Summary Of The Scarlet Ibis By Hurst

In the book “The Scarlet Ibis”, Brother is portrayed as Selfish, Mean, and Guilty. Doodle, his brother, was born very sick, everyone thought he would die. Doodles parents gave him the name “ William Armstrong” but brother renamed him Doodle because no one will ever expect something great from a boy named Doodle. Brother wanted someone that he could play and have fun with, well when the information given to him that his brother would never be healthy enough to play with him he decides to start a plan to kill him by smothering him with a pillow. Later on in the story Doodle gets old enough to where he can talk and he tells brother to take him outside, when brother takes him outside he takes him to the barn to show

In “ The Scarlet Ibis”, James Hurst uses indirect characterization through the protagonist’s thoughts towards his younger brother, Doodle, to show that pride can be dangerous and destructive when driven by shame. In the beginning of the story, the family had a coffin made for Doodle and didn’t even name him until he was three months old, because he wasn’t supposed to live. Even though he lived he was invalid and mentally” not all there”, which the narrator thought was worse than not having a brother at all. “It was bad enough having a invalid brother ,but having one who possibly not all there was unbearable, so i began to make plans to kill him…” (2). Hurst uses indirect characterization through the narrator thoughts to show that pride can

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.”

The “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst Is about Brother and Doodle are Siblings. Brother is disappointed by Doodle. This leads him to do many cruel things to Doodle. Over the course of the story, Brother changes a lot. James Hurst describes Brothers’s change in the story, from being overly prideful of himself and ashamed of Doodle, which leads him to do many cruel things, to realizing that his pride and shame lead to the death of Doodle.

Character are often times really the only thing that needs to be interesting for the story to be worth while. Veritably, reading about experiences through a character is far more engaging than directly being told advice or analysis. That is because narratives are almost always based in inherently human ideas/feelings and that is what most take and/or want to take away when they read one. A great example is “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst, where the main focus is the guilt the narrator feels after his actions towards his brother. It’s about a boy who has a brother with health problems, who he’s trying to fix into someone he won’t be ashamed of or have to constantly look after. Throughout the story one can see how the narrator

Don’t leave me!”(Hurst 182) It did not stop Brother from leaving Doodle behind. Brother abandoning Doodle, betraying Doodle's dependence on him, and letting Doodle pass away allowed Brother to be free of a burden that he was not wanting to help but instead assigned to him which he needed to help, now that Doodle is gone Brother is free. Another instance where betrayal is seen is in Jay Bennett’s “My Brother's Keeper”. The “My Brother’s Keeper” focuses on two brothers who both have very bright futures.

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.

The first and one of the most important literary devices you can detect in this writing, is the usage of flashback. Hurst uses flashback to develop the whole story, relationship between Doodle and Brother, and explain what happened to Doodle. A majority of “The Scarlet Ibis” is told through this flashback and past tense. The flashback improves the story and is used in a way to show Brother at the beginning and how much his past with Doodle still affects him. We really get to see that guilt and even his maturity when he is older, because he goes back to all these places where him and Doodle played and grew up. Yet even though it's so far in the past, going to his old home and fields brings back painful memories. *

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

The Scarlet Ibis bird symbolizes Doodle; this symbolism can be seen by the authors description of both Doodle’s and the Scarlet Ibis’s appearance after death. After the Scarlet Ibis fell from the bleeding tree his

“The only difference between a hero and the villain is that the villain chooses to use that power in a way that is selfish and hurts other people” (Chadwick Boseman). In Hurst’s “The Scarlet Ibis,” the narrator chooses to use his power in a way that hurts his invalid brother, Doodle. While living in a time period where different is improper, the narrator cannot mentally handle the fact that Doodle is different from others. Being the older sibling, the narrator takes on the responsibility to help Doodle become ordinary. He teaches Doodle to walk, run, climb, and swim, because he is ashamed of having a brother with disabilities. As a result, the narrator serves as a villain by forcing his invalid brother, Doodle, past his limitations, which ultimately causes the

“The Scarlet Ibis” is both a deeply emotionally disturbing, and eye opening story about the effects of pride. The author, James Hurst, establishes the idea that escalating pride can lead to negative consequences. He does this through the thoughts,words, and actions of the character Brother. The thoughts of Brother show that he has too much pride to have a brother like Doodle. On the same note the words and actions of Brother throughout the story continually show that too much pride can lead to negative consequences.

In the short story, “The Scarlet Ibis”, by James Hurst, the narrator suffers from an internal battle with his own ego to convey the message that pride blinds any because people are, to a degree, naturally selfish. In the beginning of the story, after the narrator presents his family the miracle of Doodle walking, Older Brother starts crying secretly because he knew he made Doodle walk out of his own selfish reasons. When Doodle took his public first steps for the first time the narrator confesses an important reason from his point of view, thinking, “Doodle told them it was I who taught him to walk, so everyone wanted to hug me, and I began to cry. ‘What are you crying for?’ asked Daddy, but I couldn’t answer. They did not know that I did it for myself: that pride,

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.

Firstly, James Hurst’s “The Scarlet Ibis” is a dismal story due to the figurative language that is used. This figurative language forces the reader to become sympathetic to the characters, and therefore connected to them.