Character Comparison

In life, we face and overcome many challenges and struggles that help to define and build who we are. According to Orrison Swett Mardon, “Most of our obstacles would melt away if, instead of cowering before them, we should make up our minds to walk boldly through them.” Ruth, Jade, and Marie do exactly that. Ruth McBride-Jordan in The Color of Water is a Jewish immigrant in America who desperately struggles to search for her identity in a time of great prejudices. Breaking free from her abusive father and religious intolerance, Ruth undergoes trials and changes that create the extraordinary life she leads. Love Medicine’s Marie-Lazarre-Kashpaw experience’s a difficult life full of responsibilities, but despite the destruction around her, she manages to keep her head up high. In The Fifth Chinese Daughter, Jade Snow Wong is a young woman trapped between her traditional Chinese teachings and the American beliefs. Jade’s longing for independence and knowledge pushes her to defy the odds against her. These spectacular women from different backgrounds, despite their many differences, share similar struggles. Ruth McBride-Jordan, Jade Snow Wong and Marie Lazarre-Kashpaw each come to a crossroad of difficult decisions as they face troubles with their family, and lose a loved one, in order to grow into the strong, independent women they are.

Each of the characters comes across a point of darkness in their lives, forcing them to make a difficult decision. After leaving her home in the South, Ruth tries to make it on her own by working in Harlem and meets Rocky, who, unbeknownst to her, is a pimp. When she finally does realize this, she gets lost in the night life in an attempt to forget her past, and almost ruins her future. Ruth even says, “...a prostitute, which I almost did become.” (McBride, Pg.172) She gets past this when she fesses up to Dennis McBride, and realizes her error when she sees how disappointed he is. Ruth then returns home to Bubeh, her grandmother living in New York, and gets a decent job at a diner. Jade Snow comes across a similar, yet different problem when she is unable to acquire the scholarship for a university. She starts to consider not going to college at all if she can’t go to a university until her friend, Joe, says to her, “…makes you so sure that junior college won’t teach you anything...Once you stop school, it’s hard to go back.” (Wong, Pg. 119) After her conversation with Joe, Jade Snow goes to a junior college which becomes the foundation of new following successes. Both Jade and Ruth face their crisis when they attempt to break away from their families, but Marie’s predicament is the exact opposite. When she finds out, through a letter, that her husband and the man she loves, Nector Kashpaw, is cheating on her with another woman, she is torn. Her desire to keep her family together puts her in a difficult place. In the end, Marie chooses to leave him in question by switching the sugar shaker with the salt shaker that Nector places on top of the letter. She describes her thoughts on her choice of action as, “…what this Marie who was interested in holding onto Nector should do…I did what I never would expect of myself. I lifted the sugar jar and put the letter back. Then I thought. I put the sugar down and picked up the can of salt. This was much more something I would predict of Marie.”(Erdrich-Pg.165) Ruth, Jade and Marie make it through their darkness and in turn, grow emotionally stronger by analyzing their situation and coming to terms with what they really want for themselves.

Socialization happens within the family structure, which determines the basis of a person’s character. Family structure is not perfect, and with these imperfections come problems that result in self-growth. Growing up, Ruth is molested by her hypocritical rabbi father and forced to take care of her handicapped mother, a sister and the family’s convenient store. As she gets older, she severs her ties with her family, mainly because, as Ruth puts it, “I’ve been dead to them for fifty years... They want no parts of me, and I don’t want no parts of them.” (McBride, Pg.1). This arrangement, perhaps, works out for the better, when Ruth converts to Christianity, marries, has children and is happier than she would have been had she stayed with her family. She explains her thoughts on her transition by stating, “Rachel Shilsky is dead as far as I’m concerned. She had to die in order for me, the rest of me, to live.” (McBride, Pg.2) Like Ruth, Marie also grows up in an extremely dysfunctional family. Marie is from the Lazarre family who are characterized as irresponsible, filthy, drunk thieves. She describes her mother as, “…the old drunk woman who I didn’t claim as my mother anymore.” (Erdrich, Pg.85) Marie deals with her family by ignoring them instead of dealing with the problem head on. This choice affects her own ability to hold