I am reading “The Bass, The River, and Sheila Mant”, by W.D. Wetherell, and I am on page three. The story is about a boy who loves fishing. He has a neighbor who he thinks is really cute. Every time Sheila is sunbathing he likes to show off by swimming laps and diving off of the diving board. One day he got the guts to ask her out. He invites he to a music concert. He brings her to the concert by canoe, because he isn’t old enough to drive. He gets to know Sheila a little more, and Sheila states that she doesn’t like fishing. While he is bringing Sheila to the concert he gets a huge bass on his line and he has to choose between Sheila and the bass. In this journal I will be questioning and connecting. Will the boy choose Sheila or …show more content…
Sheila could fall in love with the boy and they could live happily ever after for the rest of their lives. Another option the boy has is to choose the fish. One reason he could choose the fish is, because it is the biggest fish he has ever caught. He was incredibly excited when he heard the snag of the line and he saw the bend of the pole. Another reason he would choose the fish is, because he is an avid fisherman. He always has a pole in his hand and he knows the lake very well. All in all the boy has a very difficult decision to make. Like in the story I had to make a difficult decision to make. The narrator had a hard time making a decision. He had to choose between the girl of his dreams and possibly the biggest bass he has ever caught. He chose the girl. He cut the line of the fishing pole, and let the bass free. When he got to the concert Sheila left him for another guy. The narrator regretted the decision he made of letting the fish go all summer. Like the narrator I also had to make a difficult decision. One day I got home from school and as usual I checked the messages on the answering machine. The first message was
He teaches the kid what to do in order to successfully reel in a large, beautiful fish. Ironically, the narrator is the one who learns from the kid in the end. At the beginning of the story, everything is described negatively, from the description of the kid as a “lumpy little guy with baggy shorts” to his “stupid-looking ’50s-style wrap-around sunglasses” and “beat-up rod”(152). Through his encounter with the boy, the narrator is able to see life in a different way, most notable from how he describes the caught tarpon as heavy, silvery white, and how it also has beautiful red fins (154). Through the course of the story, the narrator’s pessimistic attitude changes to an optimistic one, and this change reveals how inspiring this exchange between two strangers is. This story as a whole reveals that learning also revolves around interactions between other people, not only between people and their natural surroundings and
Today’s job seeker has tough competition. In the textbook reading “Judging by the Cover” by Bonny Gainley, she argues that job seekers ought to be careful when they make personal choices that initially will affect their chances of entering the workplace. People have a need to be accepted by others just the way they are, but many of us were taught as adolescence that we should not judge a book by its cover, yet people judge others solely on their personal appearances. That goes for businesses as well, “[t]he bottom line is that businesses exist to make money. Whether it seems fair or not, generally employers do care about the personal appearances of the people they hire because those people represent the business to its customers” (5). Maybe
I am reading “The Bass, the River, and Shelia Mant” by W.D. Wetherell, The story is about a young boy trying to choose between a beautiful girl and his passion of fishing. In this journal, I will be questioning and evaluating.
In “The Weekend,” George cheats on Lenore with Sarah, and she still chooses to stay with him and work out their issues. The story by Ann Beattie can relate to “The Awakening” by Kate Chopin because Edna cheats on Leonce with Robert and Alcee Arobin. After learning Edna cheats on him, Leonce decides to stay with Edna to work their relationship out. While nothing is wrong with their significant others, they cheat because something in them is unfulfilled. Lenore knows George cheats because he spends much of his time with the other women, but she never acknowledges it, until she talks with Julie one day; “she’s really the best friend I’ve ever had. We understand things—we don’t always have to talk about them. ‘Like her relationship with George,’
James Duncan’s book entitled, The River Why, focuses around the main character, Gus, and how he changes throughout the book. In this book Gus is discovering what life really is and that the whole world does not revolve around fishing. After moving out of his erratic house he spends all of his time fishing at his remote cabin, but this leaves him unhappy and a little insane. He embarks on a search for him self and for his own beliefs. Duncan changes Gus throughout the book, making Gus realize that there are more important things to life than fishing, and these things can lead to a happy fulfilled life, which in turn will help Gus enjoy life and fishing more. Duncan introduces a character, Eddy, who significantly changes Gus’s views on what he needs in his life and she gives Gus a sense of motivation or inspiration. Eddy changes Gus by their first encounter with each other, when Eddy instills in Gus a need to fulfill his life and when they meet up again, completing his need. Fishing is Gus’s first passion but he loses it after he puts all of himself into it, and when Eddy comes into his picture Gus feels a need to have more in his life, like love. Through finding love he re-finds his passion for fishing and learns more about himself. When Eddy and Gus finally get together, he sees this “equilibrium” between his old passion, fishing, and his new one, Eddy. Duncan’s use of Eddy gives Gus a new found sense of purpose and to have a more fulfilled life is a critical step in Gus’s development as a character. This is why Eddy is the most important character to this book, because she gives Gus inspiration to find himself.
The story describes the protagonist who is coming of age as torn between the two worlds which he loves equally, represented by his mother and his father. He is now mature and is reflecting on his life and the difficulty of his childhood as a fisherman. Despite becoming a university professor and achieving his father’s dream, he feels lonely and regretful since, “No one waits at the base of the stairs and no boat rides restlessly in the waters of the pier” (MacLeod 261). Like his father, the narrator thinks about what his life could have been like if he had chosen another path. Now, with the wisdom and experience that comes from aging and the passing of time, he is trying to make sense of his own life and accept that he could not please everyone. The turmoil in his mind makes the narrator say, “I wished that the two things I loved so dearly did not exclude each other in a manner that was so blunt and too clear” (MacLeod 273). Once a decision is made, it is sometimes better to leave the past and focus on the present and future. The memories of the narrator’s family, the boat and the rural community in which he spent the beginning of his life made the narrator the person who he is today, but it is just a part of him, and should not consume his present.
In the Maclean family, fly-fishing was portrayed as the link that brought the father closer to his two sons. Not only did the family strongly believe in their Presbyterian values, but they believed that fly-fishing was an important way to release their frustrations and just relax together every Sunday after church. In Norman Maclean’s novella, A River Runs Through It, a sport that started out as a hobby transformed into a tradition that brought discipline and structure into a family that seemed as though they would never be able to get along. In everyone’s life there is one activity that brings him or her these same feelings and emotions, it is just up to them to find it.
Love, an emotion that grips over people in intense ways, and holds them for an everlasting time. In the short story called “The Bass, The River, and Sheila Mant” written by W.D. Wetherell shows how love, or having a passion for someone, or something can drive a person into doing things in different ways. The story deals with the narrator trying to impress and go out with a girl named Sheila Mant, but at the same, the narrator loves fishing very much, so these two different passions would go in conflict with each other in the story. The theme of the story is not letting your love of something be overshadowed by anything else. The story portrays the theme through literary devices such as; the characterization of the narrator, the ironies involved
In the article “ From Fly to Bitches and Hoes” by Joan Morgan, she often speaks about the positive and negative ideas associated with hip-hop music. Black men display their manhood with full on violence, crime, hidden guilt, and secret escapes through drugs and alcohol. Joan Morgan’s article views the root causes of the advantage of misogyny in rap music lyrics. In the beginning of the incitement her desires shift to focus on from rap culture condemnation to a deeper analysis of the root causes. She shows the hidden causes of unpleasant sexism in rap music and argues that we need to look deeper into understanding misogyny. I agree with Joan Morgan with the stance that black men show their emotions in a different way that is seen a different perspective.
“The Boat”, narrated by a Mid-western university professor, Alistar MacLeod, is a short story concerning a family and their different perspectives on freedom vs. tradition. The mother pushes the son to embrace more of a traditional lifestyle by taking over the fathers fishing business, while on the other hand the father pushes the son to live more autonomously in an unconstrained manner. “The Boat” focuses on the father and how his personality influences the son’s choice on how to live and how to make decisions that will ultimately affect his life. In Alistair MacLeod’s, “The Boat”, MacLeod suggest that although dreams and desires give people purpose, the nobility of accepting a life of discontentment out weighs the selfishness of following ones own true desires. In the story, the father is obligated to provide for his family as well as to continue the fishing tradition that was inherited from his own father. The mother emphasizes the boat and it’s significance when she consistently asked the father “ How did things go in the boat today” since tradition was paramount to the mother. H...
He had a crush on his neighbor named Sheila Mant. He was willing to do anything for her, most likely he only likes her for her looks. He asked her out to go see a concert and her response was, “Do you have a car?”. He told her they’ll go on a canoe which disappointed her. The narrator wanted to impressed Sheila Mant by bringing his fishing gear. Later on, Sheila mention how she doesn’t like fishing and all she cared was talking about herself. The narrator wasn’t paying attention to Sheila, but instead a big bass caught his eye. The two of them were in there own world. Sheila then leaves him for another guy. His regret was not being for who he is and giving up what he loves to do. He learned that when he got older and will be more careful with decision
The poet seems to share the same pain with the fish, observing the scene and enjoying the detail just like enjoying an artwork. The poet lets the fish go because she is totally touched by the process between life and death; she loves life but, meanwhile, is deeply hurt by the life. In the poem, the fish has no fear towards her; the desire to live is in the moving and tragic details when she faces the death.
In her article “But What Do You Mean” Deborah Tannen, claims that there is a huge difference in the style of communicating between men and women. Tannen breaks these down into seven different categories; apologies, criticism, thank-yous, fighting, praise, complaints, and jokes. With each of these she compares men to women by explaining the common misconceptions that each of the genders do. The different style of communication can cause some problems at the workplace and even affect the environment. The different styles of communication has been around forever and almost becomes a “ritual”(299). Tannen is effective with mainly women and not men. She is primarily successful with women due to the fact that her tone targets women, also the organization
The son is somewhat imprisoned as well. He struggles throughout the story to choose what he wants to do in life, either go to school or stay at home and help his father with fishing. This is a difficult decision for him as he is pulled in different directions as his mother wants him to stay, and his father told him to go back to school. At the beginning of the story the readers realize that the narrator works at a university. This displays that the narrator, or son, chose to go down the path of education after his father died. He feels as though he owes it to his father to live his dreams. Another part to this story is the mother’s relationship with her husband and children. It is clear that she strongly is against anyone doing something other than fishing with their lives. Why is it that she strongly dislikes anyone going against fishing, while her husband is the total opposite? Her husband is fisherman, whose desire is education, but the mother can’t stand anyone wasting time on useless books. I feel as though this may be because the mother frowns upon what her husband loves, and she is upset that he has to escape the life he lives with her and their children, using books.
Bishop, Elizabeth. “The Fish.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature. ED. Nina Baym and Robert S. Levine. 8th ed. Vol. E. New York: Norton, 2012. 73-5. Print