What would you do if you got a new brother and he couldn’t even walk like a normal boy?  This is what happened in Hurst’s “The Scarlet Ibis”.  In this story comes a new baby boy and how he and his brother work to overcome his disability.  The narrators new baby brother, Doodle was born.  No one ever believed Doodle would even live long enough to learn how to walk, but through some hard thinking Doodle’s brother knew he would. The two form a bond of dependency, one needing to become strong, the other needing a companion.  After lots of hard work the shocking truth is revealed. The Brothers pride helps and hurts Doodle.

            Through shear belief and determination the Brother’s pride helped the two reach their goal of success.  At the beginning Doodle’s weak body meant that Brother had to carry him on his back to wherever they went.  Seeing as no one likes to do this task, as Brother says “,So I won’t have to haul you around all the time” (Hurst 318).  As a result Brother knew he was the one who had to teach Doodle to walk in order to save his own strength.  Brother brought Doodle to Old woman swamp everyday in order to teach Doodle to be strong and work on is skills.  Brother was so determined, that when Doodle fell the Brother says “you can do it” (318) or even “All you got to do is try” (318).  He hated to see Doodle fail over and over again.  Brother wanted someone to spend time with.  Like his friends he wanted someone to climb, run, jump and swim with.  Brother kept teaching Doodle to do all of these things and once Doodle had learned to walk by his birth day he knew there was hope.  They started to double their efforts increasing the work on Doodle.  Brother says “It’s a miracle I didn’t give up” (318).  Pride helped Doodle greatly, but you can only have so much of a good thing.

            Brother’s pride began to hurt Doodle when their training got too rough.  Determination took over Brother and replaced safety and caring in his heart as the two got older.  Corrupting normal life between the two was caused by Brothers impatience and greed to get Doodle strong.  When they were just exploring around and Doodle was left up in the loft, Brother says “Then I’ll leave you here by yourself” (318) after Doodle does not cooperate.  Doubling Doodles efforts also tapped into the bad side of pride.  During training in Old Woman Swamp, Brother says “I made him swim until he turned blue and row until he couldn’t lift an oar” (320).  Brother didn’t realize that he was pushing Doodle past his limits until it was too late.  One day the family came upon a weak red bird or a scarlet ibis in their backyard tree blown in from the storm and out of place.  The night after the incident with the scarlet ibis dying in the bleeding tree Doodle’s fate was locked to die as the scarlet ibis did.  It seemed as the two were oddly out of place in a similar way.  Brother and Doodle were running home from the storm and the tired Doodle just couldn’t make it and collapsed.  Brother realized he had killed his scarlet ibis through pride as Doodle bled to death in the thundering storm.

            Though stronger Doodle was overwhelmed and killed by Brothers pride.  Brothers’ training was too hard, especially for someone not expected to live and to walk.  Once Doodle was gone brother realized he had lost his “Scarlet Ibis” and really valued Doodles company whether he could walk or not.  He was just nice to have to take care of or carry or just be there in general.  Brothers pride was just too much.