For this week's freestyle blog entry I decided write about a book I read quite a while ago but have been really wanting to re-read again: "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walker. It is a memoir about her childhood; her parents were very stubborn nonconformists and lived a nomadic life. They wouldn't even let their children attend school for quite some time and were "home schooled" by their father. When he was sober they thought of him as a great teacher and amazingly creative; however, he unfortunately was rarely sober and ended up stealing grocery money and disappearing for days. Eventually the family settles in a mining town in West Virginia in extremely substantial conditions. The oldest sibling eventually breaks free and moves to New York City; the rest of the siblings eventually follow.
The quote I chose is, "All this running around and moving around was temporary, Dad explained. He had a plan. He was going to find gold." (Walker, 22)
This quote is very important to the story because it is simply the start of a series of broken promises. This goal, like many of his others, was simply unfathomable; the title, "The Glass Castle", comes from his promise that he'll make enough money and build the family a literal glass castle. Instead, he forces them to live in a West Virginia home with no toilet, an unusable kitchen, no running water, and, if I remember correctly, no electricity. The mother is no more a saint than the father; though she has a teaching degree and could easily bring in enough money for the family to avoid surviving on a single bag of popcorn for days, she refuses to go to work and insists on painting all day instead.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone; ti's extremely interesting, but the fact that it's a memoir makes it quite tragic. However, the ending is very inspirational!
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Amanda,
ReplyDeleteThe story does in deed sound like one worth reading. And sad to say, it's probably a story that was, and still is, somewhat common in our society. People who are too imature to have children, have them; all the while they're chasing a dream and dragging the children along for the ride. As they get older, their dream becomes a quest and the children suffer tremendously.
I will add your recommendation to my future reading list. I especially enjoy memoirs.
thanks for sharing your thoughts about this story.
Janet
Hi, Amanda. I read The Glass Castle this summer and couldn't put it down. It amazed me what the children went through and yet the tone always gave the experiences a kind of childlike perspective, like this is just our experience not something awful. I think what made me really sad for the kids was that they finally realized they needed to escape and started saving money to do so, and the dad stole it. They did, however, cling to their dream, and at least three of the four escaped to have their own lives. I forget what happened to the youngest. Nancy
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