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Symbolism Of Bedrooms In Anderson's Speak

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Bedrooms are a repeated symbol used in Anderson’s Speak that expresses the struggles with establishing identity. An early example of symbolism involving bedrooms occurs when Melinda criticizes her room for not matching her personality. Just after Melinda rushes up to her room, she is reminded of how out of place and strange her bedroom is. Melinda thinks, “My room belongs to an alien. It is a postcard of who I was in fifth grade. … My room was stuck in the middle, a bit stolen from everyone else. The only things that were really mine were my stuffed-rabbit collection from when I was a little kid and my canopy bed.” (Anderson 15-16). Using words like alien, stolen, and everyone else, Anderson’s diction shows that Melinda is uncomfortable with …show more content…

Constructing an identity is a complicated task that takes time, diligence and effort to accomplish. Anderson later uses bedrooms again to emphasize that many people struggle with establishing their identity, not just Melinda. While Melinda is inside of Heather’s room, she believes that the bedroom is a perfect fit for Heather’s identity. Anderson writes, “ All her clothes wait patiently, organized by type--skirts together, pants hanging by their cuffs, her sweaters stacked in plastic bags on shelves. The room screams Heather” (Anderson 33). Shortly afterwards, Melinda finds out that Heather is also having the same issue with crafting her identity; the perfect room is a false perception of Heather. Anderson writes, “ She pushes her books to the floor and knocks the green nail polish on the sand colored carpet. ‘Why is it so hard to make friends here? Is there something in the water? In my old school I could have gone out for the musical and worked on the newspaper and chaired the car wash. Here people don’t even know I exist.’ … She flops on her bed and bursts into sobs.” (Anderson 34). Heather’s room and personality look perfect on the outside, Heather's true self is shown when she

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Joyce Carol Oates’s story, “Where Is Here?” is the haunting tale of a family who receives a strange visitor who tours their home claiming to have lived there as a child. The work is incredibly elusive, leaving the reader with many questions by not naming the characters and mentioning many characters that are never seen. Oates leaves her audience in the dark with this work, but she does give them a few clues as to what is really going on. When the visitor first appears, Oates writes “He had not seen the house since January 1949… he thought of it often, dreamed of it often, never more powerfully than in recent months.”

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Symbolism is the practice of representing things by symbols, or of investing things with a symbolic meaning or character. In Speak, Laurie Halse Anderson uses literary devices to help the reader better understand Melinda’s personal changes and growth. Trees, lips, and coldness are all symbolically used to represent the changes of Melinda. Throughout the novel, trees play a big part in symbolizing Melinda. Melinda is constantly drawing and relating to trees in the book.

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Lenny Abrahamson’s drama film Room follows Joy and her five-year-old son Jack and their experiences of living in a tiny room with only so much space. Throughout the film, both aspects of low-key lighting and high-key lighting are filmed in various scenes. These lighting styles indicate both the rough and unstable atmosphere of living in just one small room as well as the freedom of escaping the small room and starting a new chapter in their lives. In addition, both lighting styles also play an important role in the film’s plot and set the mood for the plot by either adding suspense or relief. Room narrates the story of Joy and her son Jack’s lives as they are trapped in a very small shelter that they refer to as Room.

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The main conflict the narrator encounters is being torn between reality, which is the world outside the room, and understanding herself. Jane establishes the room as a shield. The narrator refuses to acknowledge everything outside, like her relationship and child, and constructs a safety zone. Her restriction for writing, placed by her husband, also inhibits her imagination. In contrast, her rebellion in both writing and fantasizing further her descent into madness.

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