Love And Cruelty In James Hurst's The Scarlet Ibis

Within brothers, there is a scale with love on one side and hate on the other balancing forever. In The Scarlet Ibis by James Hurst, Brother and Doodle fight through both mental and physical disabilities. The two brothers use love to push forward until hate eventually drives a wedge between them. Love and Hate two of the most influential emotions coursing through a human’s mind can build and destroy relationships.

In “The Scarlet Ibis,” love and pride war in Brother's motivations to help Doodle; his love encourages kindness, but his shame at Doodle's failings results in the cruelty that kills the younger boy. “It is,” I said. “And before I’ll help you down from the loft, you’re going to have to touch it.”

He leaves Doodle in the rain to taunt him. He runs back when he sees that Doodle is no longer in sight, finding his dead body. Crouching over him, Brother tells the reader, “I began to weep… ‘Doodle!’ I screamed above the pounding storm and threw my body to the earth above his. For a long time, it seemed forever” (12). The storm is “pounding”, meaning it is powerful and hurtful. Brother shields Doodle from this, attempting to shield him from the death that has already occurred. Brother finally wants to protect his brother from harm. He regrets the hateful acts he forced upon Doodle. He says this moment feels like it is “forever.” He feels time move slowly because he is miserable, and his misery seems to never end. After being hateful, then guilty, he has become remorseful and regrets his

Brother decides to help Doodle learn how to walk. He helps him be a “normal brother” by teaching him how to swim, walk, run, and etc. When Doodle dies, Brother shields his body from the rain. He cries when Doodle dies.

In fact, Doodle’s death is caused by his own brother’s selfishness. Near the resolution of the story, Doodle fails to complete Brother’s training program and collapses into the mud. Brother declares, “ He had failed and we both knew it, so we started back home, racing the storm. We never spoke, but I knew he was watching me, watching for a sign of mercy” (182). The narrator ignores Doodle’s plead for forgiveness and begins to sprint.

At first Doodle’s brother becomes angered that the plans to teach Doodle failed, then, in his rage, he leaves Doodle behind during the storm. Doodle’s death comes to his brother in full force, making him extremely sorrowful. A second instance in which cruelty is brought to light through the narrator occurs when Doodle is forced to touch his coffin. Many older brothers pick on their younger siblings, but as seen in this scene, Doodle’s brother takes cruelty to a whole new level.

The storm shows the escalation of the story and Doodles life, as the narrator continues to push Doodle to his limits. “The sun disappeared and the darkness descended, almost like the night.” (425) While the storm begins to move in, the brothers anger and rage begins to move in also, because he is not wanting to accept the defeat of their goals of summer.” When he stepped on to the skiff he collapsed” (425) As the storm moves in we can see Doodle getting weaker, because of the brother pushing him past the point of no return. As the storm moves closer and closer to the brothers they begin to go back to their home. Doodle is extraordinarily scared of the storm, therefor he stays closer to the narrator while they walk. The narrator walks faster therefore Doodle has to keep up with him. Then his brother begins to run through the storm which causes Doodle to become “uncoordinated,” and the narrator leaves Doodle behind in the storm. Then the storm stops.”The flood of childish spite evanesced as well”(425) when we see the storm stop, we see the brother come back to his sinces and become perturbed about Doodle. When in the storm we see Doodles life coming to an end.The brother sees a bolt of lightning shatter a gum tree,which could also be compared to his

Guilt, a word with some very negative connotations. Things that immediately come to mind may be simple mistakes on an essay, or an eternal grief that you must bear. The narrator in “The Scarlet Ibis” feels an immense guilt for his poor decisions. In James Hurst’s “The Scarlet Ibis” readers learn the dangers of guilt through one man’s tragic loss of his handicapped brother, even after he watched him grow up to defy doctors’ predictions by walking, talking all on his own.

Symbolism is used in literature as a visual representation of something invisible, which provides deeper meaning to the writing beyond what is being described. In “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst, various examples of symbolism are incorporated into the story. The plot and action that take place in the excerpt can be thought of as one level, while the symbolism of certain things in the writing act on another level to enhance the story. Birds are of extreme symbolic importance within the narrative, and encourage a reader to think below the surface of the text.

The dangers of cruelty in life ultimately overpower emotions and decisions of higher quality. Difficult decisions are made daily, and the compelling idea of satisfaction leads people to make choices for the sake of themselves. The emotions that potentially can happen because of those decisions are captivating, resulting in cruel outcomes. An author that portrays this idea through a character is James Hurst. In his work, “The Scarlet Ibis”, Hurst develops a relationship between two brothers using the idea that cruelty ultimately overpowers love. The brothers, Doodle and Brother, experience events that cause them to make valued memories, but also break close bonds. Through these experiences, Brother begins to accept his disabled brother, Doodle, for his limitations. Doodle has to be extremely cautious due to his disability, never letting an emotion or feeling become too strong. Some events lead Brother to show affection towards Doodle, but others prompt him to do just the opposite. Hurst uses Old Woman Swamp and the coffin as symbols in, “The Scarlet Ibis”, to assist in demonstrating the highs and lows of Brother and Doodle’s volatile relationship.

It is impossible to find a family that is problem free and does not go through its ups and downs. Seasons often marks a progress, here it not only sets the way for Doodles progress of becoming like a normal boy, but it is used as a way to show the growth of the sibling relationship between the two brothers. Seasons and weather play an important role in setting the tone and mood of the story. An example of the motif of seasons and weather is seen in the short story “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst as doodles progress goes along with each season. This motif is used to develop the relationship between Doodle and his brother as evident through the clove of seasons, summer, and storms.

How far would you take your ‘love’ for someone? Would you kill them? Would you work them till they turn black and blue, or make them touch their own casket just to punish or scare them? Brother seemed to have no limits for Doodle, in “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst. In this short story, Hurst showed the relationship between a crippled child and his older, forceful brother. Brother pushed Doodle to his maximum, trying to get him to walk, swim, run, and become a ‘normal’ child. Yet, becuase of his embarassment, Brother took his training to great lengths, killing Doodle in the end. This passage uses several important literary devices that advance the story, such as help the readers gain a better meaning of the symbols and what Hurst is trying to convey.

A heavy, dreadful storm came that evening. As Doodle and Brother run back home, Brother runs ahead not bothering to look back because of anger and frustration of wanting Doodle to be normal and dependent on his own. When he calms down, he looks back to see Doodle but sees no sign of him. He heads back searching for Doodle, suddenly seeing him curled up a bush and says, "Let's go, Doodle". Brother approaches him finding him bleeding from the mouth with no response. Realizing he had lost his little doodlebug because of shame and guilt of wanting a normal brother. Brother crying, puts his body over Doodle trying to protect his brother from the

Hurst utilizes foreshadowing to demonstrate how the brother’s selfishness and pride leads to the death of Doodle. Not long after Doodle was born, the mother explains to the brother that Doodle might be mentally handicapped as well as physically handicapped. The brother could not accept the fact that his brother is different, so he “began to make plans to kill him [Doodle] by smothering him in his sleep” (Hurst 1). From the very beginning, Doodle’s brother is unable to except the fact that his brother is not normal and never will be. His selfishness and pride leads him to want to kill

Symbols are used to represent something else deeper than the actual meaning either in real life or in literature. In the story “The Scarlet Ibis”, Doodle who is mentally and physically disabled was not expected to live. Although, he did live, however, he could not do things other children could do such as walk or talk. Therefore, his older brother set out to teach him because he was embarrassed to have an abnormal brother. However, many years later Doodle is soon overworked until he can no longer go on, and he sadly dies. In “The Scarlet Ibis”, James Hurst uses the caul, the oriole nest, and the blood od Doodle as symbols to offer greater insight into abstract ideas that are difficult to understand on their own.