This week my literature class made a temporary transition from novels to short stories. We were instructed to read five different short stories, then select one on which we would write the remainder of our response paper. All of these short stories are found in Short Story Masterpieces, edited by Robert Penn Warren and Albert Erskine.

Summary:

“The Egg” by Sherwood Anderson is a story narrated by a young boy about the influence of eggs on his father. From before the narrator was born, his father worked at a chicken farm where he raised chickens from birth to death; he goes on to describe the depressing cycle of life and death that raising chickens involves. The narrator’s father seems to be an emotional, detail-oriented, and materialistic person, as he had the idiosyncrasy of saving the bodies of mutated chicks. The bulk of the story has a recount of an event where his father, unable to overcome his social awkwardness, made a fool of himself in front of a guest by trying too hard to impress him, and instead, failing all his egg-related tricks.

“The Boarding House” by James Joyce features Mrs. Mooney, the former daughter of a butch­er who was abused by her husband and left him to start a board­ing house. While at the board­ing house, she noticed a middle-aged man who was building a relationship with her daughter Polly. She did not intervene at first, but when the time came, she decided to speak with the man and demand that he follows through with marriage. At first, Polly is frightened, but eventually, has positive visions of her future.

“Marriage a la Mode” by Katherine Mansfield tells a story of the couple William and Isabel. Isabel is dissatisfied with William because they lived in a small, stuffed-up house and had a nanny that was ruining their children. Isabel begins to think of William as dull, and says bad things about him with her friends. The following day, Isabel receives a letter from William that she shares with her friends, but then feels ashamed for doing so and decides to write a letter back to William later.

“Cruel and Barbarous Treatment”€ by Mary McCarthy tells the story of a married woman who decides to engage in extramarital affairs. She demonstrates her skill of manipulating her hus­band, lover, and friends by calculating how others will perceive her. She also considers all the positive and negative consequences of each of her potential decisions. Eventually, she has a divorce with her hus­band and pursues a relation­ship with the Young Man to enhance her life.

“€œA Spinster’s Tale”€ by Peter Taylor is narrated by Elizabeth, a woman who tells of the relation­ship she had with her brother and drunkard Mr. Speed. For Elizabeth, Mr. Speed was a curious and frightening character that she claimed she would eventually build the courage to confront. Later on in the recount, she explains that she has gotten more used to Mr. Speed with the encouragement of her father, but is still fearful. One day, Mr. Speed is accidently let into Elizabeth’s house due to a case of mistaken identity, and Elizabeth reacts by calling the police.

Impressions:

When I first read through “The Egg” by Sherwood Anderson, I went through a series of emo­tions of confusion, depression, sympathy, and understanding – confusion as to the nar­ra­tor’s father’s actions, depression as to the fact that he would choose to do such things, sympathy for his failures, and understanding after possibly identifying a reason for why everything happened as it did.

This story reminded me about how someone’s emotions can severely affect how someone performs actions, and I drew the conclusion that this was most likely from what the narrator’s father was suffering. The narrator notes, “‘I have handled thousands of eggs,’ father said. ‘€˜No one knows more about eggs than I do.'” This is a valid claim, as he spent his entire life working with chickens and eggs; however, his expertise in the field was severely impaired when he was trying too hard to what he was good at. I made a connection between this and the “golfer’s error” story that I’ve heard frequently before, which says that even professional golfers will make elementary mistakes if they overanalyze their swinging technique, and should instead rely on muscle memory.

Critical Analysis:

When thinking about the narrator’€™s father throughout the piece, I was able to make con­sis­tent connections between him and individuals with autistic intelligence about whom I have learned in the past. (Note that autistic intelligence is not the equivalent of having autism; possessing autistic intelligence does not mean someone has autism, and not all types of autism are characterized by strong levels of autistic intelligence.)

In the beginning of the story, the narrator’s father is illustrated as being satisfied as to how his life had turned out: “[He] himself went to bed, quite happy in his position in life. He had at that time no notion of trying to rise in the world.”€ This can be seen as the control or baseline situation, where he was able to decide what to do with his life, and stop when he felt he reached the edge of his comfort zone. Upon meeting his wife, this changed, as, “€œfor father and [the narrator] she was incurably ambitious,”€ which implies that she pushed them to achieve more with their lives. Those with autistic intelligence have a tendency to become uncomfortable when being pushed out of their comfort zones by an outside force; as a result, they show other peculiar and unique traits, which were also seen by the narrator’s father.

One of them is an extreme attention to details that may seem irrelevant or unimportant to most people. A common example used to describe this concept is to compare normal and autistic intelligence with flashlight use in a cave -€“ normal intelligence shines the light on the entire cave to get the big picture, while autistic intelligence shines the light on a single stalagmite to pick out all the details. The narrator’s father did a similar thing when he fo­cused excessively on grotesque chicks and preserved them in alcohol-filled jars.

Another defining characteristic of those with autistic intelligence is having difficulty em­pa­thizing and mirroring the emotions of others. When the narrator’s father was trying to impress Joe Kane with his egg tricks, he was so engulfed in his own emotions that he was not able to pick up on Kane’€™s attempts at disengaging from the conversation.

Keeping these connections in mind, it is likely that the author attempted to characterize the narrator’s father as someone with a relatively high level of autistic intelligence. He is some­one who a majority of people would perceive as strange and different, as said by his visitor: “Joe Kane decided that the man who confronted him was mildly insane but harmless.” However, those with autistic intelligence are still fully capable humans in their own ways, as demonstrated by the father’€™s ability to work like others, and receive comfort from his family.

To read more papers I wrote as homework for my classes, check out the “Academics / Homework” cat­e­go­ry index.

This is once again another response paper that I wrote for my literature course this past week. The topic was on the setting of As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner. If you want more information about what response papers are supposed to be, check out last week’s blog post about The Awakening by Kate Chopin for a description.

Summary:

William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying tells a story of the Bundren family’s journey from their home town to Jefferson, a distant village. This trip spurs into action upon the death of Addie Bundren, the mother of the family, as her last dying wish was to be buried in Jefferson near the rest of her relatives; she is placed in a coffin and carried to her destination via wagon. During the journey, we learn more about each member of the family and get a better sense of their relationships with their mother and each other. While traveling, the Bundrens face a series of obstacles, both related to the health of the coffin and to the needs of the family members. These unfortunate events include a flood that nearly washes Addie’s coffin and dead body away; the complete replacement of the team of mules due to a drowning; and a secret plot by one of Addie’s sons, Darl, to incinerate her body by lighting an entire barn on fire. Eventually, the family arrives at Jefferson and successfully buries Addie’s body. In the conclusion, we find that Darl has been tagged as insane, and Addie’s former husband, Anse, has already found a new wife.

Impressions:

Although this might not be one of the best books I’ve read, it will definitely be one of the most memorable because of the premise of the story – a family carrying their dead mother to a different location for burial is quite a distinct and original plotline for a novel. One thing that stuck out to me was the meaning and power of presence of Addie’s body. She states that throughout her life, she has found the love and intimate relationships between herself and her family members (husband and children) to be meaningless and empty. From her family’s perspective, she was probably seen more as a liability than as a loving wife and mother, and it seems like this continued on after she died, but to a greater extent. I also felt the sense that Addie’s dead body was powerful enough that it was as if she was still alive, but equally empty as before. She was able to create a scene multiple times, forcing people to risk their lives to save her, and emitting a stench that brought together crowds; there were also air holes drilled into her coffin, as if she needed to breathe.

Critical Analysis:

The literal setting of As I Lay Dying occurs on a trip to Jefferson, a village where Addie wishes to be buried, and where her husband Anse can finally acquire a set of false teeth for which he has been longing. However, the central point of the mental struggles and obstacles of the Bundren family seems to be the coffin, which is why I believe a secondary and more implicit setting of the book is within and in the environment surrounding the coffin.

The conflict of the book seems to begin when the coffin is being constructed and prepared. To begin, the coffin is built in front of Addie’s bedroom, which gives off the impression that her family is waiting for her to die, and is eager to see her fall. When she does finally pass away, she is not even placed in her coffin in the proper orientation, and she gets holes accidentally drilled through her head. These dysfunctional changes to the coffin seem to set off the dysfunctional events that are soon to affect the Bundren family.

The coffin then becomes a brooding ground for even more problems for the family. The first problem they encounter is almost having the coffin swept away by the flood waters. The near loss of the coffin signifies the near loss of the family – it’s as if the slipping away of the coffin resulted in the slipping away of the Bundrens mules, and if the coffin had not been saved, they would have lost more. Later in their journey, when Darl attempts to incinerate the coffin, it was as if he had identified the coffin as the source of their troubles and wanted to eliminate it. However, Jewel risks his life and saves the coffin, as he understands the simple destruction of the coffin would not bring all these problems to a proper resolution, and their troubles would not come full circle.

The burial of the coffin, as a result, represents the proper end to the Bundrens’ dysfunction, and a return back to the setting of normalcy before the construction of the coffin. Although questionable as to whether it is considered “back to normal” or not, Anse has fulfilled his wish of acquiring his false teeth and has found a new wife, so things seem to be going better, at least for him.

Works Cited:

Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying. New York, NY: Jonathan Cape and Harrison Smith, 1930. Print.

If you want to take a look at last week’s paper, you can click on the “Academics / Homework” category to be taken to an index page of all blog posts that include papers I have written for homework.

As I stated in a previous blog post, I’m going to start posting my homework from my summer classes like I used to for my regular classes from previous semesters. The only class for which I’m consistently writing papers and essays is my literature class. Unfortunately, the books that we need to read aren’t exactly that exciting, so the resulting homework most likely will not that exciting either, but it’s still more content that I can put up on my website.

This assignment is called a response paper – we write a summary of the book, our impressions on a particular aspect, and a critical analysis of the week’s topic. This week’s topic was theme, or the overarching idea that is present throughout the entire work.

Summary:

Kate Chopin’s The Awakening features Edna Pontellier as the main character, a Victorian woman who adventures through concepts forbidden to females and conflicting against ideals at the time – self-exploration, freedom, and independence. Edna has a husband and children for whom she must care, but instead, chooses to rebel against what society expects of her and pursues her own emotions and desires, a process referred to as “awakening.” Edna begins to ignore her family responsibilities and develops a relationship with Robert, a man with whom she falls in love; he gives her a feeling of liberation from the constraints placed upon her by the idea of her husband possessing her. As her awakening develops further, she begins to acknowledge her internal desires for creativity, and begins to satisfy her primal needs. Unfortunately, at the end of the book, Robert leaves her, as he respects societal ideals more than his relationship with Edna. Her feelings of solitude become so overwhelming that she eventually commits suicide.

Impressions:

I felt Chopin was able to take the concept of the lack of women’s freedom and portray it well into a fictional story that incorporated the many different consequences of the societal norm. Not only did she give an example of the ideal woman of the time through Adèle Ratignolle, she also created an understandable metaphor of what was the opposite extreme would look like by connecting the ocean to freedom and independence. The struggles Edna Pontellier faces throughout her awakening are realistic and believable; it is likely that many Victorian women who questioned societal ideals went through very similar thoughts as she did. The consequences of Edna’s actions are also not farfetched, and appear to be what one would expect from someone in the process of rebelling against the accepted norms of society.

Critical Analysis:

A primary theme of The Awakening is the solitude that comes along with the lifestyle of Victorian women, both those who comply with the ideals like Adèle Ratignolle, and those who go against ideals like Edna Pontellier.

Those who are in compliance with the idea that husbands possess their wives and their wives are responsible for tending to their family feel solitude because they are distant from their true selves. They are oppressed from expressing who they really are, and are told to fulfill their duties without tending to their own emotional desires. Failure to fulfill these urges keeps them distant from self-discovery, and they feel alone and separated from reality because they are unable to express themselves.

Those who rebel, like Edna, still feel solitude because they are rejected by the rest of society for pursuing what is considered taboo and unacceptable. Although she was able to feel a sense of accomplishment by achieving her own sense of self, she no longer had others to be with her along the way. Although she developed a strong relationship with Robert Lebrun, Robert was still in tune with the norms of society and did not want to establish a further relationship with Edna, even though the love was mutual. He continued to acknowledge that Edna belonged to her husband, and he was to not breach that relationship by interfering with Edna. His ultimate compliance was clearly demonstrated when he left Edna to her own at the end of the story, and Edna was left to achieve her own awakening by herself.

Works Cited:

Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. New York, NY: Bantam Classic, 1981. Print.

I finished this last week and my instructor already scored it as 50/50, so if you’re looking at this to actually learn something about The Awakening, the stuff I included is accurate and written well enough to meet my instructor’s standards.