a new england nun analysis

A number of critics have noted that the opening paragraph of Mary Wilkins Freeman’s “A New England Nun” very closely echoes the first stanza of English poet Thomas Gray’s famous “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”: The curfew lolls the knell of parting day, / The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea, / The plowman homeward plods his weary way, / And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Lacking paints, she has made her life like a series of still-life paintings of “delicate harmony.” Before the artist can begin to create, however, she needs a blank canvas or a clean sheet of paper. The perfectionist side of her also shows when she “methodically” does her housework for the day (Freeman, 476). The image of a spinster is of an old maid; a woman never married waiting for a man. She does choose not to marry, even if only to continue her placid and passive life. Instead, she watches from her window. Deborah M. Williams, “Overview of ‘A New England Nun,'” for Short Stories for Students, The Gale Group, 2000. The evidence shown throughout the story suggests the story takes place in a time period where women were not able to sustain a life on their own. The client had longed for…, In “A New England Nun,” one can view the protagonist, Louisa Ellis as either a feminist or a selfless person. The woman waiting to be married is restricted in her […] Adèle way of living life actually depressed Edna “for that colorless existence which never uplifted its possessor beyond the region of blind contentment, “ (78). This illustrates her readiness to accept others and her commitment to protect people from the pain of loneliness, her one central fear in the story. In the nineteenth century, passivity, “calm docility,” and a “sweet even temperament” were considered highly desirable traits in a woman. Gentle ghost. Her artistic sensibility allows her to provide a subjective, personal answer to what the rigid Puritan code of behavior sees as an objective question of right and wrong. Search Pages. A New England Nun (1891) is about Louisa, who in a month's time, is expected to wed a man whom she's only seen the last year of their fifteen year courtship. Waiting 15 years to marry the love of her life, “she had been faithful to him all these years” (Freeman 472). Lily Dyer has a whimsical, romantic sound to it, and she is the other, third woman. On this particular evening, Luisa sits quietly by herself in her home, sewing. He muses thai “some mule inglorious Milton” might be buried there—someone who possessed the talent of seventeenth-century poet John Millon, bul who remains ”inglorious” (or wilhoul glory) because lack of education made Ihem mule. A New England Nun Analysis A nun is usually seen by society as someone who does not follow the normalcies of every day life, especially when it comes to men. We see Louisa going about her daily activities calmly and meticulously; she gathers currants for her tea, prepares a meal, feeds her dog, tidies up her house carefully, and waits for Joe Dagget to visit. She was not taught to be a painter or musician. She has “almost the enthusiasm of an artist over the mere order and cleanliness of her solitary home” and has polished her windows “until they shone like jewels.” Even her lettuce is “raised lo perfection” and she occupies herself in summer “distilling the sweet and aromatic essences from roses and peppermint and spearmint” simply for the pleasure of it. The manner in which she has repetitive precise movements can be interpreted as having an obsessive compulsive disorder. Likewise Louisa has found freedom in her solitary life. As Marjorie Pryse has demonstrated in her essay “An Uncloistered ‘New England Nun,'” Louisa Ellis is a woman with artistic impulses. A New England Nun Summary " A New England Nun " opens in the calm, pastoral setting of a New England town in summer. A New England Nun. She is also a financially self-sufficient woman who grows plants, extracts essences out of them and sells them. He is known for his expertise in cooking. Louisa “would have been loathe to confess how often she had ripped a seam for the mere delight of sewing it together again.” When she sets her table for tea, it takes her a long time because she does it “with as much grace as if she had been a veritable guest to her own self.” She uses the good china, not out of ostentation (there’s no one to impress, anyway), but out of a desire to get the most out of what she has. The opening scene of " A New England Nun " is an apt example: Freeman's narrator paints a vivid picture of New England pastoral life in the summer twilight. Lily vows that she will not marry Joe even if he breaks off his engagement to Louisa because “honor’s honor, an’ right’s right.” Without Louisa’s intervention three people would be made miserable for the rest of their lives—all for the sake of duty. A New England Nun by Mary E WI Pages: 7 (1719 words) Compare & Contrast between New England, Middle, and Southern Colonies Pages: 2 (350 words) Chesapeake Vs New England Research Paper Pages: 2 (392 words) about New England Pages: 2 (284 words) In her work, "A New England Nun," Mary E. Wilkins Freeman illustrates a woman's struggle with the commitment of marriage after waiting fourteen years for her fiancé to return from Australia, where he was making money to support her. A New England Nun by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman. Louisa might have been an artist had her society provided her with the tools and opportunity. However, for this time period, this was not always the case as women depended on their husbands for financial support and protection. Furthermore, narrowness is not the same thing as sterility—or it need not be. In this isolation is the only place where she feels truly content.…, Their materialism causes them to neglect their families. Start your 48-hour free trial to unlock this A New England Nun study guide. When Joe tells her that "someday I 'm going to take him out,” he suggests he will one-day release Louisa from her solitude life (Freeman, 474). Analysis "A New England Nun" falls within the genre of local color. A collection that shows Freeman’s many modes – romantic, gothic, and psychologically symbolic – as well as her use of pathos and sentimentality, humour, satire and irony.

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