Symbolism In The Storm And Eudora Welty's A Worn Path

The setting of a story is often overlook and thought to be a less important when it comes to the overall message and plot of the story. The place, time, or geographical location has a great impact on the theme, mood, tone, and the central conflict. The setting can also foreshadow events, affect dialogue, and characters actions. In our everyday life we make numerous amounts of decisions or action s that are dependent of our location. In a library an action of reading a book may take place, but in a grocery store, picking out food may be done. This is the sole reason why the setting of a story is so important. In Kate Chopin’s “The Storm” and Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path” the setting lays the foundation for the conflict and resolution presented

Many people look at life as a path and that is exactly what Welty used that to represent Phoenix Jackson’s life. Phoenix was faced with various obstacles on her journey. Her dress is caught on a thorn bush, she must cross a creek where a log has fallen, crawl under barbed-wire, and maneuver though cotton and old corn fields (Welty 264-265). While these are obstacles that are dependent on the setting it is also a figurative meaning for the lives of African Americans during the period in American history. When Phoenix falls in the whole and the hunter comes along and helps her out it allows the reader to see a snip it of what it was like for a white male and black female to interact with each other. At first it seemed as if the hunter was trying to be nice and just help an old negro woman, but we soon find out that that is not the case when he pulls out a gun and points it at Phoenix. Phoenix is not frightened and continues her journey (Welty 467). The hunter displays how whites acted and felt towards blacks in this period. Last is that the path and obstacles show how a simple task like going to the doctors can enforce a great deal of conflict to someone who is not looked at as equal or important in