"What is your perfume? a student once asked her. Room freshener, she said.
This might have been one of the funniest stories I've been forced to read. I think one of the reasons I found this story so funny was the type of humor displayed. In today's society, most stand-up comedy and box-office comedies are crude dry. The humor is no longer knock-knock jokes but it is rather roasts of celebrities or mocking social customs. Zoe displays this type of humor. Although she doesn't intend to, her humor offends the people she insults but is hilarious to the reader. But, the source of her harsh sarcasm seems to be the result of her own state. In the beginning of the story, she alludes to her losing her mind. Is she insane?
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Irony and alcholism in "The Drunkard"
p. 351 "My brave little man!" she said with her eyes shining. "It was God did it you were there. You were his guardian angel."
The irony in this statement is beyond hysterical. The first irony is that everyone expects Father to be the drunk one at the funeral when in reality, his son ends up drinking the beer. But, this isn't the only irony found in this situation. Not only is he drinking beer at 10, his mother is praising her 10 year old for stealing alcohol and getting drunk. In doing this, she is encouraging he son to drink and probably one day turn in to his father. So, while saving her husband from relapsing into another alcoholic fit and not showing up for work, she instead celebrates her son for drinking his beer. I'm reminded of the McDonald's scene in Big Daddy where Adam Sandler drops some ugly words in front of his kid and is told "nice parenting" by some sarcastic customer. So, nice parenting, mom.
Style in Popular Mechanics
"I want the baby.
Get out of here!"
Throughout this short, short story, there is an obvious disregard for quotation marks. Usually with a lose of punctuation, there is often a lose of clarity or meaning. But, with "Popular Mechanics", the story is still easy to follow and understand who is speaking. The breaking up of this couple and the ensuing battle for the baby, is intense and very emotion-filled. None of which is lost with the loss of a some small marks. What I really want to know is the reasoning for the title. Is the popular mechanics ironic in that his lack of quotation marks isn't popular at all? Or is the "popular" referring to the society's trend of the problem of divorce/ break up and custody battle found in the story's plot itself?
Get out of here!"
Throughout this short, short story, there is an obvious disregard for quotation marks. Usually with a lose of punctuation, there is often a lose of clarity or meaning. But, with "Popular Mechanics", the story is still easy to follow and understand who is speaking. The breaking up of this couple and the ensuing battle for the baby, is intense and very emotion-filled. None of which is lost with the loss of a some small marks. What I really want to know is the reasoning for the title. Is the popular mechanics ironic in that his lack of quotation marks isn't popular at all? Or is the "popular" referring to the society's trend of the problem of divorce/ break up and custody battle found in the story's plot itself?
Foreshadowing in "The Lottery"
P. 264 "Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example, selecting the smoothest and roundest stones...made a great pile of stones."
This interesting seemingly insignificant snippet of the story is a hint of the cruelty to come. In reading this story through I glazed past this part. My thinking being: boys will be boys and boys play with rocks and throw them at each other. Also, I saw the "smoothest and roundest stones" and figured maybe these boys are stockpiling rocks to skip across some pond or lake to come. As the story focused around the gathering in the town center, the people gathering, the history of the lottery, and the lottery itself, I soon forgot about these stupid stones these boys had gathered. But at the end of the story, these stones make up part of the spectacle that is the lottery as they are hurled at Tessie Hutchinson. In reading through the early stones paragraph again, I picked up on the fact that these stones weren't being thrown immediately; they were being saved for something. If only I had known their cruel purpose, I would have been able to understand other subtitles of the story better. For example, the fact the box was black and the importance that EVERYONE from the town be there were details that make sense with the ending.
This interesting seemingly insignificant snippet of the story is a hint of the cruelty to come. In reading this story through I glazed past this part. My thinking being: boys will be boys and boys play with rocks and throw them at each other. Also, I saw the "smoothest and roundest stones" and figured maybe these boys are stockpiling rocks to skip across some pond or lake to come. As the story focused around the gathering in the town center, the people gathering, the history of the lottery, and the lottery itself, I soon forgot about these stupid stones these boys had gathered. But at the end of the story, these stones make up part of the spectacle that is the lottery as they are hurled at Tessie Hutchinson. In reading through the early stones paragraph again, I picked up on the fact that these stones weren't being thrown immediately; they were being saved for something. If only I had known their cruel purpose, I would have been able to understand other subtitles of the story better. For example, the fact the box was black and the importance that EVERYONE from the town be there were details that make sense with the ending.
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