Writing A Prompt and Answering

For this weeks assignment we were told to choose a reading or passage and write our own prompt and answer it. I chose a passage from a longer story from my author Alice Munro, the excerpt is from boys and girls, here is the small passage I took from it as well as the prompt:



The following passage is from the short story Boys and Girls by Alice Munro. Read the passage carefully. Then, in a well-organized essay, analyze how the author reveals the relationship between the speaker and her mother. In your analysis, you may wish to consider such literary elements as imagery, tone, and diction.


    It was an odd thing to see my mother down at the barn. She did not often come out of the house unless it was to do something – hang out the wash or dig potatoes in the garden. She looked out of place, with her bare lumpy legs, not touched by the sun, her apron still on and damp across the stomach from the supper dishes. Her hair was tied up in a kerchief, wisps of it falling out. She would tie her hair up like this in the morning, saying she did not have time to do it properly, and it would stay tied up all day. It was true, too; she really did not have time. These days our back porch was piled with baskets of peaches and grapes and pears, bought in town, and onions and tomatoes and cucumbers grown at home, all waiting to be made into jelly and jam and preserves, pickles and chilli sauce. In the kitchen there was a fire in the stove all day, jars clinked in boiling water, sometimes a cheesecloth bag was strung on a pole between two chairs straining blue-back grape pulp for jelly. I was given jobs to do and I would sit at the table peeling peaches that had been soaked in hot water, or cutting up onions, my eyes smarting and streaming. As soon as I was done I ran out of the house, trying to get out of earshot before my mother thought of what she wanted me to do next. I hated the hot dark kitchen in summer, the green blinds and the flypapers, the same old oilcloth table and wavy mirror and bumpy linoleum. My mother was too tired and preoccupied to talk to me, she had no heart to tell about the Normal School Graduation Dance; sweat trickled over her face and she was always counting under breath, pointing at jars, dumping cups of sugar. It seemed to me that work in the house was endless, dreary, and peculiarly depressing; work done out of doors, and in my father's service, was ritualistically important. 

    I wheeled the tank up to the barn, where it was kept, and I heard my mother saying, "Wait till Laird gets a little bigger, then you'll have a real help." 

    What my father said I did not hear. I was pleased by the way he stood listening, politely as he would to a salesman or a stranger, but with an air of wanting to get on with his real work.

I felt my mother had no business down here and I wanted him to feel the same way. What did she mean about Laird? He was no help to anybody. Where was he now? Swinging himself sick on the swing, going around in circles, or trying to catch caterpillars. He never once stayed with me till I was finished. 

    "And then I can use her more in the house," I heard my mother say. She had a dead-quiet regretful way of talking about me that always made me uneasy. "I just get my back turned and she runs off. It's not like I had a girl in the family at all." 

    I went and sat on a feed bag in the corner of the barn, not wanting to appear when this conversation was going on. My mother, I felt, was not to be trusted. She was kinder than my father and more easily fooled, but you could not depend on her, and the real reasons for the things she said and did were not to be known. She loved me, and she sat up late at night making a dress of the difficult style I wanted, for me to wear when school started, but she was also my enemy. She was always plotting. She was plotting now to get me to stay in the house more, although she knew I hated it (because she knew I hated it) and keep me from working for my father. It seemed to me she would do this simply out of perversity, and to try her power. It did not occur to me that she could be lonely, or jealous. No grown-up could be; they were too fortunate. I sat and kicked my heels monotonously against a feed bag, raising dust, and did not come out till she was gone. 


Now here is my response to the prompt I wrote to the above passage:

In the passage from Boys and Girls the speaker focuses on the descriptions and action of her mother. Though the two characters relationship is not kindled, they still play important roles in each others lives. The speaker spends an entire paragraph describing her mothers past and present actions, showing how important her mother is to her and how her actions directly affect the feelings of her daughter. In Alice Munro's piece Boys and Girls the speaker explains to the reader her mother as well as their connection, revealing through imagery, tone, and diction that they are entirely different and do not get along well.

In this excerpt the main focus in the first paragraph is that of the mothers description. According to the daughter, the mother is very hardworking and adaptive to work in different locations. As a reader we are told, " she did not often come out of the house unless it was to do something" indicating that she is more the average women stereotype of working in the home. But in the setting of the passage the mother was down at the barn, and the speaker describes this as an "odd thing." The mother is adapting herself to new places, and with that she is forcing her daughter to do the indoor work that her mother is now missing out on. Now this is what sets up a conflict between the two characters, overall setting up a tone for the rest of the descriptions of her mother. The speaker reveals one of her actions, "As soon as I was done I ran out of the house, trying to get out of earshot before my mother thought of what she wanted me to do next." The tone started to become resentful, as she resented the tasks her mother gave her. Her mother wished for her to be like her a home worker, but she longed for outdoor work like her father, and with this conflict the speaker had no other feeling but resentment towards what her mother wished of her.

Though the tone in this piece be that of resentment, the speaker has a sense of admiration for her mother with her close attention to her detailed life. Her resentment made her stand up for her mother. She hated that her mother did out of the ordinary work with her father, she felt "my mother had no business down here and I wanted him to feel the same way." Her resentment or jealously towards her mother doing the desired work shows how she admires what she does indoors, and cares for the best in her mother. The vivid imagery the speaker delivers consists of negative shots toward her mother, showing that she pays attention to her very closely. Such as "my mother, I felt, was not to be trusted," "but she was also my enemy," and "she looked out of place, with her bare lumpy legs." Their connection was obviously not an easy to communicate type of relationship. They had their differences, but it's not that she was a daughter full of hatred, instead a loose admiration that she'd never share with her mother. The mother and daughter both wish for a more connected relationship based on the details the speaker shares and feels about her mother.

A huge reason the relationship between the two characters is hard to uncover is because of the diction choices used. The speaker is very clear with not saying that she hates her mother, because that's not how their relationship is. Instead she says, "my mother was too tired and preoccupied to talk to me, she had no heart." It's not that she hates her mother, it's that she dislikes how her mother doesn't take time for her, or forces work on her. She describes her mother negatively because she doesn't wish to be anything like her mother, she wants to build her own reputation and be more like her father.

After reading, I feel that she doesn't have a great relationship with either parent. The passage doesn't focus or speak much of her father, but talks primarily about the mother figure. It can be assumed from the imagery, tone, and diction that the speaker has a more difficult time getting along and communicating with her mother, based on the lack of description on her and her fathers relationship.

That is it for this weeks blog. I know it is not the best of all essays, but I tried to only spend an hour all together writing it so it would feel more like preparation for the AP test. I feel I did well at trying not to do a summary of the piece, I feel like that's one of my biggest downfalls.