Thursday, November 27, 2008
Everyday Use
I like these feel good stories. The ones where someone realizes they've been, either consciously or unconsciously, favoring the wrong choice of two people. Yaaaay mama. She had been looking at the confident, attractive, intelligent Dee as a success and at the end realizes it is Maggie who is the success. Maggie is the success because without even knowing it, it is her values that have true meaning. Awareness of the heritage of your race is good but if it comes at the price of your family heritage then noooo. Too costly and blind, in my opinion, to what is really important. That being family. When Maggie says Dee can have the quilts it is a concession. As Walker writes Maggie says it 'like somebody used to never winning anything.' However when Maggie says "I can 'member Grandma Dee without the quilts." That hit me. She is saying it is the memory of the person not the material things that matter. Yaaaay Maggie.
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Yes, now expand this a bit to the question of heritage--the various ways the story explores the meaning, value, and function of this, ant the conflicting points of view about it represented by the characters. Also, it's not just a question of memory, right, since the mother and Maggie represent not only cultural memory, but continuity, which is not to say that Dee's attitude doesn't represent another sort of continuity? You may find that the story doesn't completely resolve this issue... but this is the way of most good stories...See my comments on previous blogs as noted on the class blog hiomepage.
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