Pride In The Scarlet Ibis

¨At six years old, when his brother is born, the narrator tells the reader that from the first, Doodle was "a disappointment." When he learns that Doodle is possibly mentally and physically challenged, the narrator begins his plan to kill his brother; however, his plans are soon discarded after Doodle smiles at him¨. (James Hurst) The main conflict of "The Scarlet Ibis" by James Hurst is Brother's inability to deal with Doodle's disabilities.

Now we knew it could be done.” this piece of text in the book is when Doodle learns how to walk. The Doodle plan is the next piece of evidence of him showing improvement but not ready to pass another boundary “I would teach him to run, to swim, to climb trees, and to fight.

The narrator explains, “They did not know that I did it for myself, that pride whose slave I was spoke to me louder than all their voices combined, and that Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having a crippled brother” (Hurst 184). The parents believe that

The narrator throughout the story was ashamed that Doodle his brother was paralympic so he tried to help Doodle walk for the benefit of his self-esteem. For example, in the story, the narrator says,¨ They did not know that I did it for myself; that pride, whose slave I was, spoke to me louder than all their voices, and that Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having a crippled brother.” The narrator expressed himself to help his brother in the way that it would seem as if he is the hero, but he did it so that he wouldn't have to go through life with a paralympic brother. The narrator knew what he was doing was bad, but didn't care enough to make it all about Doodle.

Multiple times throughout this story the narrator attempts to leave Doodle scared and alone, and Doodle calls out to his brother, “Don’t go leave me, brother” (Hurst 418).This shows not only the dependency Doodle has on his older brother, but also the lack of empathy and care that he bestows on Doodle. When the older brother declares that he is going to teach Doodle to walk, his response is, “‘I can’t walk brother”’ (Hurst 418). This shows that, in the beginning, Doodle has little hope for himself, and that he based his accomplishments off of what others thought of him.

Brother knew that Doodle had disabilities, but instead of accepting it he tried to push Doodle into learning the normal ways of life. When Doodle was a baby he tried to do things on his own for example, he would push himself up until he turned purple, which was not healthy. Brother also tried to teach Doodle how to swim, walk, and talk. Pushing him could have caused emotional damage and false hope. When Doodle was learning how to walk, he would get up and then eventually he would fall down.

In the passage, the Narrator was very brutal. The Narrator’s “bitter cruelty came back to {him} while {he} was running away from the storm leaving Doodle behind.” Also, Doodle has some conditions including a weak heart, disabilities, and he is paralyzed. Which, Narrator didn’t show compassion towards. The Narrator taught Doodle how to walk but in the worst way! He taught him how to walk because he was embarrassed that he had a brother that couldn’t walk at age five. In the passage the Narrator was embarrassed, “When Doodle was five years old, {he} was embarrassed at having a brother of that age who couldn't walk, so {he} set out to teach him.” (Hurst 2) The narrator felt self-contious because of Doodle’s disability of

Growing up, Brother has always hated that Doodle has to go everywhere with him. But he knows he has to have pride in someone in his life, and that person is Doodle. Pride is a very dangerous thing. The definition of pride is a high or inordinate opinion of one's own dignity, importance, merit,or superiority, whether as cherished in the mind or showing one is proud of another. It can be good until taken advantage of. In that case is can mean the difference between life and death. Brother has pride in his brother so much that he is taking time to teach him to walk. Although, he is not teaching him to walk for the best of reasons. Doodle will be starting school in about a year and Brother does not want to be embarrassed by having a brother that can not even

The author uses flashback to show how the narrator felt guilty of his own pride. The narrator wanted to teach Doodle to walk because he was “ashamed of having a crippled brother” (559). He “[begins] to cry” as he realizes that he “did it for himself”

Without delay the narrator took Doodle to accomplish more than walking; he taught him swimming, rowing, climbing, and swinging. They would work until Doodle could not do anymore, till he couldn’t left an oar or lift his arm to take another stroke. The only reason Doodle did it because his brother would always say, ‘“Aw, come on, Doodle,’ I urged. ‘You can do it. Do you want to be different from everybody else when you start school?’ ‘Does it make any difference?’ ‘It certainly does,’ I said.’’. (52) In the beginning of the story it talked about how Doodle would turn blue and almost black in the face as he was straining just to get up and crawl. Likewise when in the ending he said he knew that he was pushing his brother to run faster and Doodle had never done that before so he was struggling and ended up dying.

The setting of “The Scarlet Ibis” helps prepare the readers’ state of mind from the very beginning. In the first place, the story takes place at the end of World War I and represents the internal conflict the narrator has as he struggles between guilt of his younger brother’s death and the acceptance of his brother’s disabilities. With this in mind, the narrator is abashed over Doodle’s inability to walk because he thinks disabilities are shameful, and he wanted a brother who was athletic, outgoing, and adventurous. For this reason,”When Doodle was five years old, I was embarrassed at having a brother of that age who couldn't walk, so I set out to teach him (Hurst 417).” The narrator admits to going out of his way to train Doodle to walk because he has so much pride that it is getting in the way of more important goals, meaning he would rather have a “normal” brother than a happy one. The poor treatment of his brother ultimately leads to Doodle’s death. Furthermore, he forces Doodle to do things unwillingly, such as touch his own coffin and train him to be “normal”. The narrator traumatizes his little brother to think a certain way in order to become accepted by society. Even

There are multiple themes throughout “ The Scarlet Ibis”.The strongest theme in the story is that you should not do things for the benefit of yourself all the time, you should do things for the benefit of others also.His selfishness is shown in this line of the story “ they did not know that I did it for myself; that pride,[...] and that Doodle walked only because I was ashamed of having a crippled brother” (Hurst 468).Even though Doodle finally walked, his brother helped him for his own good, which shows his need to help himself before others.He taught Doodle how to walk for his own selfish reason that he was “ashamed” of him (Hurst 468). This shows the reader that doing things for your own benefit can have a negative effect on you.

This time he did not lift his face up out of the rubber grass. ‘I just can’t do it [...] Oh yes you can, Doodle,’ I said. ‘All you got to do is try. Now come on,’” (Hurst, 37). When the older brother sees how Doodle responded to him before, the older brother was given hope and decided to teach Doodle how to walk. The older brother does not give up on Doodle and he continues to strive to help him out. Even when Doodle does not believe in himself, the older brother keeps pushing Doodle to his limit. Before, the older brother did not have hope that Doodle would become a normal child, but after seeing Doodle grin, he gained hope and decided to teach Doodle how to walk. Additionally, Hurst used the characterization of the Doodle’s older brother to show how a person’s motivations can be changed negatively through the loss of hope.

James Hurst is the author of the heart breaking short story entitled “The Scarlet Ibis”. “The Scarlet Ibis” is a short story about two brothers; one brother is healthy, while the other is physically handicapped. The short story is centered on the idea that the older, healthier brother’s selfishness and pride ultimately led to the death of his younger brother, Doodle. Numerous quotes throughout the story demonstrate Hurst’s use of symbolism and foreshadowing to portray and predict Doodle’s untimely and heartbreaking death.

The first time I read it, I could tell from early on that this story was not going to have a happy ending and predicted that Doodle would die. I assumed this just by the tone that the author used and how he talked about Doodle in the past tense using words like “would”. One of the messages that this story proves to make a point out of in my opinion is how dangerous too much pride can be. Doodle’s older brother mostly wanted Doodle to become more physically capable of keeping up not for his brother’s personal improvement, but so that he would not be embarrassed of his little brother. By making him learn to walk and eventually setting the goal of running and climbing trees, he felt accomplished and was proud of himself that he got Doodle to do those things.