Dan Barden Analysis Essay

Analysis essay Dan Barden, in the art of conflict, He says “everything you want from your life is the opposite of what you should give to your characters” that’s how life is around us if life was smooth we may not get all the pain we have; life has ups and downs. Barden, stated that,” Story=conflict, that’s the thing, and I really mean that equals sign and conflict is what create growth, conflict is what creates character”. Here that’s the reality of life, if we don’t have a conflict we couldn’t have a story, conflict helps us to make a commitment when we come with the best solution. We have unlimited demand and we struggled to get them. As a result we face challenges and temptations
as its main infrastructures so it is like no pain no gain. He says “all forward movement is a product of conflict and all meaning, in fact, is a product of conflict”. After a conflict we start to recognize a series of personal events, feelings, thoughts and we get changed; I agree on this depend on our direction and imagination to win or lose. Our character should, have a bad day, because that’s how human beings grow, as we are living our life, we have different kinds of obstacles and troubles and give us a good lesson for the rest of our life.
Conflict is an important signal when something is not right. And it teaches us about differences and makes us more aware of and more sensitive to them. And we get changed due to growth in character. Likewise, in the essay “I know why the caged bird sings” (199), (p31), Maya agelou, has a difficult experience when she took a job in mrs.cullinan’s home at the age of ten. This experience shows us the relationship between the black and white races, and the superiority of the white people in changing some ones name for their convenience in the United States of America.
Angelou says ”a white woman from Texas who would quickly described herself as liberal, asked me about my home town”,(p31) .This shows that Angelou remarks the racial identity of the woman from Texas. A contrast between whites and blacks and it gives a hint about the whole story. Angelou says “when I told her that stamps, my grandmother had owned the only Negro general merchandise store since the turn of the century, she exclaimed” why you were debutante”. This shows the racial identity differences. Because the woman from Texas is thinking of finishing schools when in reality Angelou’s school was working as a maid in a white woman’s home.
Negro girls were given training for all intent and purposes, for adult hood as rich girls shown in magazines. But the training was not the same at all. While White girls were trained to learn about waltz and to sit gracefully. The black ladies were lagging behind learning the mid-Victorian values with little money to entertain them with a favorable pleasure. Angelou says “during my tenth year, white woman’s kitchen became my finishing school” (p32). As a child she is supposed to go to school and learn something for her future. But she is required to work as a maiden in mrs.cullinan’s home. Angelou says “the exactness of her house was in human”. As Mrs. Cullinan kept up the tradition of her wealthy parents; the restricted cultural rules, orders, the placement of the house wares and the schedules with lack of freedom were inhuman for Angelou as a ten years old child. Angelou says “if she had her own children, she wouldn’t have had to ask me to run a thousand errands from her back door to the back door of her friends”.
Mrs. Cullinan was a barren she didn’t have children and she couldn’t understand Angelou’s feeling. The cook, miss glory, a descendant of the slaves once owned by the cullinans, informed Angelou that mrs.cullinan couldn’t have children and angelou feels sorry for her loneliness, and write a poem on being white, fat, old, without children.
. When Mrs. Cullinan’s friend asked about the name of Angelou “what’s your name, girl” (p34). Mrs. Cullinan immediately answered the question before angelou has the opportunity to answer it and says “her name is Margaret.mrs. Cullinan friend doesn’t want to call her by Margaret she suggested mrs.cullinan to call her” Mary” because Margaret is too long.
Angelou says “the very next day, she called me by the wrong name” (p35). mrs.cullinan doesn’t want to bother herself to learn Angelou’s real name marguerite, and decided to change it to Mary for her convenience as she suggested by her friend. This shows that Angelou has enough mistreatments and couldn’t accept especially for the wrong name and It associates with, calling a black person with different name means loosely interpreted as insulting, because blacks have been labeled negatively for centuries as “niggers ,jigs, dings, blackbirds, crows, boots, and spooks”(p35).Angelou faces a painful stimulus and wakes her up to help her when to
react as Barden states “all forward movement is a result of conflict”. Angelou looks in to Mrs.cullinan’s face for a week as she decided to get herself fired, because she knows that momma (her grandmother) will not allow her to quite.
Then she decided to find a reason, and started coming late and leaving early. Angelou is reacting towards her mistress for a matter of survival, as human beings nature always tends to be free. Angelou slacks in her work but she didn’t win. Angelou finally takes bailey’s advice (her brother) and breaks Mrs. Cullinan’s favorite china dish, making it looks like an accident.” Mrs. Cullinan screamed and cried louder and is insulting to Angelou with a racist slur. Up on hearing Mrs. cullinan’s screams and cry, her friends crowd in to the kitchen and one of them asks if “Mary” is responsible but things were different mrs.cullinan screams and says” her name is Margaret” (p36).this is true Angelou’s first name was marguerite even though it was with different spelling she was right her name wasn’t Mary.
Finally as a result of all the conflicts Angelou got a resolution. Here we learned that a conflict results in a growth of character as Barden stated.margaret says “I left the front door wide open so that all the neighbors could hear”. This shows us how much stressed was Margaret to be called by a wrong name and her attitude couldn’t tolerate to this kind of mistreatments that’s why she want to announce her real name to the neighbors. The image of the older woman writhing on the floor crying over broken dish is hilarious and
definitely worth a look. Work cited
(Barden, Dan). “The art of conflict” poets and writers July /august2013: 23-24.print.
(Angelou, Maya) “I know why the caged birds sing” New York, Bantam books, (1969).print.