Friday, April 6, 2012
[insert catchy title here]
Sorry, but running on a time restraint today! I had started to see a connection earlier in this book between the mothering styles of Beli and Edna from The Awakening. let's be honest, both of them were bad mothers. As much as I hated Edna though, I found Beli to be even more horrid of a person and mother. I can sympathize with the fact that Beli had a rough childhood. Anyone who could survive everything that Beli went through during her "dark years" deserves a little sympathy. The fact that she "never thought about that life again. Embraced the amnesia...embraced the power of the Untilles. And from it forged herself anew" (258-259) is commendable. It does not, however, negate the fact that as a mother she was entirely useless. I can understand that when all a person knows is pain and hatred that it is hard to show love, but there is only so much physical and mental abuse that anyone, let alone your own children, can take before they distance themselves from that person. Not even saying "Just know that I would die for you" (72) was enough for Lola to want to have a closer relationship with Beli. At least with Edna, her children were not put through the wash-cycle of abuse that Beli put Lola and Oscar through. I still think that when a person goes through a life as tragic as Beli did that it is no wonder that her psyche would be turned upside down. I believe that if Beli lived in a time and place where she could have talked with someone about her past openly and freely, her life and her children's may have taken a different turn. What do you all think?
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I agree completely that both are terrible mothers. However, I also believe that, for the most part, both characters create their own tragedies. (They're both entirely selfish as well.) However, while Edna does not have an exact excuse for her careless actions, you are right when saying that Beli's childhood does present the reader a means to somewhat see past her wrongdoings. With that in mind, I like her more than I do Edna, which is quite the stretch.
ReplyDeleteI agree Ben, i think that both women are causing a lot of their own problems, and as bad as this is, i like Beli better than Edna. I suppose i think that Beli is stronger than Edna to go through as much as she did and come out alive.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Kyla here, I do like Beli a lot more than Edna. I think even though most of us can say we are Beli haters as well as Edna haters, I think a few of us would rather say aloud that we like Beli rather than say we like Edna. As Ben said, Edna did not have an 'exact excuse' for her careless actions while in turn, we can see that Beli technically does.
ReplyDeleteEverything you say about how Beli should treat her children (there is only so much a person can take, etc.) can (and should!) be applied to Beli herself. Isn't it unrealistic to expect her to come out of her painful past and be a terrific mother?
ReplyDeleteAnd was she really "useless"? Both kids go to college. Lola turns out okay. Even Oscar has "brief" and "wondrous" life--in part because she fought to give it to him.
I mean, someone please cut this woman a break. I worry that the class's hate of her is verging on misogyny--or at least unfair expectations of what a mother "should" do.