The Sheriff’s Children
This short story is completely different than the ones written in the Europe, that we had read. The problems dealt in it are closer to the society problems of today, and then were issues of previous stories. Everything evolves the Civil War and the difference between the North and the South norms.
The plot is set in a county that seemed to be stuck in time, making it being different then everything else around it. The time is set to be about ten years after the war and the mixture of cultures is clearly represented even by the vernacular style of the “slaves” and the more educated people. The difference in the talking also presented the way those characters differed in thinking and possibly even intelligence.
What I especially like about this short story is that throughout it you are made to believe how the sheriff, the only educated and the voice of reason in the story will be the flawless and perfect protagonist. You are made to believe how he never done anything wrong, and that other characters in the story would have been doing so many wrong things, not only with their lives, but also with the lives of other innocent people, and that everything could go wrong if sheriff wasn’t there. But then, by the end you realize even he isn’t perfect, and with not making the right decision of regretting the mistake from the past, he was being punished with the ultimate guilt stamp mark on his soul.
The Goophered Grapevine
This is another story with the plot set around the consequences of the Civil war and how the South looked like after it. “But the house had fallen a victim to the fortunes of war, and nothing remained of it except the brick pillars upon which the sills had rested.”
What is so special about this story is that it is written from a standpoint of a slave after the Civil war and what the life through his eyes looked like. This story was extremely difficult for me to read and get in to the “what is it all about.” I figured because the author wanted to portrait the speech of the “venerable-looking colored man”, she he had to use the vernacular style.
Jean-ah Poquelin
This is yet another Southern Gothic story, for it was written with the shadow of the Civil war and South and North differences.
From the beginning we are encountered with the Gothic element symbolizing the old ways, before the war – ruined, old plantation. That is where the plot is set on. The plantation is set away from the civilization indicating that everything around it will submerge to change, but the character in the plantation will stay unaffected by the change, stubborn, stuck with the old ways.
In my opinion this was a sad story of how cruel the ignorance can be. Jean-ah Poquelin was being judged for not living the life everyone else was, for being different. Since no one was brave enough, stories that engage the imagination of characters started to circle around, but that is where the Gothic elements got their opportunity to spice up the short story.
The story of two brothers, one stubbornly sticking to his opinions and ways, contradicting the norms and ways of the modern society, and the other brother considered to be dead. At the end the author discovers how wrong everyone was with their judgments and comments, and their false accusations that made life of poor Jean-ah Poquelin miserable. Everyone was sure Cain killed Abel, even me as a reader, was so sure Jean-ah killed his brother, were at the end we discover his brother was sick with leper, hiding from the society.
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