essay about grandma's house

Essay on A Visit to My Grandmother’s House

Every summer vacation, my parents and I go to visit my grandmother. This time too we went to stay with her for a week.

My grandmother stays in a small town near Berlin.

Her house is very beautiful and it is located in the middle of the town. The house has four bedrooms and a huge kitchen. This time when we went to meet her, I found her lovely garden full of beautiful flowers.

She was very happy to see us. We stayed with her for a week, and each day she cooked something special for us. She also baked my favorite chocolate cookies.

The weather there was very pleasant. So one day we all went for a picnic to the lakeside.

At night I slept in my grandmother’s room, and she told me lovely stories. She not only showed me my father’s pictures when he was young but also narrated many funny incidents about my father and his friends.

She gifted me two pullovers which she had knitted herself.

I always feel happy to be with her. I wish I could stay with her for a little longer. I left her house with a heavy heart. She too felt sad about us going back. We promised to visit her soon.

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When thinking of typical grandmother’s house, the first image that comes through person’s mind is probably a cozy comfortable house placed among beautiful natural surroundings, with sunny garden and birds singing all the year round. You may either believe me or not but I was lucky to live in such a house during the years of my happy childhood. My granny owned a grand building which left an indelible impression in my soul. In my narrative I want to recall the most touching moments of my life in that ‘house of wonders’.

It’s common knowledge that the place of our birth and childhood leaves the strongest impressions in our souls. Later it is always nostalgic to recall dear places, where we used to explore the world around during our early years of life. When we recall the place of our childhood, we may feel the very scent of the surroundings. Places where we used to spend good lot of our time make us feel especially nostalgic. And we are often eager to return to those places. When we do return, everything seems to be touchy and cute.

As for my personal experience, I’d like to begin with I’d like to say that I spent my childhood in Florida in my grandmother’s house. I spent there too much time not to remember it in details. As I’ve already mentioned, return to native place always arouses certain feeling of happiness or so. As for me I seem to be lucky that I spent my childhood in the country house of my dear granny. In the course of time visiting old relatives became an excellent chance to turn the time round and to become child once more. Every time I was at my granny she couldn’t help taking care of me. May be that’s why I love to visit her so much. Countryside is actually the nicest place for everybody to have really unforgettable rest. Fresh air always cheers you up and little noise helps to relax to full extent. The years of my staying in granny’s country house in Florida remained the most remarkable years in my life. I remember sand beach, which now became so popular among tourists. I was always fascinated by vast and mysterious sea. I used to walk in the forest which seemed to be full of adventures. Frankly speaking I did millions of things all children usually do in the countryside, but my staying there remained something special and dear for me personally. This impression is completed by the image of my old granny, which is a kind and cute woman, always affable and helpful. All her life she worked hard and now she is still very industrious and tender-hearted. All best moments in my life belong to my granny’s place at Florida. I consider myself to be lucky in this way, because nowadays it became the most visited resort for tourists in the USA. Florida. People tend to come here in any season, because it’s always warm and pleasant. Conditions are ideal in any way. The temperature is always stable and in my early age I was able to bathe all the year round. As I lived in the west peninsula of Florida, Mexican gulf water was especially suitable for bathing. It was warm and pleasant. Apart from this Mexican gulf is less salty in comparison with ocean waters. The water here never hurts eyes or skin. I remember how hot it was in summer when the temperature was about 35 degrees. Bathing however didn’t protect from the heat, as the water itself was 30 degrees. However I don’t really remember whether I suffered much, cause I used to spend the whole days long in the garden or in woods. Speaking about my grandma’s country house I can’t help mentioning that for some reason pensioners tend to buy houses in Florida, cause it is an ideal place for calm and tranquil life. Perfect climate attracts hundreds of people. May be just because of this I felt so satisfied and comfortable there. I don’t remember a moment of unhappiness staying there. However speaking about it, I can’t help mentioning that natural catastrophes often occur in the USA. Unfortunately it especially concerns the state of Florida. In comparison with other states, Florida was more often attacked by various hurricanes, storms, tornados and watersprouts. During my years of childhood, I experienced it on my own. I remember being amazed by this. I always knew much about different storms and tornados, cause I saw them with my own eyes.

There are people who like to move from one place to another, to live in towns, villages or country sides. My grandmother however keeps to another mode of life. During the whole life she used to stay in one place among peaceful hills, mountains, fields, rivers and streams. She has always preferred tranquil life instead of busy world of streets, city traffic, buildings and constant crowds. May be due to this she was never depressed. She was always satisfied with the place where she lived, even though she was deprived of certain modern conveniences. May be due to this I’m never feeling uncomfortable when I return there. There is always warm and friendly atmosphere. The house itself looked impressive, as it was big and old. The ivy was creeping from its red-brick walls. On the whole it seemed to be done in old-fashioned style with its big half-round windows. The surroundings amazed with numerous green trees everywhere. It created an impression of being somewhere in the park or even in the wood. Due to this I often felt a sort of lonely to some extent. It always seemed that trees hid some part of the world from me. Sometimes I felt like being in the jungles. In such moments I deepened into my inner world. In this way such surroundings gave me an opportunity to think over numerous things. Everything seemed to be so friendly that I couldn’t help just admiring it. I consider native house to be the most attractive destination in my life. Warm and gentle climate and the beauty of scenery made me fall in love with those places. I remember there being several lakes, stretching in miles of coastlines. My grandma often took me there to see the beauty of clear waters. Besides I find it outstanding that I could eat grapefruit and oranges right from the trees. It may sound odd but I do miss those happy days.

The house was not so luxurious, but there was something cute in it. From the first sight it was a usual one. There were two vast rooms with wide windows and old-styled furniture. I always felt sort of shy at the sight of those grand apartments. There also was an attic, which seemed to be just as it must be in such old houses. It was full of old things all in dust and disorder. Actually I don’t remember much from my staying there. But one of the strongest impressions was that attic. I was so attracted by the mystery of it that often spends time there trying to reveal its secrets. It’s quite ordinary children’s activity. There was always possible to find something to do. I can’t remember being bored or tired either. I always managed to entertain myself. My granny owned a vast territory of land, so I could always find attractive places to explore. Another impressive thing is federal highway Turn Pike. Actually there are not so many things which can really impress, but as a child, I admired those deserted surroundings. There were great relict swamps which later became national reserves. I dare say there is much to admire. As I spent much time there I can’t help recalling it with cute but painful feeling of nostalgia. These were happy days of my life. But every time I return to those native places, I regret I can’t really return to the past. There is no one living there now. And the house itself changed much from the times of my childhood. But the feeling of tranquility remained. Sometimes I see that narrow path leading to my grandma’s house. Though now it may have been completely hidden with grass. Life changes and we change together with it. But the only thing that remains the same is our feelings. I will always bare in heart the sense of security that I used to feel in my granny’s house.

Time of people’s childhood influences the personality most of all. My life in grandma’s house until the age of 6 made great impact on me. As I used to live in natural surroundings, apart from the city noise, I learned to feel close to nature. Everything in the house was filled with grandeur and I still respect it. And my granny was like a mistress of all those wonders which I’ve met there. I remember even there being a big dog. I don’t know exactly whether it really was big or just I was too little, but for me that dog remained a guard of the house in the first place. So that was actually how we lived. There were three of us: my granny, the dog and me. We used to spend evenings together in front of a big old fireplace. It hardly remained there now, but at that time we sat there, my granny telling me fairy-tales or real stories from life. But I didn’t see much difference cause I was no more than a child. My granny was a talented story-teller and I liked it, but it is a bit painful for me to recall it now. The more I try to remember those times, the more painful it is to continue the narration. Another vivid memory is portraits our ‘ancestors’ looking from large paintings on the walls in the hall. The matter is that the house was not quite usual. It was too old and ancient traditions still remained there. It hard to believe but still…

To know the personality of a person, psychologists make him recall for the earliest memories in his life. If you’d ask me, these would be my first days in the granny’s house, when everything seemed to be sort of enigmatic for a little child like me. I dare say I tried to explore it as deep as possible.

The very atmosphere of the house and its surroundings made me feel calm and relaxed. Sometimes it seemed that time had stopped for a moment for me to admire that world. As I moved from there when I was just 6 years old, I don’t remember much, but I do remember my feelings. The most touching recalling is may be autumn in my granny’s house. I remember it being neither warm nor cold. It just made me feel lonely a bit. I remember me walking among those numerous grand trees and admire colored leaves on the trees and on the ground. I miss that feeling of calmness and stability of the world around. I wish I could return the reality of those feelings once more. But I’ve nothing else to do rather than to keep those memories in mind and never forget about happiness of staying in my grandmother’s house. Even though I didn’t last long, I would never forget it.

References:

1. Tampa Bay Convention & Visitors Bureau ‘Tampa Florida attractions and activities’ ― 2007 http://www.visittampabay.com/ 2. Robertson ‘Tampa Guide’ ― 2006 http://www.tampaguide.com/

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Why My Grandma’s House is My Favourite Place

My grandma’s house is my favorite place, because it represents a “the sky’s the limit” approach to life in my memory. Being at her house instilled in me the wish to fulfil my potential and live my dream, because at grandma’s house I received encouragement I shan’t ever encounter anywhere else in life.

Why do adults yearn for the days they spent at grandma’s house?

The grandparent-grandchild relationship is a two-way deal that benefits both parties. Freed from the ever-watchful parental eagle-eye, a childwill blossom under the indulgent care of grandparents. Liberated from conventions, grandparents feel they can “spoil” their offspring’s children.

Most grandparents “spoil” their grandchildren quite unashamedly. When asked, many grandparents will admit to giving greater emotional support to their grandchildren than they ever did to their own children. This time around they understand children’s needs that much better.

1. Grandparents have had much practice being a carer and provider of emotional, financial and physical support, unlike new parents, who both often have to work to provide the financial support for the family and therefore lack insight into the child’s every day concerns.

2. Meanwhile, grandparents feel that the real responsibility lies with the parents of the child. This frees them from making important decisions about the child’s present state and future. The result is a far more relaxed relationship between child and grandparent.

3. In a grandparent-grandchild relationship there is none of the usual competition between personalities. Although one party is clearly “in charge”, because they are adults, the child instinctively feels that they are friends and allies, rather than authority figures.

4. Abdicating as “authority figure” allows grandparents to enjoy childhood the second time around; grandparents are far more self-confident than new parents, and therefore less inclined to let inhibitions get in the way of having fun.

A recent Oxford University and Institute of Education in London survey revealed that children are generally happier when their grandparents are involved in their upbringing. The study was based on questionnaires completed by 1,596 children between the ages of 11 and 16 across England and Wales. Grandparents generally have more time than working parents, providing advice, problem-solving and support for children.

According to an article published by David A. Coall of Edith Cowan University and his co-author Ralph Hertwig of the University of Basel in the April issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal published by the Association for Psychological Science, grandparents in Western Societies “invest a significant amount of time and money in their grandchildren”, which is why the bond between grandparents and grandchildren is not just very strong, but “magical”. The time spent at my grandmother’s house is exactly that in my memory: enchanted, magical, utterly comforting in hindsight.

Finally, the rooms at my grandma’s house represent not just comfort, safety and childhood innocence, they remind me of a more carefree existence, when anything was possible and life was still full of choices.

1. http://www.grandparents.com/family-and-relationships/caring-for-children/study-grandparents-make-grandchildren-ha 2. http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/news/releases/the-ties-that-bind-grandparents-and-their-grandchildren.html

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My Grandmother’s House By Kamala Das – Critical Summary and Model Questions

Table of Contents

My Grandmother’s House

Introduction: My grandmother’s house is a poem written by Indian poet Kamala Das. The poem first appeared in an anthology of verse entitled ‘Summer Time in Calcutta 1965). It is an autobiographical poem in which the speaker’s nostalgic desire for home reflects through the inability to visit the happy past.

The poem describes the speaker’s happy life before her grandmother’s death and sad life after her grandmother’s death. The speaker of the poem is a married woman. She is reminded of her parental home which is the symbol of immense love. The poem describes the clear difference between past and present. In past, the life was full of activity whereas now it has turned into deadly silence. The intensity of sadness is expressed by dark and negative imagery.

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Kamala Das is one of the three most popular Indian poets writing in English today, the other being Nissim Ezekiel and Ramanujan. Her poetry is all about herself, her deeply felt desire for love, her emotional involvement, and her inability to achieve such a friendship. In this poem, “My Grandmother’s House,” Kamala Das remembers her ancestral home and her deceased grandmother. This poem takes the form of a confession that contrasts her current fractured state with that of being unconditionally loved by her grandmother.

The poem starts with the reference of a grandmother as ‘that woman’ which is particular and who is no more now. The house is now far away and the past happy condition is irretrievable. The house represents the feeling of love which the speaker could get from her grandmother. But, now the house is silent. The poem moves through the happy past and sad present.

The poet uses the image of snakes moving among the books now for which she was too younger in her childhood. Now very often she thinks to revisit the house but now it is very difficult now to peep through the blind windows. Here, the image of blind windows may represent the eyes which are now visionless. The air is frozen and now she wants to bring the handful of darkness.

The poet uses the simile where she compares herself with the brooding dog who is helpless. The sudden reference to the reader as a ‘darling’ is striking. The speaker again mentions the love which she once received but now her condition is like a beggar asking the change of love.

The poet in intense terms expresses the sadness. The use of language represents the strangeness and unhealthy relationship between people and this woman. Note the words- House, that woman, asking love as a change etc.

Analysis of th e poem

Kamala Das’ s childhood reminiscences are linked to Nalapat House, her family home in Malabar, and her grandmother, whom she loved dearly. These memories are often connected to feelings of nostalgia and wit. In My Story she writes, “from every city, I have lived I have remembered the noons in Malabar with an ache growing inside me, a homesickness.” Her family home and her ‘presiding deity’- her gandmother, symbolise the poetry of ‘joy,’ ‘innocence,’ ‘respectability’ and ‘Traditional values’ .

Themes in the Poetry of Kamala Das

The poetry of Kamala Das is the quest for the essential woman, and hence the woman, the individual of her poems, assumes the numerous roles of the unhappy woman, the unhappy lady, the mistress of the lustful men, the reluctant nymphomaniac, the mute Devdasi and the love-lorn Radha. Kamala Das was also named a confessional poet. Confessional poets struggle with emotional experiences that are usually tabuous. There is a merciless self-analysis and a tone of total honesty. As E.V. Ramakrishnan appropriately points out, “In her poetry, Kamala has always dealt with private humiliations and sufferings which are the stock themes of confessional poetry.”

Critical Appreciation of Poems My Grandmother’s House

‘My Grandmother’s House’ is one of the finest poems in Kamala Das’s maiden publication Summer in Calcutta. Though short, it touches upon many favourite themes of her favourite. It is a poem of nostalgia, uprootedness and the poet’s eternal quest for love in a ‘loveless’ world. Relationship with her grandmother is the poet’s favourite relationship and grandma is a symbol of harmony, affection and security in her poetry. In her poem ‘Composition’ Kamala Das discloses two of her guarded secrets:

I am so alone And that I miss my grandmother

The poem also brings out the poet’s loneliness and her fondness for her grandmother. Both the old lady and the ancestral home at Malabar brought to Kamala Das the feeling of belongingness.

The poet has provided detailed information about the origin of this poem in her autobiography My Story (Chapter 33): After the sudden death of my granduncle followed by that of ‘my dear grandmother,’ the old Nalapat House was locked up and its servants disbanded. The windows were shut, gently as the eyes of the dead are shut… . The rats ran across its darkened halls and the white ants raised on its outer walls strange forms–totems of burial.

After growing up, the poet shifted to another house which was far away from her beloved ancestral house. She still misses the place ‘where I received love’ with great intensity.

The memory of those days when she was loved chokes her with emotion. The poet recalls the death of her dear ancestress – “That woman died” dwells on the difference the death made to the house and the poet’s life. Grandma was the very life and soul of this house. When she passed away, even the house could not take the grief and ‘withdrew into silence’. It was an atmosphere of allround mourning and desolation. At that time the poet was a very young child who could not read books but even at that age, she had a feeling of ‘snakes’ moving among books – a feeling of deadness, horror and repulsion. She recollects how the death of her grandmother had affected her as a child. It had a benumbing and chilling impact on her. Her blood lost all its invigorating power and its colour came to resemble the colour of the pale lifeless ‘moon’.

Her grandmother’s house always had a special significance for Kamala Das. During one of her serious illnesses, she had taken shelter in Malabar and was nursed back to health by her caring grandmother. The grandmother is no more, yet the poet often yearns to visit her beloved house. She would once again look through its windows. The windows are ‘blind’ -shut, covered with coloured windowpanes and with the overpowering sense of death. Death haunts the house and even the air is ‘frozen air’. A visit to this house would revive memories of her childhood and grandmother in the poet.

Her grandmother’s house has been a citadel of security and protection which is conspicuously missing from the poet’s later life. For her, even the darkness of this house is not terrifying in its impact. It is rather a faithful companion providing comfort and security. The poet wishes to transport some of this comforting darkness and memories of this house to her new house. These memories will be her constant assuring companions in her married life. In his article on Kamala Das, O.J. Thomas has observed, “Memory of that house at Nalapat comes back to her as a soothing thought. The very thought created a sort of energy in her and inspiration to live and love.”

As the poet remembers her present life, she is once again filled with grief over her loveless state. She badly misses her grandmother, the ancestral house and her secure and loved childhood:

You cannot believe, darling can you, that I lived in such a house and was proud and loved

That early stage is in painful contrast with her present state sans love and sans pride. The ‘proud’ and ‘loved’ child is now a beggar, begging at the ‘stranger’s doors’ for love “at least in small change” i.e. a little measure. Since love is not to be found in the company of people close to her, she knocks at the stranger’s doors and begs for it. In her quest for true love, she has ‘lost her way’ and wanders here and there. This wistfully nostalgic poem thus ends on a tragic note.

For Kamala Das, her grandmother was her mother-substitute. “She was the first I loved,” says the poet in her poem ‘Captive’. None of her later relationships could match the warmth and tenderness given by her grandmother. The oft-repeated desire to be with her, to be in her house, is an expression of Kamala Das’s natural desire to be one with the mother in the womb.

In its overall impact the, poem is a forcefully moving poem fraught with nostalgia and anguish. The poet has intensified the emotion by presenting the contrast between her childhood and her grown-up stages. The fullness of the distant and absent and the emptiness of the near and the present give the poem its poignancy. The images of ‘snakes moving among books’, blood turning ‘cold like the moon’, ‘blind eyes of windows’, ‘frozen air’ evoke a sense of death and despair. The house itself becomes a symbol – an Ednic world, a cradle of love and joy. The escape, the poetic retreat is in fact, the poet’s own manner of suggesting the hopelessness of her present situation. Her yearning for the house is a symbolic retreat to a world of innocence, purity and simplicity.

Kamala Das has resorted to her favourite technique of using an ellipsis to convey the intensity of emotion. Ellipsis also serve another purpose of suggesting a shift in mood and tone. She has used a variety of sound patterns, assonance , alliteration and especially consonance . Consonance (e.g. line-1 house, once: /s/) and assonance (e.g. line-11 – bedroom, brooding: /u/) create the drowsy somnolence apt for the atmosphere. Frequent alliteration (e.g. behind, bedroom, brooding) gives emphasis to the poet’s meaning. The rhetorical question spread in the last four lines underlines the emotional state created by the absence of love. The poem is remarkable for its utter simplicity of diction and intensity of emotion.

Reminiscent of the Poet’s Ancestral Home

The poem is reminiscent of the poet’s grandma and her ancestral home in Malabar, Kerala. Her memory of the love she had received from her grandma is associated with the image of her ancestral home, where she had spent some of the happiest days of her life, and where her old grandma had showered her love and affection. The house withdrew into silence with the death of her grandma. When her grandma died, even the house seemed to share her sorrow, which is poignantly reflected in the sentence “the House withdrew”. The house soon became desolate, and the snakes crawled through the books. Her blood was cold like the moon because there was no one to love her the way she wanted to.

Yearning for the Past: Choked with Grief

The poet now lives in another city, a long distance away from her grandmother’s home. But the memories of her ancestral home make her sad. She’s almost heart-broken. The intensity of her emotions is demonstrated by the ellipses in the form of a few dots. Now, in another city, living another life, she’s longing to go home. She knows that she can’t redeem the past, but she wants to go back home, to look through her windows again, and to bring back a handful of darkness – sad and painful memories that she would have made her daily companion, a reminder of her past happiness. For some time, the poet is unable to continue with his thoughts, as shown by the ellipses (dots).

The poet now lives in another city, a long distance away from her grandmother’s house. But the memories of her ancestral house make her sad. She is almost heart-broken. The intensity of her emotions is shown by the ellipses in the form of a few dots. Now, in another city, living another life, she longs to go back. She understands that she cannot reclaim the past but she wants to go back home, look once again through its windows and bring back a handful of darkness – sad and painful memories, which she would have made her constant companion, to keep as a reminder of her past happiness. The poet is unable to proceed with her thoughts for sometime as is indicated by the ellipses (dots).

The poet is now choked with the intensity of his sorrow. She yearns for love like a beggar going from one door to another asking for a little change of love. Her desire for affection and acceptance is not met in marriage, and she follows strangers for love, at least in limited amounts. But even in small changes or coins, she doesn’t get it. Her love-hunger remains unsatisfied, and there is a great loneliness, a void inside her, she tries to fill herself with love, but in vain. The window image is a connection between the past and the present. It means the poet’s urge for a nostalgic peep into his history and to revive his dreams and desires.

The poem springs from her own disillusionment with her expectation of unconditional love from the one she loves. In the poem, the image of the ancestral home stands for the strong support and unconditional love she received from her grandmother. The imagery is personal and beautifully articulates her plight in a loveless marriage. Thus, the old house was for her a place of symbolic retreat to a world of innocence, purity and simplicity, an Edenic world where love and happiness are still possible.

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My Grandmother's House Summary & Analysis by Kamala Das

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"My Grandmother's House," an autobiographical poem by Indian writer Kamala Das, tells a story of nostalgia and sorrow. The poem's speaker longs to return to her grandmother's house, where she once felt loved and secure—especially now that she lives a lonely adult life, mourning the safety and comfort of her childhood. This poem was published in Das's 1965 collection Summer in Calcutta.

• Read the full text of “My Grandmother's House”

The Full Text of “My Grandmother's House”

“my grandmother's house” summary, “my grandmother's house” themes.

Longing and Nostalgia

Loneliness and the Desire for Love

Lines 12-16, line-by-line explanation & analysis of “my grandmother's house”.

There is a ... ... That woman died,

The house withdrew ... ... like the moon

How often I ... ... Dog...

you cannot believe, ... ... in small change?

“My Grandmother's House” Symbols

• Lines 1-2: “There is a house now far away where once / I received love...”
• Line 3: “The house withdrew into silence,”
• Lines 7-8: “to peer through blind eyes of windows or / Just listen to the frozen air,”
• Lines 12-14: “you cannot believe, darling, / Can you, that I lived in such a house and / Was proud, and loved...”

• Lines 9-10: “pick an armful of / Darkness”

“My Grandmother's House” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Line 2: “love... That”
• Line 3: “silence, snakes”
• Line 4: “books, I”
• Line 5: “read, and”
• Line 7: “There, to”
• Line 9: “despair, pick”
• Line 12: “Dog... you,” “believe, darling”
• Line 13: “you, that”
• Line 14: “proud, and,” “loved... I”
• Line 16: “love, at”
• Lines 1-2: “once / I”
• Lines 3-4: “moved / Among”
• Lines 4-5: “young / To”
• Lines 6-7: “going / There”
• Lines 7-8: “or / Just”
• Lines 9-10: “of / Darkness”
• Lines 10-11: “lie / Behind”
• Lines 11-12: “brooding / Dog”
• Lines 13-14: “and / Was”
• Lines 14-15: “lost / My”
• Lines 15-16: “to / Receive”
• Line 3: “The house withdrew into silence”
• Line 7: “to peer through blind eyes of windows”
• Lines 7-8: “ or / Just listen to the frozen air”
• Lines 15-16: “beg now at strangers' doors to / Receive love, at least in small change?”

Rhetorical Question

• Lines 12-16: “ you cannot believe, darling, / Can you, that I lived in such a house and / Was proud, and loved... I who have lost / My way and beg now at strangers' doors to / Receive love, at least in small change?”
• Line 5: “my blood turned cold like the moon”
• Lines 10-12: “lie / Behind my bedroom door like a brooding / Dog...”

“My Grandmother's House” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• In small change
• (Location in poem: Line 3: “The house withdrew into silence,”)

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “My Grandmother's House”

Rhyme scheme, “my grandmother's house” speaker, “my grandmother's house” setting, literary and historical context of “my grandmother's house”, more “my grandmother's house” resources, external resources.

An Introduction to Das — Watch a short video that discusses Das's feminist legacy.

A Brief Biography — Learn more about Das's life and work.

Das's Legacy — Read an article honoring Das on the tenth anniversary of her death. 

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My Grandmother’s House Poem Summary and Analysis

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My Grandmother’s House is a moving and reflective poem written by renowned Indian English poet and author Kamala Das. Das explores the depths of her memory through the poetry in this literary work, following the steps of her early years and the special times she had at her grandmother’s home. The poem develops as a poetic voyage that intertwines themes of identity, love, nostalgia, and time’s unavoidable passing.

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Das considers the value of her grandmother’s home as a haven where genuineness flourished without fear of social rejection. As the story progresses, the poet is forced to face the unavoidable cycle of life and death, which is represented by the passing of her grandmother. “My Grandmother’s House” is a tribute to the eternal power of family ties, the sacredness of a special place, and the deep feelings that surface when one realizes how fleeting life is.

My Grandmother’s House

• The poem begins with the poet referring to a house that used to be a significant part of her life but is now distant.
• The poet reminisces about the love and warmth she experienced in the house, particularly from her grandmother.
• The poet expresses a sense of nostalgia and longing for her home, emphasizing the emotional connection she had with it.
• The poet expresses a yearning for the comfort and security that the house provided.
• The house was a sanctuary where the poet could be herself without any inhibitions.
• The poet felt free in the house, not under scrutiny or judgment.
• The poet cherishes the house as a place where she could be herself without having to conform to societal expectations of beauty.
• The reference to a “made-up face” suggests the societal pressure to conform to certain standards of appearance.
• The house is described as a place where the poet could discard societal expectations and be genuine.
• The poet recalls the house as a repository for sweet and secret memories.
• The poet uses a metaphor to describe the cherished memories as something precious, like the last layer of fat on meat.
• The poet anticipates a future day when the cherished memories will resurface, suggesting the enduring impact of the past.
• The poem takes a poignant turn as the poet references the death of her grandmother, symbolized by her taking a dip in the holy river, a Hindu ritual.
• The river is personified, and the poet suggests that even the river will mourn the departure of the grandmother.
• The river is seen as receiving the grandmother’s lifeless body.
• The grandmother is described as the perpetual lover of the river, implying a deep, eternal connection.
• The poem ends with a poignant statement, acknowledging the inevitable reality of a grandmother’s death and the profound impact it has on those left behind.

My Grandmother’s House Poem

There is a house now far away where once I received love……. That woman died, The house withdrew into silence, snakes moved Among books, I was then too young To read, and my blood turned cold like the moon How often I think of going There, to peer through blind eyes of windows or Just listen to the frozen air, Or in wild despair, pick an armful of Darkness to bring it here to lie Behind my bedroom door like a brooding Dog…you cannot believe, darling, Can you, that I lived in such a house and Was proud, and loved…. I who have lost My way and beg now at strangers’ doors to Receive love, at least in small change?

My Grandmother’s House by Kamala Das is a poignant exploration of the poet’s memories and emotions associated with her grandmother’s house. The poem beautifully captures the essence of a place where the poet felt loved, accepted, and free to be herself. The tone shifts towards melancholy as the poem addresses the inevitability of death, symbolized by the grandmother’s ritualistic dip in the holy river. The final lines reflect on the profound impact of a grandmother’s death, acknowledging the sorrow and the enduring connection between the deceased and the elements of nature.

1. Who is the poet of “My Grandmother’s House”?

The poet of “My Grandmother’s House” is Kamala Das, an Indian English poet and writer.

2. What is the central theme of the poem?

The central themes of the poem include nostalgia, the passage of time, the impact of death, and the poet’s longing for a place of comfort and acceptance.

3. How does the poet describe her grandmother’s house?

The poet describes her grandmother’s house as a place of love, warmth, and acceptance. It is portrayed as a sanctuary where the poet could be herself without judgment or societal expectations.

4. What is the significance of the holy river in the poem?

The holy river symbolizes the ritualistic aspect of death and the grandmother’s transition into the afterlife. It adds a spiritual dimension to the poem and underscores the cyclical nature of life and death.

5. What is the impact of the grandmother’s death on the poem?

The grandmother’s death brings a sense of melancholy to the poem. It serves as a turning point, prompting reflection on the inevitability of death and the enduring connection between the deceased and the elements of nature.

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Indian english history, poem my grandmother's house: summary and critical appreciation, summary of the poem:.

The poetess remembers passionately her family home in Malabar where she spent some years of her early life under the great affection of her grandmother. The poetess's grandmother was great fond of her. She liked the company of her grandmother. She spent some of the happiest year in her grandmother's company. The poetess had gone to live in a different city which was quite far from grandmother's home. The poetess recalls her grandmother and the day she died. She (the poetess) was very young at that time and did not know how to read the books which lay in the house. The death of her grandmother had robbed the little girl of her capacity to feel. She was greatly shocked by the death of her grandmother.

Critical Appreciation: 

Introduction: .

The poem entitled  My Grandmother's House , has been taken from the first collection of Kamala Das' poems  Summer in Calcutta   published in 1965. This poem deals with the poetess's nostalgic yearning for her family home in Malabar, where she had spent some of the most memorable and happy days of her life. This was the place where her old grandmother showered her with love and affection. In the poem she remembers both of them together, the old woman-her grandmother and the house in which she once lived. Even though the poetess lives in another city, far from her grand- mother's house, the memories of childhood, when she lived in the house are still alive. Her emotions overwhelm her. She indicates her agony by the use of ellipses. She portrays a very emotional picture in the expression "the house withdrew" as if the house were alive and could not bear to stay there anymore, as the one if loved had gone forever. 

Thought-Content: 

The poetess remembers her family home in Malabar where she spent some years of her early life in the affectionate and sheltering care of her grand- mother. She loved the poetess most. Now the poetess had gone to live in a different city, quite far from grandmother's home. But she wistfully remembers the family home where she lived as a girl, and her grandmother who showered love and affection on her. The poetess was very young at that time. There were a large number of books in the house, which seemed to be repulsive and horrible like snakes. The grandmother's death shocked her. She became cold and pale like the Moon. The poetess passionately yearns to go to the great house and to look once again through its windows which are blind. The house is now entirely deserted and no one can look through the windows. The poetess longs to sit there by herself and to listen to the dreary music of blowing cold winter winds, which would revive memories of her grandmother. At the end of her visit to the old family home she would like to return to her new home in a distant, far off place, but the painful memories of the bygone days would accompany her. She got love from her grandmother in her girlhood. Now she pines for love and begs it even from strangers.

The Theme of Unfulfilled Love: 

In this poem she speaks of her misfortune in not having received true love or affection from any man:  

The 'window' image in this poem is very remarkable and suggestive. It suggests a link between the past and the present. It also underlies the languishing desire of the poetess for a sentiment peep into her past and resurrection of her dreams and desires. The Grandmother's House is a symbolic retreat for the poetess to a world of innocence, purity. love and simplicity from a world of corruption, sterility exploitation and cunningness. It is a sanctuary of love which is conspicuous by its absence in the harsh world of reality. 

The Poetess’ Arousing Deep Sympathy: 

The poetess's life seems to be meaningless because she has always been deprived from true love. The sense of futility of life has most effectively been conveyed to us by this poem. There are some key phrases in the poem which convey us a sense of despair and the feeling of futility The house withdrew into silence, Just listen to the frozen air, And beg now at strangers' door. 

Style and Language: 

A powerful emotional effect has been achieved by the author by a use of minimum possible number, of words. The poetess has shown a remarkable capacity to avoid garrulity and copiousness. The poem is compact and well-knit so far as its structure is concerned. The style of writing here is terse. 'Cold like the Moon' is quite an appropriate Simile. 'An armful of darkness' is quite a satisfactory metaphor. 'Like a brooding dog' is a clumsy simile. The phrase 'in small change' is a metaphorical way of saying 'in a small quantity'.

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Marian Robinson, the mother of Michelle Obama who lived in the White House, dies at 86

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On election night 2008, as Barack Obama sat nervously in a Chicago hotel suite and awaited news on whether he would become the country’s first Black president, his mother-in-law was by his side.

“Are you ready for this, Grandma?” Obama asked Marian Shields Robinson, who years earlier had doubted that he and her daughter, Michelle, would last.

Six months, tops, she had predicted.

“Never one to overemote, my mom just gave him a sideways look and shrugged, causing them both to smile,” Michelle Obama wrote in her memoir, “Becoming.” “Later, though, she’d describe to me how overcome she’d felt right then, struck just as I’d been by his vulnerability. America had come to see Barack as self-assured and powerful, but my mother also recognized the gravity of the passage, the loneliness of the job ahead.”

She continued: “The next time I looked over, I saw that she and Barack were holding hands.”

The union of Barack and Michelle Obama, the 20-something lawyers who met one summer while working at a Chicago law firm, endured and made history. In her own way, Mrs. Robinson would, too.

She died peacefully on Friday, the former first lady and her brother, Craig Robinson, and their families announced in a statement.

“There was and will be only one Marian Robinson,” they said. “In our sadness, we are lifted up by the extraordinary gift of her life. And we will spend the rest of ours trying to live up to her example.”

Besides being the mother of the nation’s first Black first lady, Mrs. Robinson was also unusual for being one of the few in-laws who lived at the White House with the president and his immediate family.

Until January 2009, Mrs. Robinson had lived her entire life in Chicago. She was a widow and in her early 70s when Obama was elected in 2008 and resisted the idea of starting over in Washington. President Obama said the family suggested she try Washington for three months before deciding. The first lady enlisted her brother to help persuade their mother to move.

“There were many good and valid reasons that Michelle raised with me, not the least of which was the opportunity to continue spending time with my granddaughters, Malia and Sasha, and to assist in giving them a sense of normalcy that is a priority for both of their parents, as has been from the time Barack began his political career,” Mrs. Robinson wrote in the foreword to “A Game of Character,” a memoir by her son, formerly the head men’s basketball coach at Oregon State University.

“My feeling, however, was that I could visit periodically without actually moving in and still be there for the girls,” she said.

Mrs. Robinson said her son understood why she wanted to stay in Chicago, but still used a line of reasoning on her that she would use on him and his sister. He asked her to think of the move as an opportunity to grow and try something new.

“As a compromise, I opted to move to the White House after all, at least temporarily, while still reserving lots of time to travel and maintain a certain amount of autonomy,” she wrote.

Granddaughters Malia and Sasha were just 10 and 7, respectively, when they started to call the executive mansion home in 2009 after their dad became president. In Chicago, Mrs. Robinson had become almost a surrogate parent to them during the presidential campaign. She retired from her job as a bank secretary to help shuttle them around.

At the White House, she was a reassuring presence, and her lack of Secret Service protection made it possible for her to accompany them to and from school daily without fanfare.

“I would not be who I am today without the steady hand and unconditional love of my mother, Marian Shields Robinson,” Michelle Obama wrote in her memoir. “She has always been my rock, allowing me the freedom to be who I am, while never allowing my feet to get too far off the ground. Her boundless love for my girls, and her willingness to put our needs before her own, gave me the comfort and confidence to venture out into the world knowing they were safe and cherished at home.”

Her White House life was not limited to caring for her granddaughters.

Mrs. Robinson enjoyed a level of anonymity that the president and first lady openly envied, allowing her to come and go from the White House as often as she pleased on shopping trips around town, to the president’s box at the Kennedy Center and to Las Vegas or to visit her other grandchildren in Portland, Oregon. She gave a few media interviews but never to White House press.

She attended some White House events, including concerts, the annual Easter Egg Roll and National Christmas Tree lighting, and was a guest at some state dinners.

White House residency also opened up the world to Mrs. Robinson, who had been widowed for nearly 20 years when she moved to a room on the third floor, one floor above the first family.

She had never traveled outside the U.S. until she moved to Washington, taking her first flight abroad on Air Force One in 2009 when the Obamas visited France. She joined them on a trip to Russia, Italy and Ghana later that year, during which she got to meet Pope Benedict, tour Rome’s ancient Colosseum and view a former slave-holding compound on the African coast.

She also accompanied her daughter and granddaughters on two overseas trips without the president to South Africa and Botswana in 2011, and China in 2014.

Craig Robinson wrote that he and his parents doubted whether his sister’s relationship with Obama would last, though Fraser Robinson III and his wife thought the young lawyer was a worthy suitor for their daughter, also a lawyer. Craig Robinson and his parents were sitting on the front porch of their Chicago home one hot summer night when Obama and his sister stopped by on their way to a movie.

Her parents exchanged knowing glances as soon as the couple departed. “Too bad,” Mrs. Robinson said. “Yep,” answered Fraser Robinson. “She’ll eat him alive.”

Craig Robinson wrote that his mother gave the relationship six months. Barack and Michelle Obama tied the knot on Oct. 3, 1992 and have been married for 31 years.

Marian Lois Shields Robinson was born in Chicago on July 30, 1937. She attended two years of teaching college, married in 1960 and, as a stay-at-home mom, stressed the importance of education to her children. Both were educated at Ivy League schools, each with a bachelor’s degree from Princeton. Michelle Obama also has a law degree from Harvard.

Fraser Robinson was a pump operator for the Chicago Water Department. He had multiple sclerosis and died in 1991.

Besides the Obama family, Mrs. Robinson is survived by her son, Craig, his wife, Kelly, and their children Avery, Austin, Aaron and Leslie.

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TikTok Rediscovers an Old Rural Beauty Secret

Social media fans of Bag Balm, a moisturizer originally made for cows’ udders, say it’s just the thing for “slugging.”

Freshly filled containers of Bag Balm cooling on a conveyor belt at a plant in Lyndonville, Vt. Credit... John Tully for The New York Times

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By Steven Kurutz

Steven Kurutz reported this story from Lyndonville, Vt.

• Published May 27, 2024 Updated May 30, 2024

It is the rare item that can be found on the shelves of Tractor Supply and in the pages of Vogue . And now Bag Balm , a moisturizer originally made to heal chapped cows’ udders, is a trending beauty product among the Gen Z “skinfluencers” of TikTok.

The social media personality Alix Earle swears by it as a cure for dry skin and dry lips. Others recommended Bag Balm as an alternative to Vaseline for the trend of “ slugging ,” or covering the entire face before going to bed to seal in moisture.

“I have turned so many friends on to it,” said Madison Bailey , 28, a social media strategist for the beauty industry who has posted about the wonders of Bag Balm.

Having learned about Bag Balm from her mother, Ms. Bailey keeps an 8-ounce tin in her bathroom and a 1-ounce mini tin in her purse. “You don’t need a lot when you slug it on your face,” she said, adding that the cost (around $11 for the 8-ounce size) makes it economical.

Bag Balm, a concoction comprising petroleum jelly and lanolin, has been made in a small town in Vermont for 125 years. Early on, the instructions on the square green tin made plain its intended use: “For sore teats and hard milkers, apply the Balm one hour before the night milking and immediately after the morning milking.” The label cautioned, “For veterinary use only.”

In time, farm families found other applications for the salve, using it to treat everything from cuts and burns to chapped lips, saddle sores and the needle pricks on quilters’ fingers. Little by little, its ability to soften skin made it into a rural beauty secret, one that was eventually adopted by people who had never seen the inside of a barn.

The actress Raquel Welch credited a regimen of Bag Balm before bedtime for her ageless skin. In 1999, the Canadian country music star Shania Twain, then at the height of her fame and a Revlon spokeswoman, mentioned Bag Balm in an interview with The London Telegraph, saying, “When I’ve been flying a lot and my skin is really dry, I’ll rub it over my face and on my hair and leave it there all day.” Sales spiked.

Now the Vermont-based company behind Bag Balm is figuring out how to market itself to the digital world while staying true to its folksy heritage.

Bedsprings and Dogs’ Paws

Bag Balm is made, as it has been for more than a century, in Lyndonville, Vt., population 1,136. In this part of the country, known as the Northeast Kingdom, winters are long, cold and snow-swept, and a cow’s skin takes abuse.

In 1899, John L. Norris, a dairy farmer, bought the rights to the formula from a druggist in a nearby town, Wells River, and began selling Bag Balm through his Dairy Association Company. Other products marketed by Mr. Norris included horse hoof softener, cow teat dilator and a leather cleaner and conditioner, Tackmaster.

By the 1960s — when Mr. Norris’s son, John L. Norris Jr. , was running the company — ads for Bag Balm promoted its “use also in the home for cuts, chaps and burns.”

A Wall Street Journal article from Oct. 23, 1969, reported that people were finding all kinds of uses for the salve: a Marine in Vietnam used Bag Balm to lubricate a 105-millimeter howitzer; a dentist in Texas claimed it healed his psoriasis; a woman in Maine said it silenced squeaky bedsprings.

Today, Bag Balm is used for bicycle chafe, sunburn, diaper rash, pimples, bed sores and nail and cuticle care, among other things. Dog owners put it on their pup’s paws. In a recent fan letter to the company, a woman wrote that her 84-year-old father has long used Bag Balm for car repairs. He calls it “the juice.”

“Our whole brand ethos is simplicity and versatility,” said Libby Parent, the 36-year-old president of Vermont’s Original Bag Balm, as the company is now called.

As Ms. Parent explained while sitting inside a Mexican cafe in downtown Lyndonville that until a few years ago was the Bag Balm factory, the Norris family sold the business to private-equity investors in 2014. Under new management, the wording on the tin was changed to remove references to “sore teats” and to play up Bag Balm’s benefits to humans.

The company also introduced a lip moisturizer, soap and exfoliating body wash, and began offering its ointment in a travel-friendly plastic tube in addition to the classic green tin. In 2015, Walmart stores began selling Bag Balm.

“Bag Balm is not the most intuitive brand name,” Ms. Parent said. “We needed to define the product for people.”

Bag Balm’s agricultural associations still turn some off, however.

“Some people said, ‘I use that on my dogs, I’m not going put that on my face,’” said Faith Allison, 23, describing the mixed reviews she received after posting a video to TikTok in which she showed herself slugging with Bag Balm.

Other commenters have complained of the smell, which has been likened to turpentine. Ms. Allison, a law student in Michigan, made a response video in which she and her sister weighed in. “We thought it smelled like a doctor’s office,” she said.

Nevertheless, much about the ointment remains unchanged, including how it is made. Just up the street from the old factory site is the current plant — a squat, gray-vinyl-sided building, with a large replica of a green tin stuck to the facade.

Making the Paste

Though the healing powers of Bag Balm seem mysterious, the process of making it is quite simple.

Mark Perkins, the production manager, is one of seven employees who produce roughly 9,000 8-ounce tins a day. Mr. Perkins, 47, went to work for Bag Balm in 1997, he said, because his family’s small dairy farm couldn’t sustain his father and himself. Now his son, Logan, 19, recently joined him in the factory.

Mr. Perkins stood before a 55-gallon drum of lanolin, a wax secreted by the sebaceous gland of sheep. Lanolin is the soothing element that sets Bag Balm apart from plain petroleum jelly and helps give the product its distinctive smell. Inside the barrel, the substance had the consistency and color of caramel. Workers shovel it out.

Lanolin and four other ingredients — petrolatum, paraffin, water and hydroxyquinoline sulfate, an antiseptic — are heated into a liquid and mixed together in steel vats. Two filler nozzles squirt the hot liquid into tins that move down a conveyor belt. As the tins snake back and forth along the production line, the liquid cools and hardens into a thick, yellow, oleaginous paste.

Despite its growing popularity as a human facial cream, about 10 percent of sales still comes from farmers like Mindy McGrew and her husband, Kyle, who run a holistic dairy farm near Lincoln, Neb.

A first-generation farmer, Mrs. McGrew, 45, said she learned about Bag Balm from her mother-in-law, who grew up on a farm. She likes that it doesn’t contain artificial dyes or fragrances.

“It really is a household staple for many families,” said Mrs. McGrew, who puts Bag Balm on her cows’ udders in winter to protect from frostbite and on the tail area in summer to soothe fly bites. “Grandma had it at her house, then Mom had it at her house.”

That history of being passed down through the generations has made the brand cautious about changing its business strategy, said Ms. Parent, the company president. Bag Balm is unlikely to grow to the scale of, say, Burt’s Bees, which sells over 500 products. It was only two years ago, after the slugging videos began going viral, that the brand thought to create a TikTok account .

“Our longtime users were introduced to us on the farm,” Ms. Parent said. “So to be in Vogue, they can think, ‘This isn’t my Bag Balm.’”

She added, “We have something unique — why disrupt it?”

Steven Kurutz covers cultural trends, social media and the world of design for The Times. More about Steven Kurutz

Inside the World of Gen Z

The generation of people born between 1997 and 2012 is changing fashion, culture, politics, the workplace and more..

Many of Harvard’s Generation Z say “sellout” is not an insult, instead it appears to mean something strikingly corporate-minded .

A younger generation of crossword constructors is using an old form to reflect their identities, language and world. Here’s how Gen Z made the puzzle their own .

For many Gen-Zers without much disposable income, Facebook isn’t a place to socialize online — it’s where they can get deals on items  they wouldn’t normally be able to afford.

Dating apps are struggling to live up to investors’ expectations . Blame the members of Generation Z, who are often not willing to shell out for paid subscriptions.

Young people tend to lean more liberal on issues pertaining to relationship norms. But when it comes to dating, the idea that men should pay in heterosexual courtships  still prevails among Gen Z-ers .

We asked Gen Z-ers to tell us about their living situations and the challenges of keeping a roof over their heads. Here’s what they said .

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Marian Shields Robinson, mother of former first lady Michelle Obama, dies at 86

Marian Shields Robinson once said she had the “easiest job” at the White House as the “first grandmother.”

Marian Shields Robinson, mother of former first lady Michelle Obama, was a major pillar during former President Barack Obama’s 2008 bid for the White House. 

Taking on the task of caring for granddaughters Malia and Sasha, Robinson made their meals, ran their baths and tucked them into bed. She drove them to school, and to piano and dance lessons with Secret Service in tow. Once she became the nation’s first grandmother, she helped the girls settle into their home at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The transition would prove to be just as challenging for the Chicago native. 

“I’ve never lived outside of Chicago, so I don’t know,’’ Robinson said in an interview with the New York Times , expressing her hesitations on permanently moving into the White House which reminded her of a museum. “In the end, I’ll do whatever. I might fuss a little, but I’ll be there.”

In her 2018 memoir, “ Becoming ,” Michelle Obama shared that her mother was forthright, honest and not afraid to speak her mind. “My mother, Marian, showed me how to think for myself and to use my voice,” she writes. 

Robinson, often called “Mrs. R.,” died Friday, according to a family statement shared with NBC News . “She passed peacefully this morning, and right now, none of us are quite sure how exactly we’ll move on without her,” read the statement. The cause of death was not mentioned.

Barack Obama, whom Robinson adored, shared via Facebook in 2019 to celebrate his mother-in-law’s birthday: “I’ve always appreciated her steadiness, her perspective, and the way a wisecrack from her reverberates around the room.”

A Chicago native

Born on July 29, 1937, Marian Lois Shields was the fourth of seven children of Purnell Nathaniel Shields and Rebecca Jumper. Purnell was a carpenter and painted houses, while Rebecca worked as a licensed practical nurse. Through DNA research, the New York Times revealed the Shields’ complex family lineage to slavery. The story showed Marian’s great-grandfather Dolphus T. Shields was the son of an enslaved teen girl and her white owner. 

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This discovery “underscores the entangled histories and racial intermingling that continue to bind countless American families more than 140 years after the Civil War,” the Times reported in 2012. Some of the Shields family did eventually migrate north. That included Purnell’s mother, Annie, who moved her two sons from Birmingham, Alabama, to Chicago between 1920 and 1923.    

In October 1960, Marian Shields married Fraser Robinson III, who worked for the Chicago Water Department. The couple would dedicate themselves to building a family life in their second-floor apartment of a brick bungalow located in Chicago’s South Side. 

Robinson once worked as a secretary for mail-order retailer Spiegel and at the University of Chicago, but she was mostly a stay-at-home mom for Michelle and son Craig Robinson, former head men’s basketball coach at Oregon State University and Brown University. She returned to work as an executive assistant for a local bank when her daughter began high school.

“She was one of those parents that showed up all the time at schools,” Stephen Shields, the youngest of the Shields siblings, said in an interview with the Chicago Tribune . “She kept the teachers on their toes.” 

Michelle Obama has echoed that sentiment. “We were their investment,” she wrote in “Becoming.” “Together, in our cramped apartment on the South Side of Chicago, they helped me see the value in our story, in my story, in the larger story of our country. Even when it’s not pretty or perfect.”    

Robinson doted on both of her children as they grew and became successful adults. “When I look at Michelle and Craig — a big-time college basketball coach — I feel like maybe, just maybe, Fraser and I got something right,” Robinson wrote in a 2012 personal essay for Essence . “We didn’t do anything special. But I see the adults our kids have become and I can’t help but smile a little bit.” 

Fraser, who had multiple sclerosis , passed away in 1991.

Life in the White House

Robinson lived a quiet life in that very apartment until 2009, when Barack Obama officially took office. The Obamas didn’t want their girls to be taken to school by Secret Service agents, and Robinson wrote in her essay for Essence that she agreed to support her daughter and son-in-law out of concern for the family’s safety.   

“[Robinson is] a presence in a very quiet, understated way,” a longtime family friend told Politico in 2011 . “The first lady wouldn’t be as comfortable as she is traveling around the country and the world if her mom wasn’t there to pitch in.”

Robinson’s plan upon moving to the third floor of the residence was to help everyone get settled and then return to her quiet Chicago life. But after three years, she seemed to have built her own new quiet life full of family. 

“One of my biggest blessings is getting to see my granddaughters grow up before my eyes. My job here is the easiest one of all: I just get to be Grandma,” she wrote in her essay for Essence. 

Robinson made sure her granddaughters did their chores, including cleaning their rooms, and she taught the girls how to do their own laundry . 

“[My mother] laid out the blueprint for how I have raised my own girls,” Michelle Obama wrote in a 2020 Mother’s Day tribute on Instagram .    

Carving out her own space

Robinson did carve out her own space. She would spend afternoons reading in the great hall, which served as the first family’s living room on the second-floor residence. After spending some family time, Mrs. R. often retreated to her room, which had a four-poster bed and sitting area.

“There are many times when she drops off the kids, we hang out and talk and catch up, and then she’s like, ‘I’m going home.’ And she walks upstairs,” Michelle Obama told Oprah Winfrey in an interview.

Robinson kept a busy social life, and the Obamas mused that they would have to plan their schedule around hers. She made new friends among D.C. locals and often dined out, leaving the White House without the Secret Service detail. Betty Currie, who served as President Bill Clinton’s personal secretary, was among those new friends. 

Robinson participated in many events at the White House and traveled with her daughter and her granddaughters for state visits. That included trips to China and South Africa . She also joined Education Secretary Arne Duncan to read to young children as part of “Let’s Read, Let’s Move,” one of Michelle Obama’s cherished causes as first lady. 

“She [was] having a great time,” a family friend told Politico in 2011 . 

Yet she never put aside her main role, caring for Sasha and Malia. During a 2010 state dinner, the Washington Post reported that Robinson excused herself in order to tuck in her granddaughters, and then returned to the soiree. “She’s been there for us every day,” former President Obama once said. 

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Marian Robinson, mother of first lady Michelle Obama, dies at 86

Mrs. Robinson, Michelle Obama’s mother, was the first mother-in-law in years to live in the White House.

Marian Robinson, a homemaker from the South Side of Chicago who became the first presidential in-law in generations to live in the White House after her daughter, Michelle Obama, became first lady of the United States, died May 31 in Chicago. She was 86.

The family announced the death in a statement but did not provide a cause.

Mrs. Robinson, who often was called Mrs. R or the “First Grandma,” was the daughter of a painter and a stay-at-home mother and became a stay-at-home mother herself at a time when few African American women could afford not to work.

In a small but comfortable home, she raised her daughter, who pursued a career as a lawyer and health-care executive before becoming first lady, and her son, Craig Robinson, who grew up to become a college basketball coach. In later years, Mrs. Robinson also worked as a bank secretary.

Mrs. Robinson’s husband, Fraser, was a pump worker at the City of Chicago water plant who suffered from multiple sclerosis and died in 1991. He had been a Democratic Party precinct captain, but his wife had little interest in national politics until her son-in-law, Barack Obama, ran for the White House in 2008.

On election night, Obama described his mother-in-law as having been uncharacteristically emotional as she witnessed his historic election as the first Black president of the United States.

“She was sitting next to me, actually, as we were watching returns. And she’s like my grandmother was, sort of a no-fuss type of person. And suddenly, she just kind of reached out and she started holding my hand, you know, kind of squeezing it,” he said in an interview with CBS’s “60 Minutes” shortly after Barack Obama’s victory over the Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), in November 2008.

“And you had this sense of, ‘Well, what’s she thinking?’ For a Black woman who grew up in the ’50s, in a segregated Chicago, to watch her daughter become first lady of the United States … I think there was that sense across the country. And not unique to African Americans.”

Mrs. Robinson’s children often described her as a woman who spoke her mind and cherished her privacy. She sought to maintain those traits after agreeing to move with her daughter’s family into the White House.

“They’re dragging me with them, and I’m not that comfortable,” she told an interviewer when she left home, “but I’m doing exactly what you do. You do what has to be done.”

The decision drew widespread attention. Mrs. Robinson was the first presidential mother-in-law to live in the White House since Elvira “Minnie” Doud, Mamie Eisenhower’s mother.

Mrs. Robinson’s role was helping granddaughters Malia and Sasha Obama adjust to life in the Washington bubble and maintain normalcy.

She rode to school with the girls in Secret Service SUVs and tucked them in at night when their parents’ schedules kept them from home.

“One of my biggest blessings is getting to see my granddaughters grow up before my eyes. My job here is the easiest one of all: I just get to be Grandma,” Mrs. Robinson wrote in a 2012 essay published in Essence magazine.

During the time that she lived in the White House, Mrs. Robinson rarely gave interviews and appeared publicly with the Obamas only on holidays and at some cultural events, often when her granddaughters were present.

“If somebody’s going to be with these kids other than their parents,” she once said, “it better be me.”

Importance of education

Marian Lois Shields, one of seven siblings, was born in Chicago on July 30, 1937. After all their children were born, her parents separated.

Marian attended two years at a teachers’ college but did not complete the program for financial reasons, her son wrote in a memoir. In her early 20s, she married Fraser Robinson and stressed the importance of education to her children, both of whom graduated from Ivy League schools.

“She taught us that you can be open and honest about your own shortcomings and it doesn’t necessarily mean your kids are going to adopt them,” Michelle Obama once said.

The Robinson family was skeptical when Michelle brought Barack Obama home to introduce him; they had met at the Chicago law office of Sidley Austin and began dating in 1989.

Michelle had been career-focused and showed little interest in settling down. But after their marriage in 1992, the large Chicago-based family brought him into its fold. Barack had few relatives nearby, and the Robinsons threw his birthday parties and became the family with whom he celebrated holidays.

Barack Obama said Mrs. Robinson was an unsung hero in his political trajectory. Had she not quit her job to help care for her granddaughters, Michelle Obama might not have felt comfortable taking on the travel required to support her husband’s presidential campaign.

Mrs. Robinson continued to live in the Chicago walk-up that she and Fraser had shared until moving to the White House. There, she lived on the third floor — one level up from where “Michelle’s family” lived.

Mrs. Robinson described herself as being like most grandmothers. She teased her daughter about her strict rules for Malia and Sasha, including limited television-watching and early bed times.

“I’ve heard [Michelle] say, ‘Mom, what are you rolling your eyes at? You made us do the same thing,’” Mrs. Robinson once told the Boston Globe. “I don’t remember being that bad. It seems like she’s just going overboard.”

Mrs. Robinson described her approach to grandmothering as: “I do everything that grandmothers do that they’re not supposed to.”

“I have candy, they stay up late … they watch TV as long as they want to, we’ll play games until the wee hours,” she said.

In addition to her daughter and son, survivors include six grandchildren.

Along with her deep involvement with her family, Mrs. Robinson maintained varied interests. She was in her 50s when she took up running and won gold in the 50-meter and 100-meter races at the 1997 Illinois Senior Olympics. She stopped running after an injury.

“If I can’t do it fast, I’m not doing it,” she told Oprah Winfrey’s magazine in 2007. “You don’t run just to be running — you run to win.”

She had not traveled abroad before her son-in-law was elected president and seemed to like tagging along on the first family’s official overseas visits. When asked once whether she was enjoying her life in Washington, Mrs. Robinson told Essence, “I really am. You want to know why? Because my children are good parents. It makes it very easy to be a grandmother when your children are good parents.”

Mrs. Robinson built a busy social calendar that included trips to casinos in Las Vegas and concerts in Washington. At the same time, her low profile gave her a level of anonymity that allowed her to travel without a security detail. If someone recognized her as the mother-in-law of the president, she would often say, “I get that a lot.”