“I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen and “All That Rises Must Converge” by Flannery O'Connor tell the theme of relationships between parents and children within the family, using strongly developed characters to convey imperfect relationships and the resulting impact on each family member. Written during the time of the Great Depression, each story reflects, to some extent, the theme of loss and the causes that led to that state. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Flannery O'Connor's widely anthologized short stories often use humor, irony, and paradox within a system of Christian belief in evil and redemption to express religiosity. Southern themes and life. As a social and religious satirist, Flannery O'Connor often highlights American cultural challenges such as casual violence, race relations, and class discrimination. Born in Savannah, Georgia, in 1925, her father died from complications of systemic lupus erythematosus when she was a teenager. After high school, Flannery O'Connor went on to study writing at the University of Iowa and published her first story, “The Geranium,” at age 21. Flannery O'Connor spent several months at Yaddo, an artists' retreat, after graduating from college. Best known for her short story collections, Flannery O'Connor has received honors including an O. Henry Award and the National Book Award. Flannery O'Connor battled lupus, an autoimmune disease, for over 10 years, ultimately dying in Milledgeville, Georgia. Tillie Lerner Goldfarb Olsen, an American writer and social activist known for writing powerful novels focusing on the interior lives of the working poor, women, and minorities, have drawn attention to long-neglected female authors and inspired the development of academic programs in women's studies at the university level in the United States. Olsen gained popularity, especially among scholars, throughout her lifetime, cited by the American Academy of Arts and Letters as having created a "fresh and poetic form of fiction." He earned nine honorary doctorates, winning fellowships and residencies at artists' colonies despite his complicated relationship with his past, including the fact that he never completed high school. The second son of his parents, members of a largely Jewish and socialist self-defense league that sought to end the injustice and brutal programs of Tsarist Russia, he lived in Minsk before his father was arrested after being identified as a he had taken part in the failed Russian Revolution of 1905. Faced with death or exile in Siberia, Samuel Lerner fled to England, adapting to the language before emigrating to New York City in 1906. Hashka Goldberg, who was given the title Ida by immigration officials, followed his example in 1907 when they moved to Omaha, Nebraska, home of Samuel Lerner's maternal relatives. Samuel Lerner and Ida Goldberg never married, but raised six children while remaining reformists in the Workers' Club. Tillie enrolled at Omaha's Central High School in January 1925 and within a year began a humor column in the school newspaper. An experimental child, she had an unplanned pregnancy at age 16, which forced her to withdraw from school due to an "illness" before miscarrying and then returning to school. She did not graduate from Central due to withdrawal or expulsion, although the cause is unknown. His parents' socialist values ​​influencedstrongly Tillie Lerner, but she began to live independently and joined the Young Communist League. Abraham Jevons Goldfarb, a practicing communist, took Tillie with him to her parents' home in Stockton, California, on Tillie's eighteenth birthday. The rest of the 1930s were spent crusading for the U.S. Communist Party in the Midwest, marrying Abraham Goldfarb on February 14, 1931. Abraham and Tillie returned to the Midwest in the fall of that year after Tillie was arrested for her involvement in fomenting workers' protests. Her contracting of tuberculosis while incarcerated earned her release, moving to Omaha and then Minnesota after her photo was released to the local Omaha newspaper. During her stay with Abraham Goldfarb's sister, Tillie began to recover and write (Reid). Significant events occurred during the lifetimes of authors Flannery O'Connor and Tillie Olsen, changing and shaping both the United States and the world. The first diesel-powered automobile trip, from Indianapolis, Indiana to New York City, New York, has been completed. Hostess Twinkies were invented by Jimmy Dewar and the United Kingdom, Japan and the United States signed the London Naval Treaty which regulated submarine warfare and limited shipbuilding. The last recorded lynching of African Americans in the northern United States occurred with the hanging of Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith in Marion, Indiana. President Herbert Hoover asked Congress (United States) for $150 million for the public works program to help create jobs and better stimulate the economy. The United States, over time, occupied Haiti, fought alcohol prohibition, faced the Dust Bowl, and endured the Great Depression. These events and circumstances had a great impact on the lives of Tillie Olsen and Flannery O'Connor, in turn influencing their literary works. Tillie Olsen's "I Stand Here Ironing" and Flannery O'Connor's "Everything That Rises Must Converge" both focus on the toxic relationship of a mother and child. Although Tillie Olsen's mother in "I Stand Here Ironing" is a mother figure to multiple children, the plot focuses on her eldest daughter, Emily. Emily's mother, compared to Julian's mother in "All That Arises Must Converge", raises her daughter as a product of "eager, not proud love". Julian's mother, by contrast, uses every opportunity she presents to brag about her son's accomplishments, despite his lack of pride in himself. Julian and Emily each grew up without a father figure for part, if not most, of their lives. The lack of the father figure is replaced and compensated for in different ways; Olsen's mother chose to send Emily to a convalescent home in the countryside where she would be provided with the kind of food and care that her mother is unable to provide, and then expected to provide care for her siblings younger and to accept Bill (her mother's new husband) as a new father figure. Julian's mother was "a widow who had fought fiercely to feed, clothe, and send [Julian] to school and who still supported him." Mother-child relationships are not always positive, despite the effort made by one of the parties involved. Emily made an effort to connect with her mother in various ways. Julian, however, rejected his mother due to the annoyance she caused. Julian is ashamed of his mother and the prejudice she and like-minded people hold against people of color. Tillie Olsen's "I Stand Here Ironing" is a mother's monologue in response to a school counselor's request to talk about her oldest daughter, Emily. . In theher monologue, the mother recalls the obstacles presented by the Great Depression and the consequences they had on Emily. As the child of a single mother, Emily was sent into the care of inadequate and indifferent caretakers, “daycare centers that are just parking lots for children” (Olsen 447). Her mother spends a lot of time worrying about Emily's well-being rather than caring for her, and instead of allowing her to be a child and act her age, she encourages her to care for her four younger siblings by acting as a second caretaker. . Even when circumstances improved in her mother's second marriage, Emily was again separated from the family by contracting measles, sent to a convalescent home where Emily learned isolation as a result of minimal contact with her parents and discouragement of close bonds (Werlock) . “I Stand Here Ironing” is a story that follows in the wake of the Great Depression and World War II, drawing parallels between two generations represented by the unnamed 38-year-old mother and 19-year-old daughter, Emily. Tillie Olsen's story highlights the difficulties faced by a working single parent and the effects these challenges have on children. The circumstances exemplify the difficult times faced by Americans during the Great Depression, demonstrating the poor quality of life as stated by the mother in her reflections: “We were poor and couldn't afford her the easy growing soil” (Olsen 451). The very title of the story is an echo of the erasure and reforming of the mother's emotions, in the physical act of eliminating wrinkles with an iron (Snodgrass). “All that arises must converge” by Flannery O'Connor is set at the beginning of the civil rights movement when the South was still segregated. Many of Flannery O'Connor's stories involve the Christian concepts of sin and repentance, and "All That Arising Must Converge" deals specifically with the sin of pride, which Catholics view as an attempt to place human power and ability above of God's. Set in the South, Flannery O'Connor's story focuses on two white characters: an older woman who sees herself above others around her because of her racial heritage and her well-educated son university, and her son, Julian, who considers himself better than his mother. based on his open-mindedness and freedom from stereotypical racist views. The plot of the story revolves around a bus ride into the city for her mother's trip to the YMCA for her reduction class, and the hat she so carefully chose and paid for to be worn by another woman, a black woman, on the bus. Abby Werlock's analysis concludes that: “Self-discovery despite self-deception becomes the main thematic emphasis of this tale. Ironically, however, both Julian and his mother go from an inaccurate self-image to the stark realization that the character traits they prize so highly are actually petty and worthless” (Werlock). Julian's forced interaction with people of color on the bus ride proves this. that he is tolerant and free of racial prejudice, proof of the superiority of his mind over that of his mother. His mother, knowing that the act was out of spite, feels superior to Julian, as his actions were callous and reckless, placing value on the heart rather than the head. Flannery O'Connor's use of repetitive imagery in the purple hat, the one chosen so carefully and thoughtfully by Julian's mother, worn by a black woman boarding the bus with a child helps to emphasize the similarities between these women , which Julian happily points out to his mother. Julian fails to see the similarities between him and the black child, given that 2019.