The Glass Castle

Maureen is often forgotten throughout the entire story of The Glass Castle written by Jeannette Walls. We are very tragically reminded of Maureen’s presence when she stabs her own mother while living in New York. Reflecting back to the beginning of the story, we can see why Maureen has a mental breakdown. She is born into a world of violence, her parents fail to care for her, and she lives her entire childhood in neglect.

American journalist, writer, and magazine editor David Remnick once said, “The world is a crazy, beautiful, ugly complicated place, and it keeps moving on from crisis to strangeness to beauty to weirdness to tragedy.” In the memoir, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls the main character and author of the book tells of her crazy and adventurous life she experienced with her not so ordinary family. This quote relates to The Glass Castle, because like it states, life is full of both tragedies and beauty which is exactly what Jeannette experienced growing up with her free spirited and non-conformative parents. Walls is able to express her main purpose of the book that life is a mix of good and bad times through imagery, tone, and pathos.

Everyone has some kind of hope for the future, something that they want to achieve or experience. “The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls, is the real life story of Jeannette growing up in poverty and her experiences as a child. Jeannette’s father was an alcoholic man, he was very irresponsible when it came to taking care of his children. Rex still managed to keep an emotional connection with his children, and this helped shape the Walls kids into who they became and kept their family together. Throughout Jeanette's childhood, she was always moving from place to place, and was constantly struggling to keep her family together. Throughout the book, “The Glass Castle” was mentioned a multitude of times. “The Glass Castle” was representative

Think back to your own childhood. Could you imagine being a child, and not having a care in the world, but then, as quick as the snap of a finger, that all changes because of a thoughtless mistake made by your parents? In The Glass Castle it is revealed that as Jeannette grew up, she endured hardships inflicted upon her by her own parents. However, if Jeannette had not gone through these things, she never would have gained the characteristics that she values present day. Although Jeannette Walls faced hardships and endured suffering during her childhood, these obstacles formed her into a self-reliant woman who proves that just because you do not have as much money as other families, you can still achieve success in your life.

People often fall into some sticky situations, but how they deal with them is the thing that matters most. In The Glass Castle, a memoir by Jeannette Walls, she takes the readers through her life, starting at her earliest memory as a three-year-old, constantly living in a state of homelessness. Throughout the story, Walls experiences countless situations from her father being an alcoholic, to everyday school bullies. She uses a series of coping mechanisms to deal with, and sometimes terminate these issues. In fact, everyone of her siblings and parents uses various coping methods for these same situations. These methods may not always be the most effective, but people, including the Walls family, nevertheless use them to get by on their

5. “I survived, but it’s not a happy ending. I was a coward. I went to war.” (61)

In the same fashion, dealing with Maureen Walls, the youngest child of the Walls family, had to rely on her friends and people she hardly knew to provide for her. This situation went as far as Maureen going to her friend’s house to eat meals and

1. “I’ll just tell you about this madman stuff that happened to me around last Christmas just before I got pretty run-down and had to come out here and take it easy.”

“I’m thankful for my struggles because without it I wouldn’t have stumbled across my strength.” Through the eyes of Alex Elle you first must struggle in order to find your true strengths. An obstacle that most of us deal with throughout our lives. Some, more extreme than the other, regardless having the power to lift us as humans or tear us down. These crossroads are formed at different points and for different reasons in each person's life, nevertheless morphing them into the people they will soon become. Along with struggle comes forgiveness. Allowing yourself to let go of the things that cause you the pain and struggle in order to move on. Giving yourself the opportunity to wipe your slate clean and start fresh. Throughout Flight,

With parents like these, succumbing to anger and revenge proves understandable, but instead the author bypasses all of this. Although her childhood is surrounded by less than inspiring figures her optimism allows her to make something of her life. Wall's even ends up maintaining excellent grades and

In the memoir, “The Glass Castle”, there were characters that desired freedom from the rules of society while the others however, wished for a normal life that had the happiness and security that they wanted. A normal life would be having a decent home, going to school everyday, parents with stable jobs, bills paid and at least three meals a day. The Walls Family didn’t have a normal life, in fact they always traveled from place to place because they couldn’t pay their bills, the children were home tutored by their parents (although later on they go to school) and worst of all, the Walls would starve going many days without food. For every child, it’s important that they have a sense of freedom by being able to do what they want while they’re still young. Then again, children should also feel like they’re secured, protected and safe from everything. Although if I were to choose which is more important for children, I would say security is more important .

“Life with your father was never boring.” – Rose Mary Walls. Rose Mary Walls, Jeannette Walls’s mother and Rex Walls’s spouse, reminisces life with Rex, which included migrating frequently, refusing to conform, and advocating self-sufficiency. Despite Rose Mary finding Rex disdainful at times, she still believes that being with Rex was an adventure. In Jeannette Walls’s The Glass Castle, Walls reveals that there are turbulence and order in life, the influence of family, and how she develops as she grows up through Walls’s recollection of her life, from living in a nomadic household, where her parents neglect their children, to living in a squalid hovel with no plumbing, and finally living in New York City, where she is employed as a journalist.

As I read the Glass Castle, the way Rose Mary behaves, thinks and feels vary greatly and differently throughout the memoir. The immediate question that pops up in my mind is to ask whether Rose Mary carries some sort of mental illness. Fortunately, given the hints and traits that are relevant to why Rose Mary lives like that in the memoir, we, the readers, are able to make some diagnosis and assumptions on the kind of mental illness she may carry. To illustrate, one distinctive example is when Rose Mary blames Jeannette for having the idea to accept welfare. “Once you go on welfare, it changes you. Even if you get off welfare, you never escape the stigma that you were a charity case.” (188). In my opinion, Rose Mary is being nonsense and

The glass walls at the new Laramie High School have employees and students at differing opinions, from decoration to a more effective reason.

5. On the bus, he describes it to two or three friends saying Miss Narwin hates him; that is all, but it’s more than that.