Discussion Topic
Maggie's Character and Development in "Everyday Use"
Summary:
In Alice Walker's "Everyday Use," Maggie is portrayed as a shy and introverted character with low self-esteem, largely due to physical and emotional scars from a house fire. She feels inferior to her confident and educated sister, Dee, who often belittles her. Maggie is content with her simple life, living with her mother, Mama. Despite her meekness, Maggie's self-worth is renewed when Mama asserts Maggie's right to family quilts over Dee's demands, illustrating Maggie's quiet resilience and inner strength.
In "Everyday Use," how does Maggie perceive herself?
Maggie is not very confident. She is an adult woman but continues to live with her mother, Mama, while her bolder, more outspoken sister, Dee, has gone off to college. Part of Maggie's demeanor is due to her being badly burned in a house fire. When Dee arrives, Mama describes Maggie's mannerisms:
Maggie will be nervous until after her sister goes: she will stand hopelessly in corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs, eying her sister with a mix of envy and awe.
Here, we can see that Maggie is self-conscious about her burn scars and also that being around her sister makes her feel small. Dee is the one who always gotten whatever she wants ("'no' is a word the world never learned to say to her"), while Maggie has gotten the leftovers. She is not bold enough to demand what she might...
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want; she is very meek.
Maggie's lack of confidence is also evidenced by Mama's comment that Maggie "has been like this, chin on chest, eyes on ground, feet in shuffle" since the house fire. Mama even compares her to "a lame animal . . . run over by some careless person." Maggie is painted as a victim, as someone who is pathetic and helpless.
The characterization of Maggie and her contrast to her sister Dee set up the showdown at the end of the story, which is a fight over family quilts. Dee wants to take the quilts home and hang them as art works, while Maggie would "put them to everyday use" (Dee says this as an insult). It's pretty clear that Maggie wants the quilts but is not strong or confident enough to speak up. Mama takes Maggie's side and wrests the quilts from Dee. At the end, Maggie finally smiles, "a real smile, not scared," so we know that she is satisfied with this result.
In "Everyday Use," Maggie is not the narrator, and because she speaks little, she does not offer her vision of her own identity to the reader. Maggie is largely identified and characterized by Mama and Dee. Mama tells the reader that Maggie knows she is not a bright girl, and Maggie shuffles around the place staying out of people's way. Mama reckons that Maggie is envious of her sister Dee, and Maggie's nervous nature suggests that Maggie feels she is not as good as her sister. Later in the story, Dee characterizes Maggie as one who has not taken any effort to better herself, but Maggie is seemingly happy with the life that she leads. Maggie's grunts and groans during conversations with Dee suggest that Maggie believes Dee's ideas to be misguided, so Dee's opinion of Maggie is misguided too. At the end of the story, Maggie's sense of self-worth is renewed when Mama gives her the quilts and finally tells Dee "no" for the first time.
In 'Everyday Use,' what can be inferred about Maggie?
We never get a direct insight into Maggie's mind, but we can infer quite a lot about her from the way she acts and what her mother tells us about her. She appears extremely shy and retiring as a result of the burns she suffered in the house fire, as her mother reveals. Her mother describes her gait in the following terms:
Have you ever seen a lame animal, perhaps a dog run over by some careless person rich enough to own a car, sidle up to someone who is ignorant enough to be kind to them? That is the way my Maggie walks.
This image of the wounded animal perfectly captures Maggie's self-effacing and nervous manner; it seems she is a person that other people simply ride roughshod over, pass by. She hardly speaks at all, tries to keep out of sight - and in this she forms a complete contrast to her older, brash, confident sister Dee.
Maggie, however, does have strong feelings of her own. We see this in her disapproving reaction to Dee's visit; the noise she makes when confronted with Dee's extravagant fashion sense. She also slams the door violently when Dee first asks for the quilts that have been promised to her. However, she appears anxious to avoid confrontation when she says meekly that Dee can have the quilts (although her mother does not allow this to happen).
To sum up, we can deduce that Maggie has had rather a hard life and has become withdrawn as a result. Yet there is also a hint that she is, after all, fairly content with her quiet and modest lot; she smiles when Dee ends her unwelcome intrusive visit, and then afterwards she is described as relaxing contentedly with her mother until bedtime.
What type of character is Maggie in "Everyday Use"?
Maggie is, in just about every way, the polar opposite of her sister, Dee. She is shy, reticent, and loving. She is not ambitious and seems content to live the simple, quiet life that she enjoys with her mother. She is a dutiful daughter and a kind-hearted person.
In terms of narrative structures, Maggie is a foil character, exhibiting opposite traits to those exhibited by her sister, Dee. While Dee, the antagonist, has left her family life far behind her in search of one she deems better, Maggie has stayed close to her mother's side, living a quiet and secluded life.
It could also be argued that Maggie is a deuteragonist, which is defined as a character only slightly less important than the protagonist—who, in the case of "Everyday Use," is Mama. A deuteragonist can be either a good or bad character, and in Maggie's case, she is the epitome of goodness. One of the most prominent characteristics that readers get to see in Maggie is her generous spirit and unwillingness to get into an argument. Despite the fact that her mother had promised her the family quilts, she offers to let Dee take them when her sister expresses a strong desire for them. However, it could also be argued that this instance represents Maggie's inability to stand up for herself.
What crisis does Maggie face in "Everyday Use"?
The character of Maggie is not focused on as much in the short story "Everyday Use" as Dee or the narrator. This makes sense if you analysis things properly because the character of Maggie stays in the background as well, so why wouldn't Alice Walker have her in the background of the story.
The crisis with Maggie would have to refer to the fire that burned her so badly. After explaining Maggie's character as being like "a lame animal", the narrator remembers the fire. She recalls this as a pivotal moment saying "Sometimes I can still hear the flames and feel Maggie's arms sticking to me, her hair smoking and her dress falling off her in little black papery flakes. Her eyes seemed stretched open, blazed open by the flames reflected in them." Meanwhile Dee was standing under a tree outside. It is implied that Dee started the fire that so badly scarred her sister and changed her sister forever.