In the Memoir of Jeannette Walls’ “The Glass Castle”, there are many broad themes to explore such as; Forgiveness throughout the book Jeanette and her siblings have come to understand the reason behind forgiveness. Everyone deserves forgiveness and it takes a strong willed good person to utilize it in order for the sake of moving forward. The parents have committed many unforgivable actions that harm the children, but they always manage to forgive there alcoholic father who spends most of their money on alcohol instead of saving up, and there selfish self destructive mother, who did not sell their land in Texas, or when she spends money on art supplies instead of important living expenses and also puts in more care for her hobby rather than her children, even though she has a teaching degree that gives her the ability to hold a proper job. Other themes are loyalty and courage or fearlessness; the Walls children carry these traits vividly throughout the novel. When Jeanette was being bullied her brother Brian always stepped in to save her without thinking about it, or the children always get into fights when people bad mouth their parents, this shows how loyal and courageous they are. The question is could a family survive as long as they have fearlessness and loyalty? Another interesting theme to be explored is whether if children of a family could be more responsible and mature than their parents? The children are put into many situations where they need to take care of themselves, without blaming there parents, that prove that they are more mature than their parents, for example when the parents have no food to provide their children they search and find food from various places, while keeping their thoughts hidden from their parents, because they do not want to cause them problems. One of the biggest themes of the book is domination over adversity. Through the Walls family history, they have been constantly fighting poverty in order to survive. Even though they go through hard moments such as sleeping with no electricity or food, stealing from stores, and running away from debt collectors, all while pretending it was all an “adventure”. They always manage to stay positive and find ways to overcome their problems together.
