Character Analysis Of Alice Walker, Flannery O Connor,...

The importance of family is not something that we can argue. Our relationships with parents, children, and siblings or the lack of such relationships have a huge impact on our lives. Similarly for literary characters, which authors present as either to have â€Å"normal† or â€Å"abnormal† relationships. Three authors whose writing published in the 20th century focuses on family as a central theme are Alice Walker, Flannery O’Connor, and Raymond Carver. A commonality between all three stories is the emphasize on the role of women within the family unit. All three short stories use different elements such as characterization, conflict, plot, symbolism and tone, but while Alice Walker and Raymond Carver present â€Å"normal† family relationships, Flannery†¦show more content†¦In the story, a family heirloom becomes a conflict because while Dee wants to take the quilt to decorate her home, Maggie would make better use of the quilts by using them inst ead of framing them. This quilt that has been passed down from generation to generation, is symbolic of the love that both the older generations and the present generation has for each other. The quilt also symbolizes the strength of the family and the stitching is symbolic of the bonds that hold a family together. Mama ultimately decides that the quilt will go to Maggie because Dee does not understand the practicality of the quilt which is that they were from pieces of clothes that were lived in, which represented their past. Alice Walker was also emphasizing that it is the woman in the family that have held and currently hold families together by depicting closeness of the female relationships. The family that Walker portrays fits into a greater society, especially through the character of Dee, who is getting an education and has returned home. As a young African American woman she is ashamed of her past because she no longer identifies with the name her mother gave her, a name that was passed down from one generation to the next. When education is supposed to help you understand your history, it sometimes creates barriers between parents and children. In Dee’s case education separated her from her family and from who she was. Alice Walker utilizes Dee’s internal dilemma to capture a