The Scarlet Ibis with some comparison with Flowers For Algernon

The Scarlet Ibis focuses more on the settings, details and feelings, in contrast to Flowers For Algernon, which focuses mainly on events. The Scarlet Ibis is what people would call "beautifully written" due to the detailed description of the settings, the very in-depth feelings of the narrator and et cetera. The Scarlet Ibis is supposed to be more emotionally upsetting than Flowers For Algernon due to the reader reading a lot about Doodle and thus bonding more with Doodle, whereas in Flowers for Algernon, Algernon only appears only once or twice and the reader does not have much chance to know more about and like Algernon and in the end, Doodle and Algernon died. However, many people and I felt more sad after reading Flowers for Algernon than The Scarlet Ibis. Why?

Well, most beautifully written stories seem more like a dream and more distant, due to the detailed descriptions of settings and feelings, which makes the story more realistic but distance the reader from the story. Most beautifully written story seems dreamy, because less events happen and the story mainly focuses on the narrator's feelings.

However, in other less beautifully written stories, there are more events, the character's feelings and the settings probably only accounts for one-thirds of the story in total, whereas in most beautifully written stories, the character's feelings and the settings account about three-quarters of the story. Even some beautifully written stories with only one-third dedicated to character's feelings and the settings seem dreamy due to the fact that the action is not really action at all. If you read "The Grey King" by Susan Cooper, you will know what I mean. Beautifully written stories are probably selected through the in-depth feelings of the characters, the beautifully detailed settings and/or the little suspense, which is strangely enough to keep the readers reading the story. Also, The Scarlet Ibis feels distant because it is a recount.

James Hurst titled the story "The Scarlet Ibis" because it is a symbol in the story which represents Doodle. Both died to a storm, an powerful natural force that pushes them beyond their limits and cause them to die of exhaustion. When Doodle died, he looked like the Scarlet Ibis, and the narrator called Doodle his "scarlet ibis" at the end of the story because both are rare: the determination and amazing "resurrection" of Doodle as well as the rareness of the scarlet ibis. Since they are rare and not harmful, they are precious, as said by the narrator after Doodle died. Doodle was the narrator's pride and joy because the narrator put in a lot of hard work to teach Doodle to walk, run, swim et cetera. Also, in the dimension of love, there is another dimension: pride. The narrator loved Doodle, but it was also because of pride that he wanted Doodle to be normal.

The Scarlet Ibis has no clear message. It tells us, of sorts, not to push people beyond their limits but are we not supposed to go beyond our limits, a message repeated many times?