The Power of Language in Winesburg, Ohio

The book  Winesburg, Ohio is full of modernist attributes, obviously of course; it is a modernist novel. It has many interesting attributes such as the search for ontological understanding and tightening of the form. But what has really stood out to me is the level of detail and meaning that is packed into seemingly meaningless places. As a modernist attribute, this is referred to as "language is not transparent".   Just as the title "hills like white elephants" was meticulously crafted to provided deep insight into the story, there are many examples of this attribute being put to use throughout the stories we have read in Winesburg, Ohio.

                In the story "Paper Pills" an ordinary scene at the doctor's office turns out to have deep and symbolic meaning. When the woman walks into the office, there is a woman in a white dress getting teeth pulled. This at first does not appear strange or unusual seeing as that is something that doctors do perform on a routine basis. However, this scene is crafted to deeply describe the emotional state of the woman. There are blood stains on the white dress which represent the impurity of the woman as she us no longer pure virginally. Also it is important that the teeth are being pulled because that indicates great personal change, which in the woman's case, represents her recent pregnancy.

                Another important example of this specific word choice is incredibly important is during the story, "Mother". In the story, Elizabeth decides to murder her husband, Tom, with scissors. A little strange, but at this point I've easily realized that nobody is completely normal in this town anyways. Anderson could've chose any weapon of choice- gun, machete, ninja turtles- but he decided to go for scissors specifically; and it wasn’t because it was the first idea that popped into his head. Elizabeth is experiencing a metaphorical reverse oedipal complex in which she wants her son's affection and sees the dad as a rival. Therefore the death by scissors represents the castration anxiety that is associated with the oedipal complex.

                I'll be honest, many times these deep symbolic meanings go right over my head. I read over the word scissors and did not bat an eye. But I guess that while reading any book, especially modernism, it is imperative to be mindful that each and every word could have a deep meaning. Sometimes, when these ideas are presented in class, I think to myself that it might be a little farfetched or just flat out crazy. But when reading modernism, you have to express those crazy ideas and consider the fact that they might actually be true.