Summary Of A Wall Of Fire Rising

In Edwidge Danticat's short story, A Wall of Fire Rising, living a happy life for Guy, Little Guy and Lili seems almost impossible. In Haiti, this family lives in great poverty and struggles to makes ends meet. Throughout the story Danticat focuses on Guys character and proves he is unsatisfied with the life he is living, and the situation he put his family in. With the use of textual evidence, it can be argued that Guy's death in A Wall of Fire Rising was intentional because he wanted to escape out of misery and into freedom. Guy expresses a sense of unhappiness with his life multiple times throughout the story. After Little Guy recites his lines from the play, which discuss the freedom and independence Haiti has gained, Guy says “Long live

He tries to avoid the topic and begins to become emotional because even though Haiti has gained freedom, he still feels trapped in his own life. Guy also lives a life of misery because he feels like a failure. Guy says, “I am still number seventy-eight on the permanent hire list”, explaining why he struggles to make money (Danticat 233). He does not have a permanent job and can not successfully provide for his family. Later in the short story, Guy becomes disappointed with his life when he realizes he is just like his father. Guy asked Lili “How do you think a man is judged after he's gone?” and then discovered the answer when he thought about his father and childhood. Guy says, “I know because I remember my father, who was a very poor struggling man all his life. I remember him as a man that I would never want to be” (Danticat 237). Once Guy realizes he will be remembered the same way his father

Guy will do anything to be with the balloon and doesn't stop fantasizing about flying in it. Lili says, “Don't you think about hurting yourself” and Guy replies, “Think like this. Can't you see yourself up there? Up in the clouds somewhere like some kind of bird?”(Danticat 234). Guy ignores Lilis question and proves he doesn't care if he gets hurt, he just wants to experience the hot air balloon. When Lili brings up this concern about Guy getting hurt again the next day Guy says, “Don't you ever want to be something new” (Danticat 236). Once again Guy expresses his desire to start over, but doesn't know how. I believe for Guy the hot air balloon represents freedom. He feels so strongly about flying it because he sees it as an opportunity to escape from poverty and provide a better life for his family. It seems to me, once Guy realizes his life will never drastically change the way he wants it to, he commits suicide and jumps out of the hot air balloon. He did not want to be remembered as the poor man who struggles his whole life like his father, so he proved to the town he had the potential to fly the hot air balloon. I believe once he proved his point and was recognized for being talented he saw no other reason to live and killed himself. The hot air balloon lead him to freedom and he escaped out of