Ms. Lyons
ENGL110
8 November 2013
Molly and Liza
Imagine going through over half of your life searching for the person you fell in love with. Many years go by and you still have no idea how their life is now. Everything that was remembered of that love has changed and not being sure if their feelings for you are even the same as they once were 25years ago. This is just the story in author Charles Chesnutt's "The Wife of His Youth". The female characters Liza Jane and Molly Dixon have similarities and differences in appearance, background, and their relationship with Mr. Ryder.
Chesnutt describes Liza Jane as a little woman not more than five feet tall, her eyes were restless and she looked very old. She had thousands of wrinkles on her face and her hair was short and a thick texture of gray. Liza Jane also wore a really worn down blue gown with a small red shawl fastened with an old broach, and an old bonnet with faded red and yellow artificial flowers. Chesnutt states that "she is so black that her toothless gums, revealed when she opened her mouth to speak, were not red, but blue"(Chesnutt 3). Charles Chesnutt describes Molly Dixon as the complete opposite of Liza Jane. Ms. Molly Dixon was everything that Liza Jane was not, she was young and the epitome of what a Blue Vein is suppose to be.
Liza Jane like the average slave was not well educated, she spoke in Negro Dialect which is a variation of the regular English language. Liza was born in Missouri and belong to a man named Mr. Bob Smith, she was on her second marriage and that was to a Mr. Sam Taylor. Liza was the cook, and Sam was hired by Mr. Smith after his parents had died. Chesnutt describes that the maid of Mrs. Smith comes rushing out of the kitchen and tells Liza Jane that master was going to sell Sam down the river. Liza states that her husband in free so the maid needs to stop talking, however she continues to tell her that she overheard master telling his wife that he was taking...