The short story, “The Metaphor,” by Budge Wilson is the story of Charlotte and her personal growth through her relationship with her teacher Miss Hancock. Charlotte enjoyed Miss Hancock’s class in 7th grade and was actively engaged in the class, especially when it came to the use of metaphors. As Charlotte grew older she happened to again have Miss Hancock as a teacher in 10th grade, she then felt too mature for her teaching method and distanced herself. In the climax Miss Hancock died and Charlotte’s mother lacked any sympathy, Charlotte then had an epiphany and knew that what matters is personality not social standards or external beauty. Through the use of detail, symbolism, and metaphor, Wilson creates a quality coming of age story that shows the importance of inner beauty through the transformation of Charlotte. The story began with a detailed description of Miss Hancock, this detail showed the focus on external beauty that Charlotte had early in life. The description mentioned features such as, “ Miss Hancock was plump, and unmarried and over-enthusiastic… loose threads… Like a heavy bird.”(p. 9) The clear …show more content…
This pressure caused Charlotte to be corrupted into having poor morals and a lack of sympathy for her teacher. Charlotte’s mother is a symbol for society and the pressures to act a certain way even if that way is clearly wrong. A good example is after the death of Miss Hancock, Charlotte’s mother was cruel to Charlotte and she now realized that her mother had pressured her into not looking into the inner beauty that her teacher possessed. This situation is very common with societal pressures to behave a certain way, people are shamed for acting like themselves if it doesn’t follow society's standards. Wilson used symbolism to express the difficulty of being a child and trying to be an individual while at the same time being influenced and pressured by