The Flowers” Myop grows through death. Myop is characterized as an innocent, ecstatic little girl, unfortunately her family is sharecroppers. In spite of this she often times spends her days collecting flowers with her mother. Surprisingly, one day she decides to go off by herself and ends up discovering the body of a hung man. Myop is then shocked by this discovery as she drops all of her flowers which is a symbol for her loss of innocence. In this case it is important to realize that the discovery of the body was good thing, this is because it gives Myop immense personal

Especially since Myop lived during a time where African Americans were subject to immense racism and bigotry. This is proven through the author’s writing of what Myop’s family farmed, “The harvesting of the corn and cotton, peanuts and squash”(Walker 5). Farming multiple crops on one farm is known as sharecropping which primarily happened after the Civil War. Furthermore white landowners would inundate black farmers with an immense amount of debt. In addition one can assume Myop’s family is unfortunately apart of this sad event. Not only will her family face many hardships later on in life her going through this experience of seeing the real world through sight of a body helps to substantiate her overall character. Not only did Myop lose her innocence upon discovery of the body but this event can prove to help her. Coupled with the fact that Myop is a young African american living through forlorn times. She needs to have some sort of growth for her to be able to sustain herself. When Myop finally ventured onto the body the author writes “Myop laid down her flowers”(Walker 5). Myop laying down her flowers symbolizes her loss of innocence, but that loss of innocence has served a greater good. That good being her personal growth, it is ultimately better for her to mature then for her to remain an innocent