Art should be an active and important part of one’s life, not merely something that is to be displayed and observed at a distance from time to time. Alice Walker’s short story “Everyday Use” depicts quilts as a form of artistic work to portray the importance of art being a living and breathing part of the culture from which it arose. The origin of the quilts in the short story symbolizes the history …showed first 75 words of 393 total…

…showed last 75 words of 393 total…value. When the narrator, Mrs. Johnson, the mother snatches the quilts from Dee and gives them to Maggie, Walker is explicitly expressing that the expressive value of art is of primary importance. For art to be kept alive it must be put to “everyday use,” and remain connected to the culture from which it originated in a personal and emotional manner. NOTES 1 DiYanni, Robert. Literature – Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Boston. The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc, 2000.