Eudura Welty uses the setting in this story, not only love for her grand son but also how life was in the South. It could also reference the many struggles of black Americans. Every place she goes and every people she meets is related to the theme of this story: her hardship life as a black women and grandmother who has ill grandson. Forest, the white man and Hospital are used for main setting of this story.
The forest that she has to go through means hardships and trials. Phoenix says the suffering that she feels when she goes through the forest: “Seem like there is chains about my feet, time I get this far”.Welty indicates the pain of Phoenix’s life as a black and old woman by showing appearances that she disperses a bush. Also she likened the hardship to forest (deep and still wood).
When Phoenix looks behind her where she had come, she thinks that it seems easy when she looks down from the up; however there is also a trap: “up through pines, now through oaks. ” Pines and oaks both mean hardship of life, which means that life is same as the path that there are uphill and down hill. Her duty is indicated by a little boy, an illusion that she see while she mounts the log.It revels when she goes to a hospital that Phoenix must travel a dangerous path through the forest in order to get medicine for her dear grandson.
She meets the dangerous trap consistently: “so she left that tree, and had to go through a barbed-wire fence. ” “Through the maze now” Racial discrimination is revealed by a white hunter with black dogs. The white hunter is prejudiced just because she is black, so he assumes that she is going to the town to ask for charity and she is like a child calling her "Granny": “I know you old colored people!Wouldn’t miss going to town to see Santa Claus! ” Also, it is factor of the racial discrimination for white hunter to threat the black dogs by the gun. Because white hunter could be referred to the white race black and dogs could be referred to the black race: “Phoenix heard the man running and throwing sticks, she even heard a gun shot. ” Both the lady who ties her shoes for her and the first attendant at the clinic call her "Grandma"; the attendant rudely asks whether she is deaf because Phoenix does not immediately reply to her outine questions.From that point on, she consistently treats Phoenix with rudeness because she thinks that Phoenix is stupid.
When he asks what she is doing, Phoenix responds “Lying on my back like a June bug waiting to be turned over, mister,? ” reaching up her hand. This demonstrates that women are often in a helpless position in a male-dominated society and depend on men, in this case, literally. The social obstacles that encumber her on her journey are the most difficult problems to overcome.When she go to hospital, she is very embarrassed since she does not know how to read the prescription of the medicine: “I’m an old woman without an education.
” Instead, she has to look for a gold emblem of the doctor’s office that helps her to recognize the right medicine. The nurse’s attendant scorns her because Phoenix does not feel comfortable talking in the office: “Speak up, Granma, what’s your name? Have you been here before?... Are you deaf? Cried the attendant,” All these social obstacles are because of her race.
She has to go through discrimination all for the love of her grandson.She has saved the grandson’s life by enduring long-suffering journey and discrimination and gave him life just as her name says she would. In all, it is a heart-touching story that focuses on the sacrifice that a grandmother makes to keep her grandson alive: “ This is what come to me to do, I going to the store and buy my child a little windmill they sell, out of paper. ” Phoenix demonstrates a miraculous ability to accept the harsh circumstances of her life. Phoenix's path is worn not only because she had to travel it so many times, but also because it symbolizes the path traveled by poor and oppressed people everywhere.
