I quit! These words can be attached to so many things in life. At times in life things seem to be different then they really are, for instance the thrill and the excitement of having a summer job or even successfully getting a first job. There are certain moments in a person’s life that will always have an impact on them one could call this a definitive moment or an epiphany. In the short story A&P by John Updike the main character Sammy has an epiphany in that he realizes that a moral line has been crossed in his working environment. The story is a simple conflict followed by definitive action short story. It’s a wonderful portrayal of what a young man thinks and what he will stand for and what he will not. The fascinating part is how Sammy describes the young ladies as they enter the convenience store. Updike states “She was a chunky kid, with a good tan and a sweet broad soft-looking can with those two crescents of white just under it, where the sun never seems to hit, at the top of the backs of her legs”. Sammy is only talking about one of the three young ladies in this description. The descriptive words in the story are very thought provoking; Updike refers to the girls derrieres as “cans”. Imagery and symbolism are used frequently through out the story; Sammy describes the shoppers inside the A&P Updike uses this description “sheep pushing their carts down the aisles”. Updike uses Imagery to tell you where exactly where the A&P is located in the town, the lay out of the store and how Sammy’s co workers have a say in what he does and his work routine. Sammy is a nineteen year old man; he is no longer considered a minor by today’s’ society. He is trying to find out what he is doing working at a grocery store during the summer, in his mind he should be down on the beach checking out the ladies. The ocean seems to be just another aspect of the town, nothing too special. The following passage supports this Updike states “people in this town haven’t seen the ocean in twenty years”. Tourism is what drives ocean towns, and communities. It’s a simple matter of taxation the more money a city can make off of the natural or man made attractions the better off the city is.
There is two main types of people in the story "A&P by John Updike". The types are conformity vs rebellion. Sammy in the story is a rebel.
The plot of the story deals with three girls who come into the store dressed only in bathing suits. They make their entrance in the very first sentence, and they complicate Sammy's life. At first, Sammy, his older friend Stokesie, and McMahon the butcher all look at the girls lustfully. But of them all, only Sammy enjoys the entertainment the girls bring. The other shoppers crash their carts, look stunned, and are suddenly jarred out of their everyday routine. Sammy, who seems bored with his job, finds the change amusing. He even begins to feel sorry for the girls when everyone else stares at them lustfully. The plot's major conflict occurs late in the story when Lengel, the manager, comes in and scolds the girls. Sammy knows that they are on their way out of the store, but Lengel has to yell at them and make them feel bad.
Updike's main character, Sammy, is overwhelmed as three young ladies stroll in to the store where he is a cashier. Sammy observers closely as the girls move
The short story by John Updike called “A&P” is a very interesting little story. The way that it is written is quite amusing. It seems as though the story takes place around the seventies maybe, but the reader never really knows because it is not specified. One might think this is the time frame because of how Sammy, the narrator of the story, writes as if this is the time period in which he is living.
“A&P” is a short story by John Updike about a nineteen-year-old male named Sammy. Sammy lives in a small town five miles from the beach and works at a grocery store called A&P. Throughout the story Sammy reveals signs of agitation at his job. Things begin to change as he gazed his eyes on three girls that walk into the store. The A&P and the girls are important symbols in “A&P” that help reveal the conflict in the story.
At the beginning of the story Sammy complains about an older woman, a fifty-year-old "witch" with rouge on her cheekbones and no eyebrows, who is waiting to check out her groceries. She gets annoyed with Sammy because he is too busy drooling over the young flesh which has just walked in the door (Updike 1026). The first half-naked girl who walks into the A&P and catches Sammy’s eye is a chunky girl with a two-piece plaid bathing suit on that showed off her "sweet broad soft-looking can" (Updike l026). As if staring at this girl’s backside wasn’t enough, Sammy also noticed "those two crescents of white just under it, where the sun never seems to hit" (Updike 1026).
In "A & P", John Updike develops his characters through the eyes of the main character, Sammy. Sammy works in a grocery store, and one day he observes three young girls as they come into the store. The whole time they are in the A & P, Sammy describes their appearance, behavior, and his impression of them in great detail. Sammy watches each of the girls as they look around the store, but there is one that catches his attention right as they walk in. He is so busy staring at her that he makes the customer he is "ringing up" very mad at him. Sammy describes the young girl as a "chunky kid, with a good tan and a sweet broad soft - looking can with those two crescents of white just under it..."(Updike, 105). He notices everything about the girl, even down to the fact that she does not have a tan line, so she must have just bought the bright green, two piece, bathing suit. He also notices that she is very conscience of being a little over weight, because she "..fumbled with the cookies, but on second thought she put the packages back". Sammy describes the next girl as a pretty girl, but not pretty enough to be called beautiful. He puts great detail in describing her appearance, and describes everything about her, from her long, frizzy hair, to her long neck, and the sunburns underneath her eyes. This girl is the tallest of the three, but he says that while she is " the kind of girl other girls think is very ‘striking' and ‘attractive' but never quite makes it....is why they like her so much". The last girl he describes is the one he thinks is the leader of the three girls, and even calls her the "queen" (Updike, 105). Sammy describes her as being a very self-assured girl, who is trying to teach the other girls how to be just like her. He states that "she had talked the other two into coming in here with her, and now she was showing them how to do it, walk slow and hold yourself straight". Sammy goes into the greatest detail describing the character. He talks about the color of her bathing suit, how her straps are pulled down, the style of her hair, and the manner in which she walks across the store.
The main character in John Updike's short story “A&P” is Sammy. The story's first-person context gives the reader a unique insight toward the main character's own feelings and choices, as well as the reasons for the choices. The reader is allowed to closely observe Sammy's observations and first impressions of the three girls who come to the grocery store on a summer afternoon in the early 1960s. In order to understand this short story, one must first recognize the social climate of the era, the age of the main character, and the temptation this individual faces.
The short story “A & P” by John Updike makes us think about the choices we make. Young people do not have much experience in life which causes them to do things irrationally. Young adults make choices on impulse, without a good reason, or simply to impress someone.
In “A&P” by John Updike we have the theme of desire, change, conformity, rebellion, liberation and consumerism. Taken from his “The Early Stories” collection the story is narrated in the first person by a young nineteen year old boy named Sammy. After reading the story, the reader realises that Updike may be exploring the theme of desire. Though it is obvious that Sammy is physically attracted to Queenie as the story continues the reader also senses that Sammy wants to live his life as he thinks Queenie may be living hers. While Queenie is at the check-out Sammy imagines what parties at Queenie’s house may be like. Unlike the parties his own parents have and which Sammy considers to be boring, he imagines parties at Queenie’s home to be more
As the story continues, Sammy curiously watches the provocative young ladies as they stroll through the store looking for groceries. In this fictional story, Sammy describes all three noticeable ladies, the main girl, "Queenie" he describes her as the leader of the two other girls. The second young lady he described was the chunky one; he fully described the chunky girl from head to toe, because Sammy had more descriptive words regarding her appearance. The third girl was the taller of the two. She was not as striking as the other two young ladies. The girls were barefoot and wore bathing suits, which is why they caught Sammy's attention. The reason being not because of the bathing suits they were wearing, but the way they strolled down the isles with confidence as they walked through the store. These young ladies were, "The kind of girls that other girls think are "Striking" and "Attractive." (48) Updike wants to let the reader know these girls wanted attention and only attention; by the way he described what they were wearing and how they flaunted themselves.
Updike uses the experiences of teenagers to say how choices can affect our lives and the consequences that follow. When Sammy decides to quit his job, he is making the choice to be an individual and venture into the unknown. He does not want to be married with children at a young age like Stokesie, nor be as rigid as the manager, Mr.Lengel. The story ends with the sentence “I felt how hard the world was going to be to me hereafter” (Updike 102) which means Sammy is no longer a carefree teen, but a man who now has to accept that his rash choice to quit came with a result.
In the story A&P, we know as the story begins, Sammy is employed at A&P. He is ringing a older lady, who he describes as a "witch", groceries up. While Sammy is occupied, in walks three girls, wearing bathing suits, who catch Sammy's eye. Their attire is against the stores policy, which is not enforced, until the manager approaches them. Once the manager approaches them, we later read that Sammy quits his job. Following his first announce in him quitting, he says, "You didn't have to embarrass them" (152), which let us know, he felt the girls were embarrassed. Sammy's main point for quitting his job at A&P, in his and my opinion, is to be an "unsuspected hero" (152).
John Updike's A&P provides numerous perspectives for critical interpretation. His descriptive metaphors and underlying sexual tones are just the tip of the iceberg. A gender analysis could be drawn from the initial outline of the story and Sammy's chauvinism towards the female. Further reading opens up a formalist and biographical perspective to the critic. After several readings I began seeing the Marxist perspective on the surreal environment of A&P. The economic and social differences are evident through Sammy's storytelling techniques and even further open up a biographical look at Updike's own view's and opinions. According to an essay posted on the internet Updike was a womanizer in his own era and displayed boyish immaturity into his adulthood. A second analysis of this story roots more from a reader-response/formalist view. Although Sammy centered his dramatization around three young females, more specifically the Queen of the trio, it was a poignant detailed head to toe description of scene. I'll touch on that later.
Sammy, the narrator of the story, is a nineteen-year-old boy who has a strong interest in the opposite sex. He is very opinionated, somewhat sarcastic and likes to observe the environment around him. From the moment the girls walk into the store, Sammy begins to soak up every detail of their physical appearance, including their bathing suits, tan lines, posture, and walk. He then begins to dive into the lives of the girls, specifically Queenie’s, the leader group. The way she speaks and her