The Character of Alice in Animal Dreams :: Animal Dreams Essays

The Character of Alice in wight Dreams She is dead. She does not appear physically plainly haunts mentally. She is Codi and Hallies mother Alice, the late married woman of Homero Noline. Throughout the novel Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver, Alice impacted the characters, action, and theme(s). When Alice passed away she took berth of Homer with her. What she left was a misfit of condemnation and circumstance an emotionally distraught and distant man who attempted to resemble a father but veered much towards the tin man. Homero existed beyond his wife as only a page out of an instruction manual, the one with the caution statement. Homeros delicate tinder decided that the only way to endure Alices death was to flush some(prenominal)(prenominal) remembrance or resemblance of her out of his fortified technical farming which throughout the novel becomes increasingly skewed. Kingsolver pushes home this idea by omitting Alice from any of Homers frequent flashb acks which are usually mishaps from the past involving his daughters. These incidents are his only memorial of his daughters estranged childhood in which he strained to create tricksy and unmothered women. Homers fear of becoming attached to anything which reminded him of Alice resulted in an unorthodox childhood for Hallie and Codi. Homero was more of a child mechanic than a father. Retaining only his technical cleverness after Alice died all he could do was provide his kids with orthopedic lieu and the correct medicine. When not fixing Codi or Hallies present or future day ailments Homero took photographs of natural objects and slyly transformed them into man- made devices by doing what he seemed to be best at, distorting frames. Codi, similar to her father mentally blocked out her past. Her childhood remained within her as only a series of stained and position memories. Codi attempted to follow in her fathers emulsion lined footprints, fixing all one of li fes problems with an internal wrench. By approaching life from behind this falsified image Codi managed to distance herself from everything and everyone who could have hurt her. One aspect of life and time in which Codi was bred to be distanced from is the past. As Codi grew older she