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Main Characters In Gary Soto's 'Growing Up'

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In Gary Soto’s short story ‘Growing Up,” the main character, Maria, says, “‘I know, I know. You’ve said that a hundred times,’ she snapped.” Maria is acting ungrateful because she doesn’t want to go on vacation with her family and she is arguing with her father about it instead of being grateful for what she has. Being grateful is feeling or showing an appreciation of kindness and being thankful. In the story Maria argues with her father about not wanting to go on vacation with her family and claims that she is old enough to stay home by herself. Maria is trying to grow up too fast and she put her family to the side instead of being grateful. In this story, conflict, characterization, and symbolism all have an effect on the overall theme. …show more content…

In the story it says, “ ‘I know, I know. You’ve said that a hundred times,’ she snapped. ‘What did you say?’ He asked, pushing his newspaper aside.” Maria’s conflict connects to the theme of the story because she is being ungrateful towards her father and wants to grow up too fast. In the text it also says, “Maybe he would do something crazy, like crash the car on purpose, to get back at her, or fall asleep and run the car into an irrigation ditch. And it would be her fault.” This connects to theme because, Maria needs to be thankful for her family and, she is not acting very thankful according to this quote. This conflict is another main part of the theme. As one can see, Maria is not very grateful towards her

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