What are the key incidents in chapter 1 of "The Story of My Life"?

In Chapter 1, Keller offers a brief sketch of her family history and then moves into her own story. She recounts being born as a baby who could hear and see, until at 19 months an illness, which it was feared would kill her, left her deaf and blind.

In this first chapter, Keller recounts themes that will recur in the memoir: the love and safety provided by her mother, and the great divide Helen experienced between the time when she enjoyed life with all of her five senses and what she calls the "nightmare" of losing two of them.

Miss Sullivan, though not named, also is mentioned, the person Keller says "was to set my spirit free." This is a fitting, if fleeting, introduction to the woman who has the largest presence, after Helen, in this memoir. Keller also mentions her love of flowers, which she could smell and feel even after her illness, as well as her general love of nature. The chapter gives us a strong sense of her background and early life.

What are the key incidents in chapter 1 of "The Story of My Life"?

Some important incidents in Chapter One of “The Story of my Life” are:

• Before writing her autobiography, Helen is beset by a sort of fear at delving into her childhood. She discovers that most of her childhood is now colored differently as she looks at it through the lenses of a grown woman.
• Helen Keller was born on the 27th day of June 1880, in Tuscumbia, Northern Alabama. Her father descended from the Swiss, Casper Keller a settler in Maryland. One of her Swiss ancestors was a teacher of the deaf. Her father, Arthur H. Keller, was a captain in the army. Her mother, Kate Adams, was her father’s second wife. Helen was named after her grandmother, Helen Everett. However, at church, her father quite forgot the second name “Everett”, and instead gave her the name Helen Adams.
• Helen walked at the age of one year.
• One spring, at about nineteen months, Helen suffered from an “acute congestion of the stomach and brain”. The disease left her both blind and deaf.

What are the four main incidents in The Story of My Life?

The first major incident is Keller's illness when she is over a year old. This illness results in her losing her sight and hearing. For many years afterward, she struggles to communicate and in handling frustration. When she is almost seven years old, the second main incident occurs when Keller's teacher, Anne Sullivan, comes to work with her. Keller compares her life before her teacher arrives to the course of a ship immersed in fog and likens the arrival of Sullivan to the appearance of light. Keller eventually learns to read and speak under Sullivan's guidance. The third main incident is Keller's arrival in Boston in 1888, when Keller is about eight, to visit the Perkins Institution for the Blind. Keller meets other blind children and travels to the ocean. The final main incident is Keller's admission into Radcliffe College in 1900, after many years of preparation for the entrance examination. 

What are the four main incidents in The Story of My Life?

Helen Keller detailed the events of her life from her birth to her early twenties in her autobiography, The Story of My Life.  She detailed many important events in her life.  The following are four very important ones:

- Helen Keller lost her sight and hearing when she was almost two years old.  She had what doctors called "acute congestion of the stomach and brain."  They thought that Helen might not live.  She did live, but the sickness caused her to become deaf and blind.

-  Annie Sullivan came to live with the Keller family.  She became Helen's teacher and her constant companion.  Miss Sullivan was a determined woman.  She did not give up on Helen.

-  After many attempts, Annie helped Helen to discover language.  Helen had a breakthrough moment when Miss Sullivan held her hand under a waterspout.  As the water poured over Helen's hand, Miss Sullivan spelled "w-a-t-e-r" into the girl's palm.  Helen made the connection that those letters meant the cool liquid.  After that, she began to learn how to communicate through fingerspelling.  Helen later said that the word "water" "awakened [her] soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free!"

-  Miss Sullivan taught Helen how to communicate and learn.  Helen was able to go to school.  She attended school beginning in 1894.  Helen studied mathematics, literature, history, and many other subjects.  She learned to write using a special typewriter.  Helen also made attempts to learn how to speak.  Helen even went to college.

What are the two most inspiring incidents in The Story of My Life by Helen Keller?

Undoubtedly, the most inspiring incident in her memoir is Keller's story of learning to communicate with Miss Sullivan through manual writing. In this very famous incident, Miss Sullivan has been trying for weeks to get Helen to understand the connection between the letters she is writing in her hand and physical objects. It is only when Helen's hand is under running water and Sullivan spells water into it that Helen makes the link. What renders this story so powerful is the utter clarity of the change Keller undergoes. In one moment of understanding, Keller's life is completely transformed for the better. It is hard not to be emotionally moved by this incident.

While there are many other inspiring incidents involving Keller's determination to move forward with her education, such as by going to Radcliffe, the other event that stands out is her tale of inadvertently plagiarizing Canby's short story about the frost fairies. While this was a very distressing episode in Keller's life, she was able to transcend the setback. We can be inspired by her honesty in dealing with it and the lesson of caution she took away from it.

What are the two most inspiring incidents in The Story of My Life by Helen Keller?

Imagining the "dayless" life that Helen Keller accepted as her everyday life, is enough to alarm anyone and the fact that she could not speak makes her story even more incredible. Communication is key to everything we do and misunderstandings abound; no less for Helen Keller who struggles in The Story of My Life to make herself understood. Her tantrums become daily "sometimes hourly" as her frustrations envelop her life.

Ann Sullivan could not have arrived at a more opportune time as Helen, a naturally inquisitive child, looks for answers. The most inspiring incident then is when Ann managed to make Helen understand that everything has a name and Helen recalls "the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand" - water! (Ch 4).

Another inspiring event is when Helen meets the other blind children when she visits the Perkins institute and experiences "What joy to talk with other children in my own language!" It is probably this spirit that makes Helen Keller an inspirational symbol. She refers to her "own language" as if it is a barrier that anyone might face and recognizes her challenges as part of her existence. Helen does not make excuses for her own shortcomings but learns from "life itself."       

Which incident in The Story of My Life by Helen Keller is the best and why?

The Story of My Life by Helen Keller recounts many of the incidents from Helen's early life, many of which shaped her understanding of the world and life itself. It can become quite a  cliche in describing the "best" incident or event  as perceptions change and what is the most important occurrence today may seem less significant tomorrow. Even Helen says this herself: " many incidents of vital importance in my early education have been forgotten in the excitement of great discoveries."(Ch 1) This autobiography is meant to inspire; hence, depending on the reader's frame of mind, different things hold different levels of importance at different life stages.

One of the 'best' incidents must be Helen's description of the arrival of Ann Sullivan who is "to set my spirit free"(Ch 1) as everything else revolves around this.

It may be Helen's parents' recognition of her talents and the need to educate her, especially allowing her to become independent, providing ""all that was bright and good in my long night" (Ch 2)  that is most crucial; rendering her journey to Baltimore and onward to Washington to see Alexander Graham Bell who helped Helen "pass from darkness into light" (Ch 3) as the "best" incident.

For someone who finds communicating difficult or who is misunderstood by others, Helen's eventual connection with her sister, Mildred may be the "best" after the incident when she pushes Mildred out of the cradle in which she is sleeping and only Helen's mother's quick intervention prevents a disaster,after which Helen learns the value of human relationships and is "restored to my human heritage"  which up to that point has almost eluded her because when "we walk in the valley of twofold solitude we know little of the tender affections that grow out of endearing words and actions and companionship.(Ch 2)This is a significant episode in Helen's life as it begins the path to self-awareness that is Helen's saving grace.

Hence, it is a very personal choice in finding the "best" incident. There are many more than I have recorded here. Each of these however is instrumental and vital in understanding Helen's daily struggle and having an appreciation of the effort involved in making the most out of the only life she knows.   

Describe two incidents from The Story of My Life that deeply touched you.

Helen Keller wrote the autobiography, The Story of My Life as a young student, having battled insurmountable odds and ensured her rightful place in Radcliffe College. Helen was very aware of the opportunities presented to her and how her life could have been so different had it not been for the positive influences that surrounded her.

The most memorable event that Helen recalls in The Story of My Life and probably the one for which she is best known due to its dramatic effect on ANYONE who reads about it or who has seen it in the movie is her recollection of the "W-A-T-E-R" incident

Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten—a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me (Ch IV)

This event has the capacity to reach even the most cynical person. The life-changing capacity of the most simple action must surely reach into the depths of anyone's soul and inspire a person to do more with what he or she already has at his or her disposal.

Other events, and there are many significant ones without which Helen's new found means of communication would not have blossomed,  may fade into insignificance as this is the pivotal point at which her life changed. 

I have chosen a different kind of second event to recall which reveals that there were still many "barriers" and that Helen was only human and not necessarily so different from everybody else in her struggles to be understood.

Mildred, Helen's younger sister, inspires jealousy in Helen who is keenly aware of Mildred's arrival and her mother's shared affections and time. In the crdle in which Helen lovingly rocks hr doll, Nancy, lay Mildred and Heln, without a thought, attempted to overturn the cradle and tip the baby out because 

when we walk in the valley of twofold solitude we know little of the tender affections that grow out of endearing words and actions and companionship(Ch II).

This event could have had a very negative impact on Helen's development were it not for her loving, supportive family. It brings a stark reality to this "happily - ever - after" story. 

Describe two impactful incidents from the first ten chapters of The Story of My Life.

In her autobiography, The Story of My Life, Helen Keller recounts many of the incidents of the first twenty two years of her life that shape her and help to make her into the adult she becomes although she admits that some events may "have been forgotten in the excitement of great discoveries." (Ch 1)The Story of My Life is NOT a novel, as it is a true account of incidents and occurrences unlike a novel which has a "true life" element but is a work of fiction (not real).

It seems that the most memorable events in Helen's young life include her discovery of the word "W-A-T-E-R" and its true meaning. To Helen it is not only " the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand" but it rouses her "soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free!"  (Ch 4)

Another incident, by contrast, that is poignant due to the impact it has on Helen, is the effect of the changing weather when she is alone in a tree. It highlights the complete isolation of her condition as she realizes that her beloved nature "wages open war against her children, and under softest touch hides treacherous claws." (Ch 5) However, in the true spirit of Helen Keller, this incident serves to strenghten her resolve as , sometime much later, in the Spring, she is encouraged to climb into the Mimosa tree which, despite her previous encounter, becomes "my tree of paradise."