Analysis Of Dance Of The Happy Shades

Dance of the Happy Shades Response Dance of the Happy Shades is a delightful collection of short stories by Alice Munro published in 1968. This collection contains fifteen short stories which all feel Canadian and personal. Narrowing down the list of stories to just five for analysis was not an easy task. Munro’s writing contains many significant subjects related to short fiction. Munro effectively utilizes narrative style, theme, conflict, setting, and creates relatable characters. The stories I chose all had impactful elements that I wished to investigate further. The Office (59), An Ounce of Cure (75), Boys and Girls (111), A Trip to the Coast (172), and The Peace of Utrecht (190) are stories that had a lasting impression on me. The short

During adolescents, one can be expected to learn many lessons about life. While reading An Ounce of Cure, numerous meaningful themes can be detected. A theme that stood out to me whilst reading related to what individuals and masses remember about your life. I believe a major theme can be described as people forget in an instant yet individuals remember forever. This can be seen in the story when people around town stop gossiping about the narrator 's life, but Martin Collingwood remembers forever. A majority of people will not remember the embarrassing exploits of our fifteen year old selves that were made public. One may remember the exciting night when they rescued a babysitting girl, who had become drunk for the first time, but they will not remember the reason said girl decided to drink. The people who chatted and gossiped about the narrators problems stop and switch topics when a new and more exciting piece of news hits the community. Young Martian Collingwood does add to the gossip by proclaiming how he always thought the narrator was a nut. Martin Collingwood has a deeper connection to the gossip than the rest of people in the town. He is at least slightly aware that the narrators issues were derived from his actions. Unlike the masses, Martin Collingwood is an individual that has a connection to the story that he will never

I found myself on the fence with the narrator, pondering the choices of a girl in an adolescent boys world. Munro provokes thoughts of gender roles and parental pressure and how they can affect development. Girls are just as capable as boys, they just need to be given the chance.

A Trip to the Coast A Trip to the Coast is set in the near ghost town of Black Horse. The central Ontario setting Munro describes made me feel a sense of patriotic nostalgia. Munro paints a picture of the landscape more clear than a Group of Seven artist. The vivid description of the landscape around Back Horse caused me to reminisce about my cottage. “People who are passing through, on their way to the Lakes of Muskoka and the northern bush, may notice that around here the bountiful landscape thins and flattens, worn elbows of rock appear in the diminishing fields and the deep, harmonious woodlots of elm and maple give way to a denser, less hospitable scrub-forest of birch and poplar, spruce and pine — where in the heat of the afternoon the pointed trees at the end of the road turn blue, transparent, retreating into the distance like a company of ghosts.” (Munro