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Lilianna Collura-Lambright

Mrs. Dott

H English III

29 November 2017

Socratic Seminar Questions (​The Glass Castle​ by Jeannette Walls)

Transcendentalist Thoughts

1. Rex and Mary are transcendentalists because they count on self-reliance rather than

conformity and believe that spontaneous feelings and intuition are superior to deliberate

intellectualism and authority. Rex’s dependence on himself and spontaneous feelings are

shown from the very beginning, as he depended on cheating in gambling to help feed his

family and rushed Jeannette and Mary out of the hospital, when they were healthy

enough to go, to avoid paying fees. Rex also has a problem with the “boss man,” and

doesn’t hold a job for very long in the series and refuses to get jobs in certain places

because of this. These things definitely do not conform to social standards. Mary is

determined to rely on her own skills throughout the book, for example, when the Wallses

lived in the desert, she could find water where no one else could, and knew very well

how to survive on very little water, and by refusing welfare, she also refuses the

government, and reveals that she believes they’ll be fine without it. Since romantics are

more focused on the past, transcendentalists are much more progressive in how they view

things, because they do things that haven’t been done that work out well for them, as how

Rex and Mary lived for a while before their life went very far downhill that they had to

live with Rex’s mom.

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2. Self-reliance is reliance on one’s own powers, resources, or knowledge rather than those

of others. The Walls family often exhibits self-reliance in this book. For example, early

on in the story, Jeannette boils herself some hot dogs. “I was three years old… I was

standing on a chair in front of the stove… I could hear Mom in the next room singing

while she worked on one of her paintings” (Walls 9). The three-year-old Jeannette

depended on herself to boil hot dogs while her mom was in a different room, while her

mother encouraged this self-reliance, letting her boil her own hot dogs often (11). This

resulted in a bad fire injury, but Jeannette made hot dogs for herself again after she

returned from the hospital, and her mother congratulated her on her self-reliance (15).

These events are examples of transcendentalism because Jeannette’s mother doesn’t

conform to the custom and rationality of keeping her children away from dangerous

places while they’re young. Another example of self-reliance is shown when Jeannette

reveals that her mom, “knew how to get by on next to nothing [in the desert]. She

showed us which plants were edible and which were toxic. She knew how to find water

when no one else could” (21) Jeannette’s mother relied on herself to determine what was

safe to eat, and what water was safe to drink, and she helped keep herself and her family

alive with that knowledge. This is an example of transcendentalism due to it focusing on

self-reliance rather than any external authorities. Later, on page 193, a man from child

welfare visited the house Jeannette and her family lived in at the time. Jeannette was the

only one home, and she deflected his questions, relying on herself to keep the family

together. “He’d launch an investigation and end up sending me and Brian and Lori and

Maureen off to different families… I couldn’t let that happen” (194). Jeannette
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effectively answered the welfare man by using her intuition and knowledge, which are

traits of transcendentalism. Self-reliance is useful in some cases and dangerous in others.

For example, it’s useful when Jeannette’s mother can find water in the desert, but it’s

dangerous when she refuses to accept welfare and has her family depend on her unstable

working habits.

3. Non-conformity is defined as failure or refusal to comply with rules, standards, or

practices. This is shown throughout the story in nearly every decision Rex and Mary

Walls make. For example, Rex’s disdain for “the boss man”, which put the Wallses in

financial stress, is far different from ordinary life. Although people are whimsical, they

have to stick with a job to support their family. Most people don’t like bosses, but

prioritize surviving well over that feeling. Next, moving from town to town to avoid bill

collectors, as Rex called it, “doing the skedaddle,” is an example of non-conformity to

the law, and many people get arrested for tax evasion. Tax evasion isn’t as severe as not

being able to or being unwilling to pay bills, but it’s an example. Most people would try

to get financial help when it comes to not being able to pay bills, so his behavior is

definitely not conformative. Thirdly, the pit the Wallses began filling with trash since

they couldn’t afford the garbage removal service in Welch was a big sign of

non-conformity, because everyone else in the town didn’t have to do that and it was

abnormal from tradition to do that. Now, some people living in less urban areas burn

trash, but in a lot of places that’s illegal, let alone keeping the trash in a pit in one’s yard.

We, in the U.S, live in a society founded by the idea of nonconformity in the sense that

all people can do what they want to and ideas, creativity, and progress will be encouraged
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but, sadly, current society does not follow this idealized society it claims to be. Rather

than encouraging nonconformity, our society disapproves of those who don’t conform, or

follow conventional standards. People are shunned, outcast, and not taken seriously for

thinking or acting differently than others.

The Glass Castle

1. The most major example of achieving the American Dream in ​The Glass Castle​ is

Jeannette, who worked hard along with her siblings and was able to get a good job by

moving up the ropes in the journalism career. She began with little to nothing and having

to scavenge for food and deal with rude and plain disturbing people, but she finds her

way to stability. She finds a husband and lives in a very nice place, whereas when she

grew up she lived in all sorts of places, usually not very well off. This is her achieving

the American Dream of rising up the ropes and achieving a stable budget, home, and

family.

3. The events we remember are either life-changing ones, ones associated with extreme

emotion, or both. I could not tell a true story of my life without embellishment and

selective fact selection even if I were trying not to, because people remember things as

they perceive them, and some things people are afraid to admit. Since a “true” story

would be from one perspective, the reader wouldn’t get the whole picture, and would

perceive the story based on how the author perceives it, and based on the details they

include. Small details can change how someone views a story dramatically, so life stories

can’t be considered one hundred percent true, however, how the author remembers their

life story is usually the only point of view one would get. In the case of ​The Glass
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Castle​, Jeannette was narrating, since it was her life she explained, and that’s the truth the

audience would know unless someone could prove a major event wrong.

4. If it isn’t damaging to other people, a free choice is a free choice no matter if mental

illness is involved or not. The person may be very happy with that choice, even if it isn’t

conventional. When mental illness doesn’t allow someone to make fair judgements, what

they choose may be the only obvious option in their mind. To some people, like Rex and

Mary Walls, they belong homeless and working with what they have developed over the

years. To others, wanting a home and living well is their goal. There should be a moral

responsibility to do something about homelessness in the U.S. since many people are

willing to accept help, work, and have a home if they can. Similarly, there are cases in

which there shouldn’t be a moral responsibility to help homeless people; if helping would

be against the person’s will, it may be better to let them remain content than being made

to do things they don’t want to do. Some people value their pride and skills very much,

as Rex and Mary did, and would only feel contained and thrown back onto the

“merry-go-round of life” as mentioned in the Twilight Zone episode we watched in class

recently. Everyone deserves to have money for food and needs, which is why the people

who are willing to accept help should be given it. An example of this would be the food

and gift drives held in schools and soup kitchens around the state. Although “needs” like

Mary’s art supplies might not be important for us, they were to her, and were probably

the main reason she stayed relatively stable sometimes, which should be respected but not

necessarily funded like food is.

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Final Requirement (One Insightful Question)

1. Did Rex and Mary Walls do a good job raising and teaching their children? Why/why

not?

● The Walls children ended up successful (except for Maureen ☹), but they had to

go through a lot of hardships caused by their parents to be able to do that.

2. Likewise, how does the same home environment create different people?

● Referring to Maureen compared to the other Walls children. I assume she turned

out differently because she was only very little when the Wallses lived in the

desert, and that’s where Jeannette linked most of her good memories before things

went downhill. There’s also the fact that she grew up with a bunch of friends in

Welch who influenced her.