Nellie Clark Poem

Discussion of the poems of Nancy Knapp, Nellie Clark, and Dora William from the book Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters.

In life have you ever thought that no matter what you do all life is going to do is get worse? Have you ever had something done to you that you couldn’t or wouldn’t tell anyone because you were scared? In the book Spoon River Anthology there are many poems that show life was hard for people. Most of the people in Spoon River Anthology believe that they only had one life, believing this had many different effects on the people. Some people looked at it as a good thing and made the most of their life but, there were some people that it took negative effect on. Nancy Knapp, Nellie Clark, and Dora Williams all
Things in life aren’t always what they seem, people can make their life look good when they actually are suffering from something inside. Sometimes things that happen early in life can have an effect on you later in life.” I was only eight years old; and before I grew up and knew what it meant I had no word for it, except that I was frightened...” a quote from the poem titled Nellie Clark from by Edgar Lee Masters. Nellie Clark has had to deal with all of that in her life. At the age of eight Nellie was rapped by a fifteen year old and didn’t know what had happened till later in life. She had no one to tell this to and held it all inside of her till she grew old enough to know what had happened to her. When she finally was happy and married her husband had found out and considered himself cheated and left her. Something that had happened early in life still had an effect on her later in life, the way her life ended negatively because something that she didn't have control of had caused her marriage to fall apart. “There I met a lush, whose father just deceased left him a fortune. He married me when drunk. My life was wretched.” A quote from the poem Dora Williams for the book Spoon River Anthology. She married, a year later he passed away and she got all of his money. She had one life to live she used it in the wrong way, she married just to get money.
Nancy’s family thought that she had poisoned her father, the rest of her family hated her and wouldn’t talk to her. With her life she tried to do what was best for her family and tried to make them a successful farm, but instead they turned against her With nobody left to turn to she set fire to the house and the farm and danced while everything went up in flames. As she burned the house, she left her old life behind, when she passed away it wasn’t a good way to go. She had to burn her house down, lost her family, and her husband that's the only way that she could find peace through all of the stuff that was going on in life. Nancy Knapp, Dora Williams, and Nellie Clark all had a rough life, and experiences that not everyone would understand. You have the choice to make your life better or worse, you have to be able to pick yourself up and move on. Many people have things happen to them that they can’t tell anyone and many people now go days without ever telling anyone. These three people had one life to live and didn’t get the best chance at living it and they all had a negative