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Contributions from: Kirsten, Kelsey

Kelsey >>> in Greenleaf, he names of the characters symbolize certain meanings. Mrs. May symbolizes the month of May and more importantly May Day and the sexual drive within all of us. This name also connotes nature and a masculine drive.The name "Greenleaf" shows how connected to nature this family actually is, not only that but they also live near the wood. Being that the Greenleaf's are more connected to nature, they are more basic and truthful. The boys work for a living and they don't just expect a good life like Mrs. May does.

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(444) "the bull, silvered in the moonlight, stood under it, his head raised as if he listened -- like some patient god come down to woo her...He took a step backward and lowered his head as if to show the wreath across his horns."

Kirsten >>> The bull seems to be a symbol of Jesus -- framed in light and wearing a crown across his horns, like Jesus wearing a crown of thorns; a force that inevitably meets Mrs. May at the end.

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(445) "She had been aware that whatever it was had been eating as long as she had the place and had eaten everything from the beginning of her fence line up to the house and now was eating the house and calmly with the same steady rhythm would continue through the house, eating her and the boys, and then on, eating everything but the Greenleafs."

Kirsten >>> Mrs. May has the sense of some greater force slowly swallowing everything that would normally cause her to feel more important than others like the Greenleafs. In reality, she knows that she is somewhat of a failure, while the Greenleaf boys, for example, are more successful than her and her sons.

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(446) "if the Greenleaf boys had risen in the world it was because she had given their father employment when no one else would have him."

(449) "Well, no matter how far they go, they came from that."

(450) "If the war had made anyone, Mrs. May said, it had made the Greenleaf boys."

(452) "'O.T. and E.T. are fine boys,' she said. 'They ought to have been my sons.'"

Kirsten >>> Mrs. May frequently points out how inferior she finds the Greenleaf boys, stating that their success was due to her, or due to the war, never just because of their own doing. The underlying reason that she does this lies in her realization that the Greenleaf boys, people who by her definition are trash, are more successful than her sons who were born into a good family. She seems to reject the fact that although she and her sons come from privilege, they have none-the-less failed to live up to their expectations.

Kelsey >>> Mrs. May is unable to accept the fact that her boys may not be as successful as the Greenleaf's kids. She thinks that her kids should automatically be better because they come from a higher class background. Throughout the whole story she tries to glorify the meager accomplishments which her boys have reached and at one point she even says that the Greenleaf boys should have been hers because they were so successful. Mrs. May expects that because she comes from a upper class background she deserves the better kids: this goes to show that she is shallow and merely wants to look good in front of others.

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(448-449) "Mrs. May stopped still, one hand lifted to her throat. The sound was so piercing that she felt as if some violent unleashed force had broken out of the ground and was charging toward her."

Kirsten >>> Mrs. May's confrontation with religion -- Mrs. Greenleaf's over-emotional idea of Jesus, that is -- foreshadows her final confrontation with the bull at the end of the story.

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(449) "She was a good Christian woman with a large respect for religion, though she did not, of course, believe any of it was true."

Kirsten >>> It's interesting the difference between how Mrs. May and how Mrs. Greenleaf think of religion. Mrs. May uses religion as a social tool -- it's only for appearances, while Mrs. Greenleaf believes deeply, almost over-emotionally, in the powers of Jesus.

Kelsey >>> This is another story in which someone assumes she is Christian, but practices none of the principles that come with this title. Mrs. May is the opposite of Mrs. Greenleaf: she is self-satisfied and superficial, thinking that she is a good person, while Mrs. Greenleaf realizes her own faults and prays.

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(451) "They had no worries, no responsibilities. They lived like the lilies of the field, off the fat that she struggled to put into the land. When she was dead and gone form overwork and worry, the Greenleafs, healthy and thriving, would be just ready to begin draining Scofield and Wesley."

(457) "'I'm the victim. I've always been the victim.'"

(454) "'[the bull] don't like cars and trucks'"

(463) "She remained perfectly still, not in fright, but in a freezing disbelief...One of his horns sank until it pierced her heart and the other curved around her side and held her in an unbreakable grip."

Kirsten >>> Throughout the entire story, Mrs. May is preoccupied with the injustices she's been served in life. When she meets her fate with the bull, I think she finally comes to terms with this injustice and accepts it as inevitable. I also believe that Mrs. May purposely sets herself up for the final encounter with the bull since she decides to drive into the field even though Mr. Greenleaf had told her that the bull didn't like cars. In the final two pages, Mrs. May also seems to experience a certain peace -- her tiredness, her contemplation about the past and future -- which also leads me to believe that sh [Kirsten -- the email stopped here -- did you have more to say?? -- M

Kelsey >>> In the end, Mrs. May is confronted with the truth about life and nature: she realizes that it does not matter how society views her. "Through her closed eyes, she could feel the sun, red-hot overhead. She opened her eyes slightly but the white light forced her to close them again." (p. 426) For Mrs. May to realize that her assumptions are false about her superiority over the Greenleafs she has to be brutally stabbed with a bull's horn.

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