Comparing Dee And Maggie In Everyday Use By Alice Walker

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In the short story “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker, most characters have strikingly dissimilar personalities, even if they share the same backgrounds. A good example of this is the difference between Dee and Maggie, the two daughters. In terms of confidence, stubbornness, and willingness to stick by family, both girls seem to have no relation to each other. This ultimately drives a wedge in between them and their mother based on lack of understanding. From the beginning of the story, Maggie is introduced as being “nervous” and that “She will stand hopelessly in corners, homely and ashamed of the burn scars down her arms and legs, eyeing her sister with a mixture of envy and awe.” When she tries to ask Mama how she looks, she hides behind the door, and Mama later compares her to a lame animal, in that she has no confidence. After her sister arrives, the first thing to come out of her mouth is a strained “uhnnnnh,” and not much comes out after that. Dee, however, is described as being always able to “look anyone in the eye.” She has her own sense of style and would never take no for an answer. Apart from this, she is more intelligent than Maggie or her mother and has gone to college; this gives her a sense of entitlement that her sister does not …show more content…
While her sister is insulting her and saying that she shouldn’t have the quilts, she tells her mother that Dee can have them without a fight in a voice “like somebody used to never winning anything or having anything reserved for her.” Dee, who only cares about what’s best for her, does not care that the quilts are for Maggie, though. As her mother tries to reach for them, she steps back because “…they already belonged to her.” Dee only wants nice things and feels she deserves them, so her stubbornness reflects that. Even though Mama eventually sides with Maggie, it still shows that Dee would try to fight for what she thought should be
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