Summary Of Paul Haven's 'Poisoned Pretzel'

Skidmore clearly has many reasons he doesent love his brother and he shows it. There are many reasons he may have hated his brother. No one ever knew if his brother was handing out gum on purpose to make his brother angry. Skidmore took his brothers gum handing out as a way to shove it in his face. This raises many questions if maybe his brother also hated him. Since it doesent really say anything how Manchester felt about Skidmore. Skidmore may have had many other incidents that were not mentioned on his brother leaving him out of things. "Everyone loved Boddlebrooks. Everyone, that is, except his younger brother, Skidmore." Everyone already knew that he didnt like his brother. So this puts a really strong idea that Skidmore murdered him. Skidmores anger must have been building up this whole time, then when he made his own invention and it was a success he wanted to get revenge, so he poisoned his

conceived a plot to throw the World Series for a sum of $80,000. A novel

In the story "The Curse of the Poisoned Pretzel" by Paul Haven, the author encourages the reader that Skidmore Boddlebrooks is guilty of poisoning his brother, Manchester Boddlebrooks by convincing him to be the first to try "his" new invention called the "pretzel." In this story, the author, Paul Haven does not actually state that Skidmore was guilty of killing his brother. Unlike his older brother, Manchester Boddlebrooks who was very friendly, generous, and had a kind smile, Skidmore Boddlebrooks was very creepy, frightening, had shadowing eyes and sinister looks. While Manchester Boddlebrooks was admired by many fans and players, for he often offered sweets and candies to his players and fans after baseball games, and often invited his players to visit his mansion for weekend parties, Skidmore Boddlebrooks was not popular and well-liked.

The author, Paul Haven, creates the perspective that Skidmore is guilty of murder by strongly stating that all people think that Skimore is a creepy person. As stated in "The Curse of the Poisoned Pretzel", "He gave everyone the creeps" (Haven). Implying that Skimore was always a creepy person and is mentally unstable, creepy. Individuals who posses these qualities have the potential to murder someone. Likewise, Paul Haven mentions that no one in the story could remember seeing Skidmore's eyes, implying that Skidmore was kind of soulless

In this passage from the book In Cold Blood, the author Truman Capote introduces a small town in Kansas. He states that Holcomb is a small, lifeless town with run down shops, restaurants, and many other buildings crumbling at the base. Capote makes the readers think that this place seems pretty normal and nothing really happens there, but in the last paragraph he makes it very clear that something strange will happen. Within the first few paragraphs of the passage, he begins to draw the readers in with the tone and imagery he uses.

During the period of American Gothic literature, authors, such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe, incorporated the sinister perspective of the human nature in their writings. Both Hawthorne’s symbolic short story, “The Minister’s Black Veil”, and Poe’s violent fiction, “The Tell-Tale Heart”, demonstrate separation and symbolism throughout the course of each story. In Hawthorne’s story, the protagonist, Minister Hooper, decides to wear a black veil over his face and vows to never remove it. This vow continues to the point of his death. Mr. Hooper’s decision to wear the black veil consequently separates him from society. Hawthorne uses the veil to symbolize the human psyche and efforts to hide sins. In Poe’s story, the narrator is the caretaker of an old man with a blind eye. He describes his internal discomfort when he sees the eye, and later devises a plan to murder the old man. His separation from humanity due to the uneasy feeling of the old man’s pale, blind eye are shown through his efforts to commit murder.

A mixture of excessive food involvement and analysis of personality produce The Curse of the Poisoned Pretzel. This tale has a theme of food, mainly bubblegum, and the often manifestation in the text of this theme is practically absurd. Even though this story has a ludicrous amount of bubble gum, it can be analyzed past this seemingly childish story to reveal human psychological tendencies. These tendencies are partially responsible for the perception of Skidmore's guilt. Skidmore is described in a way that makes him seem suspicious, and is therefore assumed to have intentionally murdered his brother. The perspective that Skidmore is guilty is produced from: the initial description of him, Skidmore's motive that is introduced, and the events that occur after the death of Boddlebrooks.

Now one must address the elephant in the room, the most obvious giveaway is more than likely the fact that after Manchester died, Skidmore is the one who inherits all of his fortunes. Suddenly Skidmore goes from poor and creepy, hiding in his brother's very large shadow; to suddenly a rich man and owner of World Champions. The author points out that after Manchester died Skidmore mentioned: "he felt terrible about the tragedy and would make his pretzels even doughier in the future." His brother just died, and Skidmore is more worried about improving his coat pretzel than the sudden death of his flesh and blood. Seems Skidmore

When Parson Hooper first dons the black veil, and long after, the community is fascinated, curious, suspicious, and almost outraged that Mr. Hooper

Hurst’s diction at the beginning of the short story foreshadows the later death of Doodle. Hurst starts by setting a gloomy scene as the narrator is speaking. The narrator, Doodle’s old brother, soon states, “But sometimes, as I sit in the cool…I remember Doodle” (Hurst 1). Hurst uses the word “remember” to emphasize the fact that Doodle is no long around. Readers do not know what happened to Doodle, but begin to suspect the answer. In the next paragraph the narrator says, “Doodle was just about the craziest brother a boy ever had” (Hurst 1). In this quote, Hurst uses past tense words such as “was” and “had” to once again show that this was in the past. Hurst’s word choices foreshadow Doodle’s death and sparks interest in the readers at the very beginning. Foreshadowing is used at the beginning of the story to draw readers into the story and help keep their interest.

This sets a dark mood to the story and hints the climax is starting. The reader is told of the evils coming, but there is not enough good in the townspeople for them to all realize the situation.

Shel Silverstein’s poem, Peanut-Butter Sandwich, revolves around a king and his insatiatable greed for a peanut butter sandwich. Slowly, the king succumbs to his favorite food and his jaws become stuck from the thick peanut butter. The whole town is called and through many different attempts, finally manages to pull the king’s jaws apart. When initially searching for a poem to imitate, I immediately looked to Silverstein. He is very famous and creates jovial poems which easily bring smiles to readers everywhere. Silverstein’s use of rhymes, tone, and organization all lead to a poem that creates a sense of nostalgia in the reader, reminding them of happy thoughts of childhood. I chose to imitate Peanut-Butter Sandwich so I could reproduce those feelings in my audience.

Secondly, both Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne share a very similar tone through their writings that affects the perception of evil in their stories. For example, “And now at the dead hour of the night, amid the dreadful silence of that old house, so strange a noise as this excited me to uncontrollable terror”(Poe, 11) represents a nervous, yet saddening tone presented by Allan Poe taking in consideration the repetition of a statement made by the main character in “The Tell-Tale Heart”. As well as Allan Poe, Hawthorne presents a mysterious gloomy tone where the minister’s veil makes the readers question themselves about the main purpose for using the piece of crape. An example of this gloomy and overwhelming mystery tone would be, “When Mr. Hooper came, the first thing that their eyes rested on was the same horrible black veil, which had added deeper gloom to the funeral, and could portend nothing but evil to the wedding” (Hawthorne, 11) letting the readers know that all of the villagers gathered at the funeral disliked the veil, for it only brought more mystery and sadness.

Although there are many themes that are present in the short story, appearance versus reality is an important theme. Hurston uses appearance vs. reality to convey to the reader that everything isn’t always as straightforward and simple as their appearances look. Since Joe admired Mr. Slemmons, he believed Mr. Slemmons was a rich man that worked hard for all of the things that he possessed. While speaking to his wife in the story Joe explained, “Yeah, he’s up to date. He got the finest clothes Ah ever seen on a colored man’s back.” (Pg.945) However, later on in the story the reader realizes that Mr. Slemmons was just a bogus man that bragged about his money and possessions which were fake; he had Joe and the others in town under the impression that he had a ton of money, jewelry, and women. Also, towards the end of the story when Joe goes into the candy store to buy Missie May some candy kisses, he puts on this act with the store clerk as if he knew that Mr. Slemmons was bogus all along but in reality, he didn’t know

1. Throughout the story suspense is aroused and maintained excellently. This is achieved by the character the author creates. Mr. Martin is characterized as a neat and cautious man, who never took a smoke or a drink in his life. Our suspense is aroused when the author states that it has been “a week to the day since Mr. Martin had decided to rub out Mrs. Ulgine Barrows”. This arouses our suspense because we are told Mr. Martin is planning to murder this woman. The suspense is maintained with Mr. Martin’s thoughts. We as an audience are given his thoughts through the use of the 3rd person omniscient point of view. His thoughts are mostly on the issue on his dislike of Mrs. Barrows. Because of this, he