The Glass Castle Poverty Quotes

It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities. This is evident in Jeannette Walls’ memoir, The Glass Castle, which reiterates the story of Jeannette who is raised within a family that is both deeply dysfunctional and distinctively vibrant. Jeannette is faced with numerous barriers throughout her life. Despite the many obstacles set forth by her parents during her childhood, Jeannette develops into a successful adult later in life. One of these obstacles is the lack of a stable home base moulds her into the woman she grows up to be. Throughout her life, Jeannette must cope with the carelessness of her

Though Jeannette gave her all to support her family, she did the same for herself without anyone’s support. She understood what it was meant to be poverty at a very young age and realised that she could not have what others did. While Jeannette didn’t have money, she was smart and resourceful to achieve whatever she could for herself. When Jeannette was young, she had already decided that if she wanted to do something for herself, she was going to have to do it herself. An example of this was when she herself to have buckteeth, and promptly said, “I decided to make my own braces,” and she did (Wall 200). In spite of Jeannette being underprivilaged and with less money, she found ways time and time again to succeed.

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.

Earlier this year, I read Jeanette Walls’ memoir The Glass Castle. The Glass Castle tells the story of Walls and her siblings as they experience and attempt to escape the poverty-stricken lives of their parents. In her descriptions of her life and the lives of her family members, Walls influenced my ideas about poverty, homelessness, and escaping hard lives.

“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.

This quote leads me to believe the father will be leaving in the future and I think Jeannette knows this too so she tries to take care of the family more and more. Some clues that I have picked up on in the text that makes

Jeannette Walls, the author of The Glass Castle, integrates multiple themes to capture the conflict she experienced during her troubled childhood. It takes us along with Jeannette trying to overcome some of her most troubling childhood memories; memories such as her father teaching her how to swim, her mother condoning Jeanette’s uncle’s inappropriate treatment of her daughter, and Rex’s recurring outbursts, shapes Jeannette and her siblings. Jeannette focuses on themes such parents must be responsible and negligence leads to more problems, which we focused on in our trailer to accurately represent her memoir.

Hardships are terrible, but they are a normal part of everybody’s life. No matter the hardship, anybody can recover. In her memoir, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls tells a true story of her unconventional childhood. She journeys the readers through her nomadic and dysfunctional family lifestyle. Her parents—the artistic, inattentive Rose Mary and the intelligent, alcoholic Rex—neglect their children and fail to provide for them adequately. Walls learns how to care for herself at an early age. Growing up in such a dysfunctional family, it would be no surprise if Walls would have turned out just as wrecked as her parents, but Walls was able to rise above and accomplish a successful life. It is through the sharing of her own personal success, that Wall’s demonstrates you don’t have to be a product of your circumstances you can shape your own future.

Rex Walls and his wife didn’t live a normal lifestyle, hopping from town to town and having odd jobs to barely get by. Jeannette Walls recounts her father as having the essence of cigarettes, whisky, and hair tonic (Walls). Even so, The Glass Castle is filled with Jeannette’s prized memories with her father. In spite of the feeling of self-doubt, Jeannette still loves her father unconditionally. Rex always inspired the author, and made her feel special. He tries a few times to turn his life around by going sober, but it never lasts long. The characteristic of Rex Walls are developed throughout his childhood, which impacts how he thinks and acts.

This is exemplified in pages 127-130 where Jeannette and her dad go to gamble and Rex risk Jeannette’s safety. When Rex was gambling with Robbie, Robbie ended up losing all of his money, he felt entitled to something in return which was Jeannette. As he tried to take her upstairs Rex said “Sure, Just don't do anything I wouldn't do. Holler if you need me," he said and winked at me as if to say he knew I could take care of myself, that this was just a part of my job”(Walls). Jeannette felt like it was her job to do what Robbie wanted. Even though nothing really happened between Jeannette and Robbie, Rex put her in a situation that she wasn’t comfortable about for money and alcohol. As stated in the text “The next evening Dad disappeared”(Jeannette). Rex had taken the money and got drunk, he got mad at Jeannette because she didn’t tag

In the memoir by Jeannette Walls, “The Glass Castle”, the author shares the bittersweet and slightly humorous story of her dysfunctional family and destitute upbringing. Walls grows up with a family that is always on the move and stricken by hunger. In the memoir, Walls writes about her memories of moving from one place to another with her eccentric mother, her alcoholic but intelligent father, and her three other siblings. Walls used language that was quickly understood to describe the happenings in the book. When I read the part where Rex brought Jeannette to a roadside bar so that he could earn the money that he owed her, I felt so disgusted and angry at the father.

Jeanette Walls memoir, the Glass Castle, illustrates Jeanette’s unusual childhood caused by constant poverty and chaos of her dysfunctional parents. This memoir teaches you to be thankful for what you have and to never give up no matter how hard things get. The Glass Castle tells a childhood story full of growing up with irresponsible parents, moving non-stop, and living in poverty. Jeannette and her siblings had to deal with situations that no one should have to go through.

Jeannette is at the point in her life where she’s grown up enough to look back at her life and realize that some of the experiences she had as a child were actually scarring and dangerous and the severity of those situations were masked by her adoration for her father who she realized as she grew wasn’t everything that she thought. Still Jeannette could never hate her father as she illustrates in this quote, “As awful as he could be, I always knew he loved me in a way no one else ever had.” This quote also shows that Rex always making Jeanette feel special and always encouraging her had a profound effect on her. Jeannette definitely took notice of the way Rex held her self-worth in high regards to his own feeling of fulfillment. This exchange is especially important because there was no one else that Jeannette could have this closure with about her childhood because there was no one else that for her was at the heart of the chaos in

In Jeannette Walls’ The Glass Castle Rex is shown as an unfit, alcoholic father. Rex has many events portraying him to be stubborn and immature that make him an unacceptable father. His alcoholism has a negative effect on his social behavior towards his family and others. He constantly struggles financially and can never keep a stable environment for his family. Although Rex can be a adventurous and caring father, the author reveals him to be stubborn and immature.

Jeannette, realizing that her father is dying, reflects about him with great affection, praising him with long and sentimental sentences but in her last moments with him (before Rex has a heart attack) there is a change in syntax, and as she leaves his makeshift apartment she, “...just smiled. And then [she] closed the door” (279). By employing short sentences, Walls is able to show that she has matured and come to realize the truths about her father, seeming detached and