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Conflict In “A Worn Path” - School Essays

Conflict In “A Worn Path”

Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path” is a short story about an old black woman who periodically makes a journey to town. In this story Phoenix Jackson faces many trials on her way to town. Many of the conflicts she faces seem insurmountable but her strength enables her to overcome them. Phoenix Jackson’s health, age, sanity, state of poverty are all conflicts in “A Worn Path.”
Phoenix Jackson has many trials to overcome in “A, Worn Path.” One of them is her health. As Phoenix travels through the forest “she carried a cane which she tapped at the frozen earth in front of her”(Welty 1). There are two theories about this one of them is that she has an old body and needs the cane to help her ...

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that she is advanced in years, and as she makes the journey to town periodically it becomes harder and harder for her.
Another is a question of her sanity. Support for the theory that Phoenix is losing it “ when she sat down to rest … she dared not close her eyes and when the little boy brought her a plate with a slice of marble-cake on it she spoke and said ‘that would be acceptable’. But when she went to take it there was just her hand in the air” (Welty 2). This statement implies that she is hallucinating. It could be from the strenuous journey, but it is believed that it is because she is fighting a losing battle with sanity.
The last conflict in this story is a question of which society does Phoenix live in. Where she could not have the medicine delivered to her house “Why would she have to travel all the way from the country side to the city by herself to get the medicine” (Roberts Paragraph 1). She also lives in a state of poverty because the woman in town says “it is ...

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Conflict In “A Worn Path”. (2008, December 16). Retrieved January 13, 2026, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Conflict-In-A-Worn-Path/94734

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 12/16/2008 11:27:06 PM
Category: English
Type: Premium Paper
Words: 481
Pages: 2

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