Madeleine's Coming Of Age Blog

While we were reading Fun Home I wondered a lot about what was going on with Alison’s dad in terms of his inappropriate relationships with teenage boys. This information was dropped pretty nonchalantly at the beginning of the book so I hoped that Bechdel would talk about it more later on. I was a bit disappointed with how little she shared about this topic because it seemed very important especially in terms of gauging her father’s character. However, I do understand that this isn’t really related to the parts of her relationship with her dad that she expires in Fun Home.      I decided to do some digging to see what I could find. I couldn’t find much more than what the reader can infer from the book about what Alison’s Dad actually did. According to Pennsylvania Law, it wasn’t illegal to supply alcohol to minors until May of 1988. Alison’s dad was arrested in June of 1974 (Center Title 18). Alison writes that there was a certain undertone to her father’s arrest. In t...

When I began reading The Bell Jar , I honestly did not understand the metaphor of the title. I didn’t give it a second thought and just decided to enjoy the book. However, when we began discussing the title in class, I was fascinated. I found the title to be an excellent metaphor and extremely compelling. Throughout the book, Sylvia Plath used this type of imagery and description not only to bring her Esther to life but to provide context and tangible examples for her readers. I found the descriptions, explanations, and metaphors in this book extremely vivid and they brought the book to life.      With the descriptions, as with the metaphor of the title, Sylvia Plath brings the characters to life through her writing. One passage that I found particularly interesting was when Esther talks about the future. Plath writes that Esther sees the future “glaring ahead of me like a white, broad, infinitely desolate avenue” (Plath 128). I found this description of how she sees t...

       Sally Hayes and Phoebe are both very important people in Holden's life. However, they play very different roles both in how they view him and how he views them. Sally is someone who he is dating. He doesn't really seem to care about her consistently but occasionally will make comments that make it seem like he cares about her. When he goes on a date with her, he calls her a phony and acts like he is only with her because of her looks. He internally criticizes her for enjoying the theater and for the words that she uses. He does play into her "phoniness," going to a play he knows she'll like, engaging with her, and agreeing to spend more time with her. However, unlike other people who he thinks are phony, he still talks to her and seems to enjoy her company. He also shares his thoughts with her. He doesn't share his thoughts with other phonies or people he finds annoying. But he does with Sally. He begins to talk to her about his thoughts and feelings a...

The tension that many Americans with hyphenated identities feel is shown in Jhumpa Lahriri’s The Namesake. The story follows the oldest son of a Bengali-American family. Due to a mix up with his names, the son, Gogol, is given a pet name as his legal name. He despises this name because it’s different from both his American friends and Bengali family. When he turns 18, he changes his name to Nikhil, a name his parents had given him when he was in kindergarten but he rejected. However, he is unable to put the name Gogol behind him and the name Gogol continues to follow him, causing him stress and resentment until the end of the book when he accepts himself and both of his names. The more that Gogol accepts his names, the more he fully comes of age.        Although it may seem that when Gogol changes his name to Nikhil he is shedding the burdens of childhood and becoming his true self, he is really just rejecting an essential part of himself. He rejects lots of suppo...