Saturday, February 21, 2015

Compare and contrast Mama in "Everyday Use" with Lucinda Matlock in the dramtic monologue in "Lucinda Matlock" by Edgar Lee Masters?

Mrs. Johnson ("Mama") from Alice Walker's "Everyday Use"
and "Lucinda Matlock" from Edgar Lee Masters' poem of the same name feature two
self-sufficient, small town, domestic matriarchs who have a no-nonsense attitude toward
the "spoiled" generation who have taken them for
granted.


Specifically, Mama chides her daughter Dee for
forsaking her backwoods culture by pretending to be a Black Nationalist college rebel.
 She give Maggie the heirlooms (quilts) because her younger daughter is humble and
hardworking like her.  This corresponds to the last part of "Lucinda
Matlock":


What is this I hear of sorrow and
weariness,

Anger, discontent and drooping
hopes?

Degenerate sons and
daughters,
20
Life is too
strong for you—

Dee is a "degenerate" daughter, not because of her
"sorrow and weariness" necessarily, but because of her fickle identity and shame of her
native culture.  Instead of using the quilts for everyday use, Dee will hang them on her
college dorm wall as a sign of "culture."  In other words, Dee does not live life: she
borrows from it.  Maggie, on the other hand, knows how to generate life: she can quilt,
sew, clean, cook, and eventually raise kids.  Maggie, it seems, will live long, like
Mama and Lucinda.


Some differences: Mama is single,
unmarried, or divorced.  She's had to go it alone for a long time.  There's no mention
of a "Mr. Johnson" at all.  Obviously, Lucinda Matlock has had a husband for a long
time:


And then I found Davis.

5

We were married and lived together for seventy
years,

Enjoying, working, raising the twelve
children,

Lucinda has had many more children than Mama as a result.
 She seems not have issues with her own children, like Mama has with Dee, but she has
issues with the next generation of "sons and daughters," so her denunciation of them is
not literal, but metaphorical.


Also of note are differences
in tone/style.  Obviously, Mama's narration is in the form of a short story, while
Lucinda uses a poetic and dramatic monologue.  But, Mama's voice is much more
regional/vernacular: she uses slang, intimate language.  Lucinda's voice is more
metaphorical: she's speaking more abstractly from the grave.  As such, Mama's narration
is grounded more in realism, while Lucinda's is more supernatural, not as
naturalistic.

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