Jack and the Beanstalk
Or, technically, just the beanstalk. From the author’s perspective, the beanstalk is a symbol of the pursuit of happiness. How so? Because he is the mechanism which gets Jack to the place where he attain all his dreams, but almost as soon as he gets his hands on that thing which brings him happiness, he finds he must chop the beanstalk down in order to avoid his dream becoming a new nightmare.
Royal Albert China Set
The author’s mother is a distinctly unhappy person who finds no joy in life. Nevertheless, she permits herself one luxury: a set of Royal Albert china always kept behind the glass of a display cabinet. And the only reason this brought her happiness was because it was a means of showing everybody she else she was still better than them despite marrying beneath her station. But the china is never used for anything else and is never able to bring happiness to anyone else. In this way it becomes a symbol of happiness that is always elusive and forever just out of reach.
The Mini Cooper
For a period of time, the author actually lives in her Mini Cooper, treating it like a home with rooms for specific use. The front seat was the living quarters while rear seat was the bedroom. This episode takes placed when she is still just a teenager after having been kicked out by her parents and under those specific conditions of homeless, the little car is transformed into the symbol of her independence and sovereignty.
Lolita
Assigned to read the controversial novel by Nabokov, the author expresses dismay at the feeling that for the first time in her life literature had betrayed her. One progressive teacher urges her to reconsider her opinion and another informs she will have to finish it. It is the librarian who offers the greatest insight, however, telling her that any book she hates should be re-read at a later point in life again and again; eventually she will reach an age at which she sees things in a new light. The advice on Lolita becomes a symbol for the entire book in which the author revisits painful episodes from her past to view things through a new perspective and learn from them.
The Creature
The Creature is the name that the author gives to the being inside her that becomes a constant companion, speaking to her and initially addressing it as a separate entity with the pronoun “you.” She is a “savage lunatic” who is accusatory and guilt-inducing, but eventually, the realizes the Creature is the symbolic incarnation of a lost part of herself--the destructive rather than lovable child--and comes to refer to the two of them as “us” and “we.”
