Literary fictional works are strange in that readers are enveloped in a new world. This new world becomes vivid as one reads along, and emotions are evoked. George Bowering’s metafictional short story “A Short Story” conjures feelings of frustration and surprise in readers. Through the use of an unconventional narrative structure readers are manipulated into believing and mirroring Donna’s hatred. Despite the evident warning within the story, it is not until the end that one realizes these feelings were controlled by Bowering.
The first word in “A Short Story” is the heading “Setting” (1), which is the first of many distractions Bowering exploits. Each heading distracts readers from the actual plot as it draws focus to the literary technique. For example, in the heading section of “Characters” (1) I focused on Art and Audrey’s surface characteristics, such as Art’s “tanned [and] muscled” (1) body and Audrey’s dyed “brownish-red” (1) hair. It was not until the second time I read the story that I realized Art and Audrey’s physical characteristics are not the most important details of the “Characters” section. The crucial detail being the absence of Donna in the section. Donna is mentioned briefly when the narrator explains how Audrey wore her hair when “Donna was five” (2). Referring to Donna at the end of the “Characters” portion places her as an afterthought, a character not worthy of being described in a section specifically dedicated to illustrating characters. When I
With this statement, Jacobs specified her purpose for writing and her intended audience. This insight gives readersan understanding of why she chose to include what she did in her story as well as why she chose to exclude other details. Although this work is presented as a narrative of
The world is a massive place full of endless literature, beginning from ancient scrolls to daily news articles, filled with many secrets, perspectives and surroundings that help connect literature to an individual’s daily life. Some writers use the skills of literary elements to express and discuss an event that has happened to them or what has happened to others. This helps others to comprehend the perspectives of the author’s understanding toward an incident that one might experience. For instance in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, she uses many literary elements to express her views over most of her stories. O’Connor expresses her views in her short story, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by using the literary elements of point of view, irony, and setting.
Short stories are seemingly a lost art amongst the literary community. Legendary writers such as Edgar Allen Poe, Flannery O’Connor, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and many more have paved the way for writers such as Ha Jin and Phil Klay who write today. Now, although one could speak on the importance of each of these tremendous writers, the focus in paper will be on two writings being that of Flannery O’Connor’s, “A Good Man Is Hard To Find” and Ha Jin’s, “Under The Red Flag”. Now, each book contains many short stories that encapture readers throughout them. Flannery O’Connor’s classic short story, “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, will be compared and contrasted with Ha Jin’s ,”Decade” and “The Richest Man”. Just as Greg Orwell
Many short stories written nowadays are written nowadays in third person to ensure that the audience receives a well-rounded, factual story. The third person POV, however, is extremely broad and can be interpreted in a multitude of different ways by various authors. An astonishing example of the third person variety is a comparison between A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner and The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien. While Faulkner’s piece demonstrates a mysterious third person POV, O’Brien’s piece takes the third person POV onto an uncommon emotional journey.
The genre of this piece is particularly significant in relaying the intended message to its full extent. This short story comes from the book, In Short, a compilation of brief creative nonfiction. Creative nonfiction is a category of writing that creates a true story using literary techniques. Without this nonfiction genre, the story would lose the essence that makes it convincing to the reader. If it was a piece of fiction instead, the message, however potent it may be, might tend to make the audience feel less inclined to value the main point of the story-- it could lose credibility. For example, if Ozick said, “I, under the electrified rays of my whitening hair, stand drawn upward to the startling sky, restored to the clarity of childhood,” during her talk of Stockholm’s autumn sunshine in a fictional story, it wouldn’t have the effect of truthfulness to support it (pg. 69). Because this piece is a personal essay and therefore a personal experience of Ozick’s life, it allows her to take the reader on a journey with her, in a sense. If it had been written in strictly third person
Short stories have fully developed themes but appear significantly shorter and less elaborate than novels. A similar theme found in short stories “Winter Dreams” written by Scott F. Fitzgerald and “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner included the social and environmental influences that encouraged and controlled the character’s life and decisions. In “Winter Dreams”, the main protagonist-- Dexter-- fell into a fixation over a young, whimsical blueblood, Judy Jones. His obsession led him to believe that Judy Jones reciprocated his feelings for her, leaving him bare and mortal-- despite prior beliefs. Following her father’s death, Miss Emily fell into a dark obscurity due to the pressure and compulsion of having to carry on the honorable family name. While using a unique point of view (first person peripheral), “A Rose for Emily” followed a mysterious and desirable woman named Miss Emily as her hometown tried to understand her peculiar ways and began to find her disgraceful. By comparing and contrasting these two literary pieces, a similar organization-- including the writers’ purpose and themes-- should become clear. By using literary devices-- such as point of view, dramatic irony, detail, and figurative language-- Scott F. Fitzgerald and William Faulkner conducted two short stories similar in aim and reasoning, probable for contrasting and comparing elements within the parallel writings.
Flannery O’Connor introduces her reader’s too unique short stories. They are “Good Country People” and “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, having too similar characters in different setting, but with the same symbolic meaning. The comparison between Hugla from “Good Country People” to the grandmother in “A Good Man Is Hard to find” is interesting, because they both suffer the same fate. In every short story O’Connor has created a intellectual individual who comes to a realization that their beliefs in there ability to control their lives and the lives of other are false. They enviably become the vulnerable, whereas they assumed it would be different. O’Connor has placed two misguide characters, that deem themselves to be manipulative and compulsive. At the end up of each short story they become vulnerable. Hugla from “Good Country People” and the grandmother from “A Good
The narrator’s diction on the page can be described as vain due to the fact he doesn’t need an introduction when the narrator says it is “not really necessary” (4). The narrator’s diction reveals that he has a methodical, stone cold personality that puts the narrator in a more superior position then the human race. Achieving
“Fiction has been maligned for centuries as being "false," "untrue," yet good fiction provides more truth about the world, about life, and even about the reader, than can be found in non-fiction,” says Clark Zlotchew, a renowned author. This begs us to question, how do short stories portray relevant issues in society?
A narrative is constructed to elicit a particular response from its audience. In the form of a written story, authors use specific narrative strategies to position the ‘ideal reader’ to attain the intended understanding of the meanings in the text. Oliver Sacks’ short story The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is an unusual short story because it does not display conventional plot development; the story does not contain conflict or resolution of conflict. The genre of the story is also difficult to define because it reads as an autobiographical account of an experience Sacks had with a patient while working as a neurologist. Although it is arguable that the narrative is a work of non-fiction, it is nevertheless a representation, distinct
Short stories usually convey a theme message, a statement which motivates the reader to be a more moral person. In order for the reader to understand this life lesson, authors implant different literary devices such as foreshadowing and conflict into their text. Foreshadowing is the use of clues to suggest events that may occur later in the story, and conflict is when there is a struggle between two opposing forces. In “Charles” by Shirley Jackson and “The Fun They Had” by Isaac Asimov, the authors use foreshadowing and conflict to enhance the story's ultimate meaning.
The choices that writers make in their writings often create some degree of impact on their readers. The use of language, dictions, style of writing, and other choices they make, all affects the moods of the readers; however, not only the mood, or emotion, of reading the piece, but the way readers analyze the writing. In the short story, Artie’s Angels, Catherine Wells utilizes rhetoric choices of metafiction, reference to King Arthur, and the selection of Morgan le Fay to identify the qualities needed to become leaders and persuade how these leaders make their social movements successful.
James A. Michener’s The Novel details the creation of the titular novel as it passes through the hands of four different characters in their respective chapters to reach completion. These four characters—the writer, Lukas Yoder; the editor, Yvonne Marmelle; the critic, Karl Streibert; and the reader, Jane Garland—each contribute to the story in some way and are each necessary to its creation and success in varying ways and in various magnitudes. However, the one who was the most integral to the creation of Lukas Yoder’s final work was Yvonne Marmelle, his long-time editor who never gave up on him. Michener’s story is done in a very unique way and provides much knowledge for the reader to gain in regards to literature as a whole.
Short stories can share themes, motifs, symbols, consequences, and plot lines, even if there is never any intention to share a common element between the stories. The stories can be written close together or in different decades and still be linked to the one another. They can also be worlds apart with different meanings in the end, but that does not stop them from having similar ideas expressed within them. The following three stories, “Lagoon” by Joseph Conrad, “The Rocking Horse Winner” by DH Lawrence, and “The Lady in the Looking Glass” by Virginia Woolf, are three totally different stories that share common threads that make them the stories that they are.
The short story is a concise form of narrative prose that is usually simpler and more direct compared to longer works of fiction such as novels. Therefore, because of their short length, short stories rely on many forms of literary devices to convey the idea of a uniform theme seen throughout the script. This theme is illustrated by using characteristics that are developed throughout the story such as, plot, setting and characters. The three main components are developed throughout the story in order to guide the reader to the underlying theme, which is necessary as a short story lacking a theme also lacks meaning or purpose.