In the short story “The Flowers”, protagonist Myop, finds herself wondering through the woods independently to seek a nervously journey. Myop was a ten year old girl who wanted her own path to find what was needed for her family, and wanted no help. The narrator mentions in the story that her mother took her several times through the woods before to “gather nuts among the fallen leaves”, “Today she made her own path, bouncing this way and that way” (76). Along her journey, Myop finds herself nervously curious on what she sees during the time. The author mentions that “it seemed gloomy in the little cove in which she found herself. The air was damp, the silence close and deep” (76). This could be a form of imagery because the sights she began to see made her uncomfortable. These sights were “the strangeness of the land that made it not as pleasant as her usual hunts”. “Causing her to circle back to her home, back to the peacefulness of the morning” (76). This imagery in this story prepares the reader for this climax.
In the short story The Flowers by Alice Walker, the author uses foreshadowing AND imagery to show how Myop lost her innocence throughout the story. In the story, Myops innocence is shown by the setting of summertime. The narrator uses true, calming imagery in the beginning of the story to influence the idea of Myops innocence. An example of this being done is shown when the narrator states, The air held a keenness that made her nose twitch. The harvesting of corn and cotton, peanuts and squash, made each day a golden surprise that caused excited little tremors to run up her jaws (Walker 76). After that, the narrator changes her diction in the following paragraphs to foreshadow the disturbed scene that Myop is about to encounter. An example of this is shown when the narrator states, It seemed gloomy in a little cove in which she found herself. The air was damp, the silence close and deep (Walker 76). Myop had found a farmer and a noose that he used to hang himself with. Before she encountered the farmer, she was picking flowers, and when she sees this dead man, she sets down the flowers as a sign of respect for the farmer who killed himself. The narrator brings this story to a very dim ending with the statement, And the summer was over (Walker 77).
