Quilts

"Quilts"

In the Alice Walker story, "Everyday Quilts", the readers learn that there are many more uses for quilts than just hanging them up on display.

Quilts have several uses. You can show your quilts off to friends and family by hanging them all around your house. Quilts can be used to keep you warm on a chilly night. Quilts are also family heirlooms that are passed on to the next generation for many years to come.

In this story, Maggie and her mother are living the simple life. Maggie has been badly burned and scarred from the fire that burned the old home to the ground. "Maggie is like a lame animal that has been run over by a careless person rich enough to own a car. She sidles up to someone who is ignorant enough to be kind to her" (Walker 107).

Maggie has a sister whose name is Dee. Dee is the child who has Ð''made it'. She has never has ever told her no. She gets everything she wants and she wants only nice things. "She wanted a yellow organdy dress for graduation and black pumps to match her green suit." She says she will come home from school in Augusta to visit Maggie and mother someday.

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When Dee does finally come to visit, she brings home a friend with her. Her friends name is Asalamalakim. Immediately, after she has arrived she starts taking pictures of her mother and Maggie. She even includes the house and a cow. She then tells her mother that she can not bear the name Dee anymore so she has changed her name to Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo.

After they go in and sit down to eat Dee (Wangero) ask mother if she can have the churn top and dasher. She will use the churn top as a centerpiece for the alcove table. As for the dasher, she will have to think of something artistic to do with it.

Then Dee (Wangero) asked if she could have the old quilts. Her mom says "Why don't you take one or two of the others?" Dee is not pleased. She wants a certain few quilts because they are made from pieces of old dresses her grandmother used to wear, and grandmother has done all the stitching by hand.

Mother then tells Dee (Wangero) that Maggie has already been promised the quilts when she marries John Thomas. "Maggie can't appreciate these quilts!" Dee (Wangero) says. "She'd probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use" (Walker 111).

"I reckon she would," Mother said. "God knows I have been saving Ð''em for long enough with nobody using Ð''em. I hope she will!" (Walker 112)

Dee was now looking at her mother with hatred. "You just will not understand. The point is these quilts, these quilts!" "I would hang them." Dee acts like that is all you should do with them.

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Mother refuses to give Maggie's quilts to Dee. Dee is told to get a few of the others. Instead