Essay on the Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls

The Glass Castle The Glass Castle, written by Jeannette Walls, is an autobiographical novel that shows how hard life can be when you have little to no money and highly deteriorated parents. During the whole memoir it shows how hard it is to live in poverty while at the same time trying to raise a family. The exposition of the novel is how having parents that cannot support their children because the lack of a stable income. The rising action is when Jeannette was in a taxi cab going to a party when she sees her mother digging through the trash can and feels embarrassed and tells the taxi driver to take her home. The major conflict in the novel is a man vs. man because Jeannette, her brother, and her sister are all affected by her parents not maintaining a job and the little money that they do earn goes to her father’s alcohol addiction. The climax of the novel is when Jeannette is able to stand up for herself after Rex blames her for making her mom angry. The falling action is when Jeannette makes the decision that she wants to move and live in New York city after her junior year of high school. Jeannette, Lori, and Brian all get a job and start working so that they could save money to get the tickets to move there. The denouement is when Jeannette achieves the goals she set in her life. The tone of the novel is very serious but at the same time inspiring. Jeannette’s parents cannot provide the financial support to supply for their children and she accepts that. She sees all her problems in a different way and acts like she is very happy. You can see this tone in the novel when she gets burned while she was making hotdogs because soon after she was out of the hospital, she was making hotdogs again like if nothing had happened and everything was okay. As she grows up she becomes more independent and intelligent. She learns that she does not have to live the way her parents do. This is where her inspiration becomes noticeable as well. She gets a job, saves up

Cited: 1.) Walls, Jeannette. "The Glass Castle: A Memoir [Paperback]." The Glass Castle: A Memoir: Jeannette Walls: Amazon.com: Books. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Apr. 2013. 2.) "Symbolism." The Glass Castle Wiki. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Apr. 2013.