The Glass Castle

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Ideally, in the eyes of a child the world is sublime, boundless. However, in her memoir the Glass Castle, Jeanette Walls unravels the unfathomable and dysfunctional truth of her adolescence. Unfortunately, because of a lack of parental guidance and protection, Walls and her siblings experience an early loss of innocence, a theme she expresses throughout her memoir. Growing up with negelctful parents, the Walls children had to basically raise themselves. On numerous occasions they went hungry and had to find alternative ways to keep from starving. During one of Rex Walls’ unemployment periods, his children began to scavenge for food since they did not have any in their home. Brian even snuck into his neighbor’s house and stole a jar of pickles. …show more content…
However, at the young age of thirteen, Jeanette confessed that “[she was] going to get out of here because [her] father [was] not going to build [her] a castle, and if anyone [was] going to build a glass castle, it better be [her], because he’s not going to do it” (Appalachian Perspective…). So at the expense of their parent’s neglect, Jeanette and her siblings conjure up a plan to move out and start anew. They save enough money to send Lori off to New York, and then the rest follow in her footprints shortly after. The Walls children took on the responsibilities in New York that their own parents were blind too. Rex and Rosemary Walls’ neglect caused their children to grow up too fast and move away to a place where they could make something of themselves despite their arduous …show more content…
Smart was 14 years old when she was kidnapped by knife-point from her room by a stranger, whom the author later addresses as Brian Mitchel. Smart was held captive by Mitchel and his wife, Ilene Wanda Barzee, for nine months, however the author suggests that her family, practically her father, never lost faith in her return to safety. While the author claims that the details concerning Smart’s mental and physical state during her captivity are still unknown, Smart was different after her rescue. She was in a state of constant of fear. On several occasions she had the chance to escape, but instead she remained silent, making frequent public appearances with Mitchel and Barzee. The author suggests that another reason for Smart’s reluctance to leave her kidnappers was her Stockholm syndrome, which is when a victim forms a bond with thier captors. A psychologist, Robert Butterworth, stated that “young victims are usually in awe of the power of their kidnappers” (Dirk) and that Smart’s captors tried “to strip away layer by layer her identity and her belief system”
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