The Glass Castle has been highly awarded in the past 15 years, even being adapted into a movie. It is a memoir by Jeannette Walls about her wild life growing up. From being constantly on the run in the desert to abuse and family connection, this story resonates with me on a deep level. The positive elements in the novel remind me of my own childhood, and the negative elements parallel with my mother’s upbringing.
- Feminist: I studied the examples of assault against women as a feminist approach to The Glass Castle. Billy, the older neighbor kid, molests Jeanette as a child. As a teenager, Jeanette is sexually assaulted in a room above a roadside bar. Rex Walls frequently uses domestic violence against his wife in front of the children. Additionally, the mother teaches Jeanette that sexual assault is a crime of perception: that if she doesn’t believe she’s been hurt, she isn’t.
- Critical Race Theory: When Jeanette and her family move to West Virginia, Jeanette befriends a black girl named Dinitia. One day after school, she brings her home to play. When her grandmother and uncle meet Dinitia, they warn Jeanette of her choice of friends and worry that people will think she is a n****r lover. Even though the Walls were self-described “the poorest of all the white trash”, they still viewed black people as lesser than themselves.
- Biographical: Jeanette decided to write a memoir, instead of an autobiography of her life. This allowed her to add in details that were much more poignant and personal. Because she is still living, it also allowed her to write in detail about her childhood and upbringing instead of the birth - death as the typical biography contains. It follows a more narrow timeline that provides a closer look into what her life was really like.
- Ecocriticism: The Glass Castle describes a very unique relationship between the family and nature. Rex Walls likes to live out in the open desert, teaching his children how to rely on the land for food and shelter. The children love the openness of the desert. The mother makes Rex pull over so she can paint an exceptional joshua tree they pass. Rex “gives” each child their very own star for Christmas. When they move to West Virginia, the earth they once cherished and protected becomes a trash dump as Rex falls into deeper alcoholism and other addictions. The way the family interacts with the earth could be symbolic of their relationships with one another, falling apart with time and neglect.
I like the connection you made between the natural landscape and the relationships between family members--it seems like this is a prevalent theme throughout the book. Was the change in their relationship with nature sudden, or was it more gradual? How was the change reflected in their familial relationships?
ReplyDeleteI really liked the comparison of the familial relationships to that of the landscape! It's deterioration as almost a symbol of the family's deterioration as well. Have you considered comparing this deterioration to a typical Hero's journey? And how Jeanette seemed to cast herself as a certain hero type?
ReplyDeleteWith the ecocriticism, I think you can expand into the disabilities studies and talk about the father's mental health, how the children and their socialization could've handicapped their development, etc. From what little I know about this story, at least the father's issues could be dissected, then you could analyze how his disability shaped the children and situations they faced, or how nature was a stabilizing factor for them.
ReplyDeleteI forget that when discussing Feminism, you can also look at women and their experience with assault, rape, abuse, etc. This really brought me to rethink about what books I have read that contain this theme, and consider it as a connection to Feminism.
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