Discussion Topic
Key characters and their relationships in The Glass Castle
Summary:
Key characters in The Glass Castle include Jeannette Walls, the narrator, and her parents, Rex and Rose Mary Walls. Jeannette's relationship with her parents is complex; she admires her father's intelligence and dreams but is also hurt by his alcoholism and irresponsibility. Her mother, an artist, prioritizes her art over her children's needs, creating further tension within the family.
Who are the members of the Walls family in The Glass Castle?
The Walls family consists of four children (Jeanette, Lori, Brian, and Maureen) her mom and dad, and her dad's mother Erma.
Jeanette is our narrator.The memoir is told from her point of view. She is a skinny and neglected girl struggling to have a life that is better than the one she grows up in. Her story is inspirational and motivational.
Lori is Jeanette's older sister. She is incredibly smart and often sides with her mother. She places the blame for the family's problems on their dad.
Brian is Jeanette's younger brother. He is quiet and shy, but he is also very protective of his sisters.
Maureen is Jeanette's youngest sibling. She is beautiful, but while the other Wall children learn to take care of themselves, she only learns to depend on others for handouts and help.
Jeanette's mom (Rose Mary Walls) is an artist and though she has a...
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teaching degree she values self sufficiency. She is often selfish.
Jeanette's dad (Rex Walls) is an engineer. He is incredibly smart and good at math. He teaches his kids to read and learn, but he is also an alcoholic. This causes many of the family's money problems.
Erma Walls is her father's mother. She is rude and racist. She molests Brian and their is evidence that she may have molested her son as well.
Who is the woman in the street in The Glass Castle?
The woman in question is none other than Jeannette's mom, Rose Mary. One evening, as Jeannette's sitting in a cab driving through New York City, she sees her mom picking through trash in a dumpster. Rose Mary and her husband, Rex, have been living the lives of hobos in the Big Apple, dividing their time between crashing at a squalid flophouse and rummaging through trash on the streets. They'd briefly stayed at their daughter Lori's apartment, but unable to accept the house rules, they ended up homeless.
Though Rex and Rose Mary are the sole authors of their downfall, Jeannette cannot help feeling guilty at the huge gap between her relatively affluent life and the sordid existence that her parents lead. She reaches out to her mother in an attempt to help out. But it soon becomes clear that Rose Mary isn't interested in receiving help from her daughter. In fact, she resents what she sees as Jeannette's attempt to turn her into some kind of charity case. To be sure, Jeannette does genuinely want to offer a helping hand to her parents, but as she admits to Rose Mary, she's also deeply ashamed of them and cannot accept the lifestyles they've chosen for themselves.