James Hurst (1)

I read this short story in an English class in high school, and it made a huge impression on me. I know this because some fifty years later I remembered it in amazing detail. It is perhaps the best example of symbolism and foreshadowing you will ever encounter. It is to symbolism what The Raven is to alliteration. But there is more to it than a study in symbolism. It is a story about pride, about cruelty, and about selfishness that is self-destructive. It is about the complication of loving someone who is imperfect and the desire to reshape them into our own idea of what they should be, and it is about the elusive quality of beauty and its fragility.

In the first paragraph, James Hurst writes, “The last graveyard flowers were blooming, and their smell drifted across the cotton field and through every room of our house, speaking the names of our dead.” I find that beautifully descriptive and strangely poignant. I can picture the setting and smell the pungent flower aromas that carry within them the promise of decay. That decay is evidenced in the person of Doodle, a little boy who was born with physical defects that might have taken him immediately, but instead left him weak and dependent, the sweetest and kindest of souls, with a brother who is anxious to have a friend and playmate who can run and swim and row and who tries, against all odds to make that happen.

There is an element of hope and determination about the story that I love. Doodle’s life might have meant nothing at all if not for this boy who torments him into walking and running against the protests of his own body. Doodle sees all the beauty of the world, he is captured by it, but it is the brother who gives him that chance; the brother who believes.

This story is heartbreaking. Its ending screams of consequences, of the cost of pressing too hard for something that is forbidden, of failing to think beyond the present or realize the implications of loss. But, there is that hopeful side as well. Doodle was not supposed to live, but he did, he was not supposed to walk, but he did, and his life had meaning and purpose, brought joy and achievement. Our narrator did not smother his brother in his crib (a thought he claimed to have had), and his life was richer for knowing him, and mine was richer for reading this story. Thank you, Mr. Hurst.
… (mehr)

By far the best short story I have ever read. This is a great example of not judging a book by its cover. I say this because at first the main character wanted to kill his brother just because he looked weird and he was ashamed of him. However, once he got to know him he turned out to be a pretty good brother. They would play a lot and the main character tried to teach Doodle (name given to brother because he looked like a doodlebug when he crawled) how to walk. They tried to do all of this before Doodle went to school so that he would not look as different then the kids at school. At the turning point of the story they see a scarlet ibis that was up in a tree probably got suck up there due to the storm that past through. Everyone just felt bad for it and started to walk away, but Doodle went and buried it the right way. Next Doodle and his brother went to Old Women Swamp to finish their training. While rowing in the swamp a huge storm comes along and they begin to run home. However, the protagonist feels this is a good time to have Doodle learn how to run fast. He keeps running until he can no longer hear Doodle calling him. He turns around and Doodle is nowhere to be found. While going back to look for Doodle he sees him underneath a shrub and you will need to read it to figure out what happens. I would want everyone to read this because it is easy to read but it is a great story.… (mehr)