The Question and Answer section for The Optimist’s Daughter is a great The focus is on the characters, particularly Laurel (The Optimist's Daughter) and her struggle to reflect and process love and loss, move ahead in a healthy way to the present from the past. Then, when he dies, she feels a kind of cosmic horror around her experience of guilt. When she started to want more than he was willing to give her in her allowance, she began stealing from him. Was this the perfect crime? For the best example of this, consider Fay, who admits that in a sick, twisted way, she did want her husband to just die already. The Optimist's Daughter is the story of Laurel McKelva Hand, a young woman who has left the South and returns, years later, to New Orleans, where her father is dying. Welty writes, “As far as Laurel had ever known, there had not happened a single blunder in their short life together. Judge McKelva, his daughter, Laurel, and his new wife, Fay, are all anxious about the surgery and what might happen. The Optimist's Daughter is a compact and inward-looking little novel, a Pulitzer Prize winner that's slight of page yet big of heart. You've reached the "hub" for any and all Dramatica analysis of The Optimist’s Daughter.In addition to the Storyform, you'll also find any additional analysis or media related to the story in question.. More Analysis → The Others. I loved the description of the sewing woman, Miss Berna Longmeyer. About The Optimist’s Daughter. The old saying "The home is where the heart is" takes on a special meaning in Eudora Welty's, The Optimist's Daughter. Why is she so insistent on the truth? After all, Welty is well-known for combining Southern religious motifs with horror. We are thankful for their contributions and encourage you to make your own. The Optimist's Daughter is the story of Laurel McKelva Hand, a young woman who has left the South and returns, years later, to New Orleans, where her father is dying. The Optimist’s Daughter (1973) Posted on March 26, 2014 by veritysayles. Where does The Optimist's Daughter rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far? Besides To Kill A Mockingbird, this is the first time I am rereading a book. to “The Optimist’ Daughter”. After you claim a section you’ll have 24 hours to send in a draft. Then, when he dies, she feels a kind of cosmic horror around her experience of guilt. A NURSE held the door open for them. The Optimist’s Daughter: Readers’ Guide Developed by Lee Anne Bryan, Former Education and Outreach Specialist for the Eudora Welty House and Garden 1. Birds seem to be everywhere in the book. Winner of the 1973 Pulitzer Prize. GradeSaver, 2 July 2019 Web. Why? The Optimist’s Daughter, Pulitzer Prize -winning short novel by Eudora Welty, published in 1972. Learn vocabulary, terms, and more with flashcards, games, and other study tools. Making Peace with the Past. Save this story for later. The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty is an emotional story about Laurel McKelva Hand who travels to New Orleans to be with her father for an eye surgery. Outliving is something we do to them. In her life, she has always just been motivated by her desires. Laurel has a air of maturity and understanding around her due to her experiences in life.3.3In "The Optimist's Daughter" Judge McKelva will soon enter eye surgery to fix a slipped retina. The optimist in question is 71-year-old Judge McKelva, who has come to a New Orleans hospital from Mount Salus, Mississippi, complaining of a "disturbance" in his vision. How does Laurel come to terms with both of their deaths? An editor The New Yorker, March 15, 1969 P. 37. The whitened floor, the whitened wall and ceiling, were set with narrow bands of black receding into the distance, along which the Not affiliated with Harvard College. The novel begins with Judge McKelva, Fay, and Laurel in an examining room, with Dr. Courtland determining what … udora Welty's novel, "The Optimist's Daughter," which first appeared in The New Yorker of March 15, 1969, is a miracle of compression, the kind of book, small in scope but profound in its implications, that rewards a lifetime of work. How does this establish the central conflict of the novel? The Optimist’s Daughter: Synopsis By Suzanne Marrs Eudora Welty Foundation Scholar The Optimist’s Daughter is a short novel divided into four sections. What do we learn about Laurel and Becky through Fay’s behavior? The Optimist’s Daughter is a quiet novel. He fails to recover from the surgery, though, surrenders to his age, and dies slowly as Laurel reads to him from Dickens. These notes were contributed by members of the GradeSaver community. The Optimist’s Daughter is one of the books that I am assigned to read for a workshop I’m taking in February.I can’t quite believe I’m about to admit this on the internet, but I had never read Eudora Welty before I picked up this book – not even that short story “Why I Live at the P.O” that is in every short story anthology known to man. I bought this copy of The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty at a Japanese bookstore in New York City this past summer. Ultimately, that is the horror of Welty's Optimist: the sublime possibility that perhaps we will all be judged in the afterlife. The Optimist's Daughter is typically analyzed through the themes of memory and vision. Search. What memories does Laurel have of her parents and books? The Optimist's Daughter is a compact and inward-looking little novel, a Pulitzer Prize winner that's slight of page yet big of heart. What is the impact of withholding details about Phil under the last section? [Eudora Welty] -- Laurel Hand is forced to face her Southern past when she returns to Mississippi for her father's funeral. WorldCat Home About WorldCat Help. Standard. It builds slowly, like the logs of a fire stacked with precision and lit with kindling, first on one side, then another, then another, until finally the coals in the center are hot enough to engulf the pile into a steady, even flame, perfect for cooking. In The Optimist's Daughter Laurel is forced to make peace with her past and her present in order to go on with her future.The event of her father's death is difficult for her because she enjoyed a loving relationship with him, and even more so because his recent marriage to Fay, a selfish, impatient woman, forces Laurel to accept circumstances beyond her control. After his death, she and her silly young stepmother go back still farther, to the small Reading plays an important role in the novel. The Optimist’s Daughter study guide contains a biography of Eudora Welty, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis. Laurel thinks, “The mystery in how little we know of other people is no greater of how much.” What does this mean? thoroughly enjoyable What was one of the most memorable moments of The Optimist's Daughter? Judge McKelva was a tall, heavy man of seventy-one who customarily wore his glasses on a ribbon. As the story unfolds, we learn more and more about Laurel and her relationship to her parents. What kind of woman is Fay? It’s The Optimist’s Daughter, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1973. The novel begins with Judge McElva, Laurel, and Fay in the examination room with Dr. Courtland. Read the Study Guide for The Optimist’s Daughter…, View Wikipedia Entries for The Optimist’s Daughter…. This novel seems perfectly normal on the surface, but a considerate reader will notice that the observations Welty draws about human nature are actually quite macabre, and perhaps even disturbing. The optimist in question is 71-year-old Judge McKelva, who has come to a New Orleans hospital from Mount Salus, Mississippi, complaining of a "disturbance" in his vision. In subsequent work, including The Golden Apples, The Optimist's Daughter, and her memoir, One Writer's Beginnings, she made the color line and white privilege visible, revealing the gaping distances between lives lived in shared space but separated by social hierarchy and segregation. From there, she embarks on a deeply personal journey to explore her past and her family in order to make sense of her future. She has to wonder what the nature of life really is. The Optimist's Daughter. In private conversation, she observes that he never really caught on, but she was always just using him because he gave her so many chances to fulfill her desires. Set primarily in Mississippi, it's the story of Laurel McKelva Hand, currently living in Chicago, visiting the South where her father is failing. Of course, there was no intimacy, so she often desired sexual company, and—not giving it to her own husband—she tells us that she found affairs. The Optimist’s Daughter study guide contains a biography of Eudora Welty, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis. Judge McKelva was a pillar of his community. March 7, 1969. Recurrent in Welty’s fiction, including The Optimist’s Daughter, is the paradox of the family as both nurturing and stifling. This is another book with a strong female lead character. A Form to Story. The Optimist’s Daughter deals with family relationships, as do the earlier novels Delta Wedding and Losing Battles and many of Welty’s short stories. She has to wonder what the nature of life really is. Be the first to comment on The Optimist's Daughter is the story of Laurel, a widow who returns to Mississippi when her father is ill and witnesses his death and funeral. One: Judge Clinton McKelva and his much younger second wife (Fay) have come from Mount Salus, Mississippi, along with his daughter, Laurel McKelva Hand, from Her description tells a deep story about that exact time in the south. Welty's novel contains a number of autobiographical elements. resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel. Her marriage to Phil, at least as Laurel remembers it, transformed her shyness into loving responsiveness. A home is a place where one can restore themselves because it gives one a sense of comfort. The Optimist's Daughter is the last and perhaps the finest novel by Eudora Welty.Although better-known as a short story writer, Welty also produced a number of excellent works of longer fiction. Each of the four sections provides greater insight about loss. Start studying Optimists Daughter. In other words, she has to wonder about the true nature of death. Judge McKelva going first, then his daughter Laurel, then his wife Fay, they walked into the windowless room where the doctor would make his examination. An exceptional sensitive, lovely read. "The Optimist’s Daughter Study Guide: Analysis". But now, he is dead. The Optimist's Daughter is a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winning 1972 short novel by Eudora Welty.It concerns a woman named Laurel, who travels to New Orleans to take care of her father, Judge McKelva, after he has surgery for a detached retina. Its style is at the service of a story … The optimist's daughter. You can help us out by revising, improving and updating The Optimist’s Daughter: Readers’ Guide Developed by Lee Anne Bryan, Former Education and Outreach Specialist for the Eudora Welty House and Garden. The Optimist’s Daughter By Eudora Welty About the book…. In other words, she has to wonder about the true nature of death. Because she has not figured out her ego-centric issues, because she is just beginning to understand the stakes of human responsibility. The Optimist's Daughter Quotes Showing 1-30 of 40 “The mystery in how little we know of other people is no greater than the mystery of how much, Laurel thought.” ― Eudora Welty, The Optimist's Daughter The Optimist's Daughter won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973, and is a short but stunning work. Home. So the novel asks the question. This partially autobiographical story explores the subtle bonds between parent and child and the complexities of love and grief. After his death, she and her silly young stepmother go back still farther, to the small Mississippi town where she grew up. Summaries of each section follow. About The Optimist's Daughter; The Optimist's Daugh… this section. In this short novel, the death of Judge McKelva prompts Laurel and Fay, who are his daughter and wife, to connect with their own homes. The optimist's daughter illustrates Laurel's memory of Phil perhaps more than anything else shapes her life and dictates her thinking. The novel begins with Judge McKelva, Fay, and Laurel in an examining room, with Dr. Courtland determining what is wrong with Judge McKelva’s eye. Surviving is perhaps the strangest fantasy of them all.” How do these words summarize the theme of the novel. 1. By Eudora Welt y. The Optimist’ Daughter By Eudora Welty Genre: Literary Fiction Buy Now This book is on reading list for February 2019 Discussion Questions. Tabor, Mason. In her life, she has always just been motivated by her desires. In this scene, Welty gives the reader a sense of the main characters’ personalities. After his death, she and her silly young stepmother go back still farther, to the small Mississippi town where she grew up. Study Guide for The Optimist’s Daughter. What do they represent? Notice that later when Laurel begins to talk about herself, Fay is disinterested and rude. Read more. Save this story for later. will review the submission and either publish your submission or provide feedback. The Omen ← But the guilt of outliving those you love is justly to be borne, she thought. This Pulitzer Prize–winning novel tells the story of Laurel McKelva Hand, a young woman who has left the South and returns, years later, to New Orleans, where her father is dying. Why is this important to her? 8 people found this helpful. The novel begins with Judge McElva, Laurel, and Fay in the examination room with Dr. Courtland. It’s divided into four parts and even though I’m going to summarize each part, I’m really not giving much away about the book because it is a … Search for Library Items Search for Lists Search for Contacts Search for a Library. Will she get away with it, so to speak? Expanded from a story published in The New Yorker magazine in 1969, The Optimist's Daughter was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1973.. Copyright © 1999 - 2021 GradeSaver LLC. THE OPTIMIST'S DAUGHTER by Eudora Welty ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 18, 1972 Those who didn't enjoy the topsyturvy eccentricity of Losing Battles will be happy to find Miss Welty back in the changeless countryside of her earlier short novels where memory is the eternal revenant keeping alive places and people often in the mortmain of the past. The fantasies of dying could be no stranger than the fantasies of living. Of withholding details about Phil under the last section the complexities of love and grief restore themselves because it one. 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