The Problems in "The Wife of His Youth"

            While reading Charles W. Chesnutt’s “The Wife of His Youth,” I couldn’t help but let out a little “awwwww” at the ending. It was just too cute! However, just because the ending was adorable doesn’t mean there weren’t may things throughout the story that made me shake my head and say “WHAT?!”.

First off, the idea of the blue-vein society made my head spins. I understood while reading that this was a society for lighter skinned African Americans. Apparently the first time I read the story I missed the part about why blue-vein societies were called such, so I looked it up. These societies were called blue vein societies because member’s skin had to be light enough to see their veins on their arms. Now, when I was first reading I was thinking that blue-vein societies sounded like a form of discrimination amongst blacks. After reading why these societies were called blue-vein, I was appalled by these societies. Maybe it took me realizing that they actually had a measure for the ‘proper’ skin color to realize how discriminatory these societies were. The societies were originally formed to help maintain correct social standards among African Americans, yet nearly all of the members of the society could pass for white! These societies really didn’t give dark skinned African Americans an opportunity for advancement. I found these societies to be extremely problematic.

Another thing I found problematic in this story was Mr. Ryder’s reaction to the wife of his youth visiting his home. He obviously knew that this was his wife but he didn’t acknowledge it. He waited until he was at the ball to ask for approval from his friends before acknowledging his wife. I don’t know about you, but to me that was a low move. Mr. Ryder says he knew his friends would have told him to acknowledge her, yet he STILL waits until he knows for sure they will not shun him if he does so. While yes, in the end, Mr. Ryder does acknowledge the wife of his youth; he should have done so of his own accord and not because his friends said it was ok. While this story ends happily, it does not mean that it has no value as a source of social questioning.  “The Wife of His Youth” questions the value of blue-vein societies, showing how they can lead to heavy reliance on others in regards to what is right and what is wrong. 

African American Superstition Origins

            While reading Chesnutt’s “The Goophered Grapevine,” I became very interested in the idea of the conjurer and all of the superstition that seemed to surround Henry and the grapes. I wanted to look further into superstition in the South and ended up coming across an essay by Chesnutt on this very topic. This essay, titled “Superstitions and Folklore of the South,” discusses how many of the beliefs held by Southern African Americans, which we would now call superstitions, were more like a religion at the time. These superstitions likely came from a variety of sources. The first place that Chesnutt sees these superstitions deriving from is African Fetishism, which focused on the worship of material items, maybe like this one…

Chesnutt also sees similarities between African American superstition and Voodoo, which has many superstitions on its own, like these…

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African Fetishism and Voodoo combined with witchcraft and ghost lore.

            The combination of all of these different traditions led to a unique set of Southern African American superstitions, which we see in “The Goophered Grapevine.” The conjure woman was a central figure in this African American ‘religion’ of the time. Many whites saw this belief in the supernatural as an indicator of African American’s racial inferiority. While some African Americans did try to change to more ‘western’ religions in order to gain more credibility as a race, the conjure tradition and superstitions still permeated African American culture.

Girl Power!

            While reading “The Revolt of Mother” and “A New England Nun”, I wanted to shout, “You go girl!” at the end of each story. The way that the women in the stories and don’t conform to societal norms is very empowering and inspiring. While both women do the things that women in New England were expected to do like cook, clean, and take care of other business around the house, they do not do so simply because it was is expected of them.

            In “The Revolt of Mother,” Sarah makes pie for her husband and makes sure that all of his needs are met. However, she does not do this simply because it is what he expects of her. I believe that Sarah has an agenda. Sarah knows that her husband promised her a new house, just as she promised to be a good wife. I believe that she continues to fulfill her end of the bargain in the hope that he will fulfill his. When this plan doesn’t work, she goes behind her husband’s back and moves into the new barn, showing how adamant she is about having a new house. When her husband returns she still does all of the things her husband expects of her, just in a different location. She had a lot of guts to defy her husband in this manner. I believe Freeman is trying to show through Sarah that women can still do the things expected of them while also taking action and empowering themselves.

            In “A New England Nun,” Louisa chooses to remain an unmarried woman in order to keep her own happiness rather than to conform to societal norms. In New England at the time “A New England Nun” was published it was unheard of for a woman to choose to be a spinster. However, Louisa deeply enjoyed her life as a single woman. She loved doing chores around the house simply for her own pleasure. She didn’t want to be forced to do these chores for someone else or be judged because she enjoyed doing them so much. Louisa choosing her own happiness rather than conforming to societal norms is Freeman’s way of showing that a woman can enjoy an independent life and doesn’t need a man to make her happy.

            Overall Mary Wilkins Freeman empowers women through her story’s, showing how societal norms are not always adhered to simply because they are norms but rather because women have an agenda or gain deep pleasure from these acts. She suggests that women actually have a large amount of power, even outside of the home through her stories, a theme that reminds me of this song... 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dS1ZW0FdoIU

Calm in Death

            While reading poem #479 by Emily Dickenson, I was surprised at the calm demeanor with which the subject of death is discussed. Normally people view death as a frightening, dreaded part of life. However, Emily Dickenson describes death in the same manner that she would discuss an acquaintance or friend. Death is portrayed as kind, quick, and polite, a far cry from the typical portrayals of death as evil, violent, and often slow and agonizing. She even capitalizes the word Death making it more than just a simple fact of life but a personified object. Death is the subject of many of Dickenson’s poems, so perhaps in her writing she came to terms with death, which is why Death is treated as an acquaintance or friend rather than an adversary.

            After reading the poem several times, I found this poem had a calming effect over me in regards to death. Through this poem, Dickenson reminds me that my attitude toward death should not be one of fear and dread, but one of acceptance. She points to the fact that death is inevitable when she says “Because I could not stop for Death -/He kindly stopped for me” (Dickenson 1-2). However, she is not scared when this inevitable thing happens but rather welcomes it. She gives up the things she loves and watches the world around her, as she never has before. Then she describes how great it is to live eternally. I found myself no longer dreading death by the end of the poem because it is inevitable and because centuries feel shorter than a day in the afterlife. There is nothing to dread about death because you get to live for eternity. It makes me wonder what faith Emily Dickenson was or if she was of any faith at all. She takes a very Christian approach to the afterlife. Overall I found the calm nature with which she regards death soothing. 

What would God do?

            While reading Mark Twain’s “Letters from Earth,” I couldn’t help but wonder what God would have thought of Satan’s observations, particularly those observations he makes in regards to what heaven is like in the human mind. At the beginning of the story God discusses what humans will be like. He says he will “put into each individual, in differing shades and degrees, all the various Moral Qualities, in mass, that have been distributed… among the non speaking animal world” (Twain 309). Here it seems that God wants all humans to be unique and that no two people in the world will be alike.

            However, as the story goes on and Satan reports back to Gabriel and Michael from Earth, the humans Satan describes are far from God’s vision. While humans are described as being unique from each other on Earth, as God had intended, they all strive to be the same in Heaven. Satan first describes the diversity among men and their intellects pointing out that every man “possesses a skill of some kind and takes a keen pleasure in testing it, proving it, perfecting it” (Twain 311). In other words, every man attempts to make his individual traits shine. However, all men strive to go to Heaven, where, according to man, everyone is the same. In Heaven, according to man, everyone sings, everyone plays the harp, and everyone is celibate.

            After reading Satan’s description of man’s Heaven, it is not hard to believe that God would have been ashamed of humans for making their ultimate goal to become like each other. God worked hard to make each individual human unique and in return human’s all try to act like each other in order to make it to Heaven where they will all essentially be clones of each other. If God would have read Satan’s letters, he could have gained some insight into human beings that he may not have seen because he is biased to love them. Perhaps, if God had read Satan’s letter, the human race would have been destroyed and started over again.

Twain, Mark. "Letters From Earth." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2007. Print.