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Myop, once blissful and energetic, stumbles across a corpse as the atmosphere becomes unsettling and grim. This dark atmosphere represents Myop's coming of age as she "[lays] down her flowers...the summer was over," leaving her innocence behind as she discovers the evils of her world.

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In "The Flowers" by Alice Walker, Myop quickly loses her innocent and pleasant view of the world when she stumbles upon a person who has been lynched. Myop's walk shows us when we are young are world is small, "She was ten, and nothing existed for her but her song". Young people have little experiences of the world and when they see evil for the first time it matures them.

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Myop slowly went from a child of innocence, light, and exuberance to a child of eerie curiosity, darkness, and no emotions. Myop realizes that the world is not just made of pretty, pink roses, but instead each death comes with a gruesome story.

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At the end of the story, the final setting symbolizes Myop coming of age. Walker uses the last 3 lines to set a dark and grim setting so at the end of the story Walker writes that "the summer was over". Walker uses the metaphor of the summer and the grim background to show how Myop will have to grow up in a dark world.

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"The Flowers" depicts a dark, coming-of-age story because of the abrupt shift in plot. Myop, an eager and naive girl, leaves her home to graze the field for flowers, feeling "light and good in the warm sun." But, when Myop stumbles upon a lynched body, all of the lightness and innocence is abruptly taken. The text explains, "it was only when she saw his naked grin that she gave a little yelp of surprise." Just as Myop went to return home to her normal, worry-free life, she spots the body of a man who was lynched, signifying the shift of her maturity.

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In "The Flowers", Myop goes from her happy and worry-free attitude to a more concerned attitude which represents the darkness that comes with growing older. In lines 47-48, "Myop laid down her flowers. And the summer was over", the author is implying that Myop's protection from real-world sorrows is no longer there. Throughout her walk, we see her change from skipping around happily without thinking about heavy topics, like that of death, to feeling more serious and concerned. This walk teaches us that children can only be sheltered from the sad truths of the real world for so long, before they eventually have to face them.

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The setting shifts at around line 26, after Myop veers a mile from home, when "the strangeness of the land made it not as pleasant as her usual haunts." The story started with a light-hearted and innocent atmosphere, but it begins to turn to a gloomy and eerie mood, which leads us to Myop seeing the hanging man. The first environment represents an ideal world, where everyone still has their innocence. Then, the shift exemplifies the reality of time period in which the story was written.

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"The Flowers" starts off as a light summer story, but suddenly takes a dark turn when the main character comes across a dead body. She discovers a skeleton of a previously lynched man lying in the grass. She can even see the noose that hung him hanging from the tree. It shows readers how quickly life changes in an instant. It teaches readers just how fast the innocence of childhood can be diminished as she discovers this horrifying sight. In line 47 when "Myop laid down her flowers." It shows her innocence of childhood being lost.

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The significance of Myop "[laying] down her flowers" (46-47) at the unmarked, unofficial grave was to symbolize her sorrow. The sorrow she felt was for whoever was tragically killed from the lynching and also the sorrow for herself and the fact that "the summer was over" (48) and she had lost her once innocent, carefree childhood.

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The setting description at the beginning of the story evokes the feeling of innocence and childhood when at one point, everyone was a child. Myop is described as "skipping lightly" (1) and each day is "a golden surprise" (4). Myop "felt light and good in the warm sun" (8). Within the setting, she can be the child who she is, but once the setting shifts, her innocence is symbolically lost.

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The setting contributes to Myop's character because it shows the happiness of her youth through the use of imagery associated with light and joy. From the descriptive techniques incorporated in the setting, the audience is able to understand the beauty and innocence of her youth. Myop "skipped lightly from hen house to pigpen" and "the air held a keeness that made her nose twitch" (Walker 1-3). This quote illustrates how Myop's upbringing correlates to the area she has been raised in and how she views the world because of it.

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The story goes from Myop bouncing along the path and collecting flowers ,and then to her lost, confused, and far from home. The shift is clarified when the author states she is "a mile or more from home" and "the strangeness of the land made it not as pleasant as her usual haunt". Indicating she is far from the familiairty and peace of her home, and the calmness of the spring. The shift from bouncey and sunny to eerie and lost is foreshadowing to her later findings.

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The setting at the exposition of the novel lends eager, innocent, and youthful aspects to Myop. Her environment radiates childlike eagerness, with the "air [holding] a keenness that made her nose twitch" (2-3). This characterizes Myop as joyfully inquisitive. Additionally, her surroundings parallel with her youth because there are no flaws, just as an innocent child views the world.

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In the beginning, the setting is bright and beautiful. The weather is sunny. Everything seems magical and perfect. This setting contributes to Myop's characterization of being innocent and jovial. Myop was at first joyful and sunny. The stream represents serenity. Myop was at peace as an ignorant child. She did not know about racism and hate, she was innocent and joyful.
"It seemed to Myop as she skipped lightly from hen house to pigpen that the days had never been as beautiful as these... till it ran into the stream..."

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Explain the significance of Myop's gesture at the short story's conclusion.

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How is "The Flowers" a dark, coming-of-age story? What does Myop's walk teach readers?

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How does the atmosphere at the end of the story contribute to Myop's characterization? In other words, how is the final setting symbolic of Myop?

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How does the setting in the beginning of the story contribute to Myop's characterization? In other words, how is the original setting symbolic of Myop?

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How and where does the setting of the story shift? Explain the contrast between the two environments in detail and what the contrast parallels.

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The flowers are a physical representation of the change felt in the air and it makes Myop excited, but after finding the body, these flowers have suddenly changed in meaning - especially the wild pink rose, Walker writes, "Very near where she'd stepped into the head was a wild pink rose." Personally, I view the pink rose as being used to symbolize the loss of innocence, not just for Myop but also for the man who was killed. When you think about roses, you either think of the white ones (which symbolize purity) or the red ones (which could either symbolize love or blood), but the first thing that came to mind for me was this innocence being tainted by external forces (racism, segregation, Jim Crow, etc.) and creating this pink rose. Not only has the idea of the change in seasons been tainted because of this experience, but so has Myop's perception of herself and her place in American society.

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At the end of the story, Myop "laid down her flowers" by the man who had been killed. This is a symbolic way for to honor the memory of man who had been killed unjustly. She laid down her flowers after she noticed the noose lying on the ground. Her laying down the flowers could also be a symbolic way of her letting go of her childhood. The last line in the story tells us that "summer was over" which could be interpreted as Myop's innocence was gone and her putting down the flower she had collected was a way of showing this.