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INSTITUTO SUPERIOR ANTONIO RUIZ DE MONTOYA

Historia y Literatura
Norteamericana
A Worn Path, Literary Analysis

Alumna: Garrido Nara Elizabeth

Profesora: De Giacomi Ana Carolina

Fecha: Diciembre, 2018

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Garrido, Nara
Lic. De Giacomi, Ana Carolina
English 3rd instance
Date: December 3rd, 2018

A Worn Path, Literary Analysis

Written by the American short-story writer and novelist Eudora Welty, “A Worn Path” is a story
about the struggles and challenges that an old Negro woman has to overcome in order to get
some medicine for her only grandson, who accidentally swallowed lye some years ago and has
his throat damaged because of that. Welty uses vivid language throughout the story in order to
make the reader create a full picture of the landscape and the characters, as well as the situations
that takes place in the story. The author, who was born in Jackson, Mississippi, is well-known
by her stories about the American South, and this is one of those cases, since the main character,
Phoenix Jackson, makes the journey along the Natchez Trace to Natchez town, which -despite
being a small town by the time the short story was written- compared to the solitude of the place
where she lives, Natchez might seem to be a big city to her. The author makes use of a great
number of symbols and allusions, as well as many other literary devices such as similes,
comparisons and vernacular language, to make connections between the path the old woman
takes to get the medicine for her son and the historical background of African American people
in which they were taken as slaves, and all the difficulties they had to overcome throughout
history in order to obtain their freedom.

To begin with, A Worn Path is a short story written in different dialects, in which Welty uses
African American Vernacular English in the conversations between Phoenix and the severa l
characters that appear in the story. Vernacular language is defined as “a literary genre that uses
daily-used language in writing and speaking. It is different from written works, as they normally
follow the formal variety of language. The word “vernacular” refers to writing or speaking of
the public.” (Literarydvices.net). The African American dialect is also known as Ebonics, and
what differentiates it from standard English are the different characteristics of the dialect such as
the omission of the verb to be 'Who you watching?', the use of double negatives “Don't let none
of those come running my direction” or the change in aspect-subject relation such as in “I
doesn't mind asking a nice lady to tie up my shoe [...] ”. (Welty, Eudora). The use of the
vernacular in the story portrays the background of the main character, since she is known from
the beginning of the story to be “an old Negro woman”. Therefore, it adds meaning and
characterizes Phoenix as being part of the African American people in the United States.
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In addition, Welty uses rich, vivid language to describe the circumstances that take place in the
story. The use of similes and comparisons in A Worn Path helps the reader picture the situations
as if they were observing a photography, thus making it seem more realistic as in “Her skin had
a pattern all its own of numberless branching wrinkles and as though a whole little tree stood in
the middle of her forehead”. In this passage ageing is lively depicted by the comparison of the
wrinkles Phoenix has in her face to the many branches a tree can have, thus letting the reader
interpret that she is very old and fragile. The author uses other similes that appeal to the smell,
therefore bringing to the reader’s minds not only pictures, but aromas, too, as in the followin g
example “she gave off perfume like the red roses in hot summer.” (Welty, Eudora)

The writer uses a large number of symbols that add meaning to the story, and that represent the
different struggles that the main character goes through along the story in order to achieve her
goal. First, the time the story is set in, that is to say, Christmas time, is meaningful to the story
since it symbolizes mercy and charity. Christmas is time for love and sacrifices, which is the
main purpose of Phoenix. Her unselfish and endless love for her grandson makes her go all the
Trace to Natchez in order to get his medicine and in doing this she has to go through countless
obstacles, which can be seen as a huge sacrifice bearing in mind her age and physical state.
Moreover, charity is reflected in many parts of the story, from the moment that the hunter helps
her get out of the ditch or when the young lady ties Phoenix laces, to the time when the
attendant gives her a nickel. But charity is not always portrayed as a loving, helping hand
without expressing any judgement; it also implies a small amount of racism since the people
who Phoenix encounters with along the story treat her inferiority, as it is portrayed in the
following example when she enters into the hospital:

She entered a door, and there she saw nailed up on the wall the

document that had been stamped with the gold seal and framed

in the gold frame, which matched the dream that was hung up

in her head.

'Here I be,' she said. There was a fixed and ceremonial stiffness

over her body.

'A charity case, I suppose,' said an attendant who sat at the desk

before her. (Welty, Eudora)

In this citation, the attendant rudely assumes that Phoenix is a poor woman, judging from her
Afro-American complexion and oldish appearance. In addition, when the nurse gives Phoenix
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the medicine for her grandson, she confirms that they give her the medicine as a means of
charity making a mark in a box.

Another symbol which is meaningful to the story is the very same path that the main character
takes to make her trip. This path symbolizes Phoenix’s life. Along this path, there are many
different obstacles and challenges that she has to undergo in order to reach her main goal. It is
not a plain, easy trail, as life is not easy either. What is more, life is loaded with misfortunes and
adversity; there are obstacles that need to be gone through to achieve success; there are
moments in life in which, despite the desire of giving up, a person needs to persevere and
overcome the vicissitudes. The adversities of the path are implicit in the following example:

The path ran up a hill. 'Seem like there is chains about my feet,

time I get this far,' she said, in the voice of argument old people

keep to use with themselves. 'Something always take a hold of

me on this hill—pleads I should stay.' (Welty, Eudora)

Here, she is implicitly comparing the severe fatigue she is suffering when going up the hill, to
the times when she was a slave, and the pain she must have felt in her feet because of the heavy
chains. Thus, it can be understood that the path that she must take to get the medicine is not an
easy one, and that she goes through a lot of adversities when going to the town.

In addition, the medicine that Phoenix obtains to help her grandson adds another dimension to
the symbol of Phoenix’s path of life. The medicine Phoenix obtains may help her grandson hea l
and recover his voice, which is very damaged because of the injures provoked on him some
years ago because of drinking lye. There is a connection between this and the ultimate goal of
the journey of life, which is to nurture the next generation. Phoenix wants her grandson to
recover and have an opportunity in life and the same happens with old generations to the new
ones. Contemporaries prepare the path for future generations, for them to have better
opportunities. They have hope, as the faith Phoenix has in her grandson healing. Moreover, the
recovering of Phoenix’s grandson’s voice is not just a detail at random. Finding one’s voice is a
strong metaphor for achieving a sense of empowerment and social justice, and the improvement
on the little child’ health is an allegory of the reassuring of future African American
generations.

Furthermore, Phoenix is a symbol in herself. Welty made a clever choice of the name of the
main character, since a Phoenix is a mythological creature that lives for hundreds of years
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before burning into ashes, as it is stated in the dictionary, it is “an imaginary bird that set fire to
itself every five hundred years and was born again, rising from its ashes” (“PHOENIX |
Meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary.”) This allegory to the mythological bird reflects
the main character’s determined nature, in consideration of the adversities she endures and the
unbreakable spirit she has in order to undergo every single hurdle in her life.

Another literary device that the writer uses that bonds the story to the historical background of
African American people in the United States is allusion. The following example, “I never did
go to school—I was too old at the Surrender” (Welty, Eudora) refers to the end of the Civil War,
when Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses Grant in Appomatox Court House, Virginia in 1865,
after which the Thirteenth Amendment brought slavery to an end, and with this many black
children who were still in school age had the possibility to be educated. However, it can be
elicited from this passage that Phoenix lived her childhood as a slave and by this time, she was
beyond school age. Phoenix was born a slave, and it connects the struggles on the journey, to
the struggles has undergone her whole life as a victim of slavery.

To conclude, A Worn Path is a short story about determination. It does not just tell a story of a
grandma who extremely loves her grandson, but about an entire society that had to overcome
the most dreadful experiences in life, as it had been slavery, punishments and inferior treatment
at the hand of white people. The literary devices in this story had not been randomly selected,
but deliberately chosen by the author, since by virtue of each symbol, allegory, comparison or
simile it is implied all the racism that African Americans had suffer throughout history, and the
struggles that they underwent in order to gain their freedom.
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Works Cited

Hawai`i Creole English, English Language Institute,

www.hawaii.edu/satocenter/langnet/definitions/aave.html.

LitCharts. “Phoenix Symbol Analysis.” LitCharts, www.litcharts.com/lit/a-worn-

path/symbols/phoenix.

“PHOENIX | Meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary.” Cambridge Dictionary,

dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/phoenix.

“Robert E. Lee Surrenders.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, www.history.com/this-day-

in-history/robert-e-lee-surrenders.

Shmoop Editorial Team. “A Worn Path Setting.” Shmoop, Shmoop University, 11 Nov. 2008,

www.shmoop.com/a-worn-path/setting.html.

“Vernacular - Examples and Definition of Vernacular.” Literary Devices, Literary Devices, 30

Sept. 2017, literarydevices.net/vernacular/.

Welty, Eudora. “A Worn Path.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 21 Sept. 2018,

www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1941/02/a-worn-path/376236/.