Analysis: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Tara Jackson
ENG 125 Introduction to Literature
Instructor Alfaro
April 18, 2011
The short story that I will do an analysis on is the Secret Life of Walter Mitty, written by James Thurber in March of 1939. This story centers around the hilarious and amusing daydreams of Walter Mitty an ordinary man, who resides in Waterbury, Connecticut, with his overbearing, nagging wife Mrs. Mitty. Throughout this short story Mitty is characterized as being a pathetic, timid man, who daydreams to deal with situations, and conflicts that arise in his life with his wife and others he encounters on a daily basis.
The genre of this short story would be comedy, Thurber’s writing style is quiet creative and
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Mitty’s second daydream occurs after he drives past a hospital on his way to the parking lot, he thinks he is a famous surgeon, heroic character, who saves the day. Mitty is awakened from his daydream only to be told by the parking attendant that he is entering the parking lot the wrong way. Third daydream, Mitty daydreams that he is a witness in a courtroom trial, walking down the street trying to remember the other item his wife instructed him to buy. The fourth and final daydream Mitty thinks he’s a captain in a war plane, he was awakened by his wife, Mrs. Mitty in a hotel lobby and confronted about not wearing his overshoes, and why he hiding in that particular chair, Mitty replies to his wife that does it ever occur to her that he is thinking. (Clugston, 2010).
Mitty is saying to his wife, he has a mind of his own and that he can think for himself. Throughout Mitty’s babblings and day dreams, he is a weak, timid man dependent on a strong woman (Mann, 1982). Most importantly I can identify with Mitty’s daydreaming not as hilarious and outrageous as his are, but we all have a need to slip away from the hoarse realities of life and escapism in the form of daydreaming.
References
Clugston, R. W. (2010). Journey into literature. San Diego, California: Bridgepoint
Education, Inc. https://content.ashford.edu/books
Mann, A. (1982). TAKING CARE OF WALTER MITTY. Studies in Short Fiction, 19(4), 351. Retrieved from
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