Storytelling’s impact on people who use it has been life saving in certain cases. By asserting the existence of different perspectives, writers get to suppress their own opinions in order to sympathize with others. (insert thing about meta-fiction) With this idea in mind, author Kate Taylor wrote the novel Serial Monogamy, a meta-fiction of a writer recalling the story of her husband’s affair and her deal with terminal breast cancer, all through her telling of Dickens’ secret life and tales of the Arabian Nights. In Serial Monogamy, storytelling makes people more understanding as they explore new perspectives.
Sharon, through her telling of Nelly’s story, gets to understand the mistress’ perspective. By trying to see how a mistress might
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At first, Sharon tries to see life from his perspective with his childhood background when he used to live in Tehran. When Al was young, “In this happy, balanced world, [he] was the neighbourhood marble king” (313). This passage is relevant because it shows how Al felt as a kid. Sharon tries to understand her husband’s dreams, fears and feelings through the way he was brought up in his natal country. By imagining him as a king, the narrator understands how Al has always felt like he deserved an important place in this world. Moreover, Sharon understands more Al’s need for power as he resembles Dickens a lot when it comes to love relationships. The two adulterous husbands are admired by their younger mistresses, as we can see with Shay’s image of Al: “she also assumed her inspiring supervisor, blessed in every aspect of life, must be happily married too” (168). This quote shows how both Nelly and Al’s mistresses were younger women who admired the two men, which is exactly what Al and Dickens must have been looking for in the affairs: a sense of power, importance. By giving Dickens his place in her story, Sharon is accepting that even in every great man, there is a portion of humanity. Finally, Al and the prince in the Arabian nights’ story told in the book share the same charming, confident, and arrogant traits. Sharon’s telling of “The …show more content…
In fact, the main character is even aware of her change of character when it comes to being a writer. When recalling how her writer side would have attempted to understand the contradictory opinion of her editor Jonathan, Sharon states that “sometimes [she] think[s] the novelist is [her] better self, interested, understanding, wanting to know more” (277). (add explanation) Also, a comparison between Sharon and Scheherazade as storytellers can be made, demonstrating the importance of storytelling for both women. In the final part of Serial Monogamy, Hope expresses to the two daughters Sharon’s heritage: “if people ask where you came from, tell them your father was a prince of Persia and your mother a storyteller from Samarkand. And no one could ever really say which one seduced the other” (341). The fact that Hope was able to see Sharon as her best self shows how the storytelling characterized the writer so much that she became one with the Scheherazade from Arabian nights. Just like the famous storyteller, Sharon was able to grow with storytelling and made it part of her heritage. Through the telling of her own story, Sharon is able to accept her situation enough so that she can share her texts with her daughters without any bad intentions. At the very beginning of the book, Sharon emotionally expresses her final feelings toward Al and Hope for her daughters to read: “Please don’t think I wrote
This type of "narrative" writing gives believability to the people, and a sense of realism to the story.
A narrative is the revealing effect of a story from the first person point of view, which describes an experience, story or a set of events. In the story, the narrator tries to engage the audience to make the story further compelling. The narrator’s job is to take a point and a stance to display the significant point of his or her’s view.
John Updike's A & P and James Joyce's Araby share many of the same literary traits. The primary focus of the two stories revolves around a young man who is compelled to decipher the difference between cruel reality and the fantasies of romance that play in his head. That the man does, indeed, discover the difference is what sets him off into emotional collapse. One of the main similarities between the two stories is the fact that the main character, who is also the protagonist, has built up incredible, yet unrealistic, expectations of women, having focused upon one in particular towards which he places all his unrequited affection. The expectation these men hold when finally "face to face with their object of worship" (Wells, 1993, p. 127) is what sends the final and crushing blow of reality: The rejection they suffer is far too great for them to bear.
Although sex, immorality, and the scandalous actions of women are major themes in The Arabian Nights, there is an underlying theme of curiosity throughout the story. In the foreword it is explained that the purpose of the book was to provide "excellent lessons" and "opportunity to learn the art of discourse" (Page 185). It also serves to "teach the reader to detect deception and to protect himself from it, as well as delight and divert him whenever he is burdened with the cares of life and the ills of this world" (Page 185). The stories told throughout The Arabian Nights express how out of a man's curiosity he can bring forth an undesired or unplanned outcome. Curiosity changes the situation for several of the characters in the story leading them into most times unwanted situations. It sends a message to the reader that one shouldn't let their actions be guided by curiosity, but rather by the "Supreme God who is the True Guide" (Page 185).
1. Growing up we all heard stories. Different types of stories, some so realistic, we cling onto them farther into our lives. Stories let us see and even feel the world in different prespectives, and this is becuase of the writter or story teller. We learn, survive and entertain our selves using past experiences, which are in present shared as stories. This is why Roger Rosenblatt said, "We are a narrative species."
Last but not least, O’Connor confirms that even a short story is a multi-layer compound that on the surface may deter even the most enthusiastic reader, but when handled with more care, it conveys universal truths by means of straightforward or violent situations. She herself wished her message to appeal to the readers who, if careful enough, “(…)will come to see it as something more than an account of a family murdered on the way to Florida.”
Literary critic, Walter Wells, states this in his analysis of the two pieces, writing that “both protagonists have come to realize that romantic gestures -- in fact, that the whole chivalric world view -- are, in modern times, counterproductive” (Wells 3). Both protagonists, being either a child or just a year into his adulthood, lacks a true understanding of the world around them. Motivated by their incomplete knowledge of the world and the people around them, they act out in a grand gesture, hoping to attract the attention and admiration of Mangan’s sister for the narrator in Araby and Queenie for Sammy in A&P. However, due to the same, flawed ideology of the workings of the world that motivates them to carry out their plan, it ultimately leads to their downfall. In conclusion, both pieces of literature show that life is a process of maturation by learning from one’s failures. Both the Narrator from Araby and Sammy from A&P fail in their original goal of gaining the affection of the girls through their grand gestures. Furthermore, both characters, in acting out their plan, realize their lack of understanding of the world and thus loose their innocence. Finally, through their growth, they are able to, by
Throughout “Araby”, the main character experiences a dynamic character shift as he recognizes that his idealized vision of his love, as well as the bazaar Araby, is not as grandiose as he once thought. The main character is infatuated with the sister of his friend Mangan; as “every morning [he] lay on the floor in the front parlour watching her door…when she came on the doorstep [his] heart leaped” (Joyce 108). Although the main character had never spoken to her before, “her name was like a summons to all [his] foolish blood” (Joyce 108). In a sense, the image of Mangan’s sister was the light to his fantasy. She seemed to serve as a person who would lift him up out of the darkness of the life that he lived. This infatuation knew no bounds as “her image accompanied [him] even in places the most hostile to romance…her name sprang to [his] lips at moments in strange prayers and praises which [he] did not understand” (Joyce 109). The first encounter the narrator ex...
The narrator of both stories did an outstanding job in setting the scene for the readers. The theme of both stories to me is about lessons learned. In Araby the young unnamed protagonist makes a promise to bring back a gift from a bazaar and was unable to purchase the gift leaving him disappointed and angry. “Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger” (Joyce, 1914). To me the young man is angry because of all the trials and tribulations he put himself through to get a gift to impress a young lady who really was not interested in him anyway. And Sammy from A&P although a little older than the unnamed boy from Araby also shared a fixation with a female character. Sammy thought because he quit his job to make a statement to his boss Mr. Lengel that she (Queenie) would be outside waiting for him. “I look around for my girls, but they're gone, of course. There wasn't anybody but some young married screaming with her children about some candy they didn't get by the door of a powder-blue Falcon station wagon” (Updike, 1961). Sammie assumed that this act of solidarity would place him in an advantageous position with the young lady. Sammy who was surely disappointed when his expectations were not met did learn a valuable lesson. According to Sammy “I felt how hard the world was going to be to me hereafter” (Udike,
...e relationship with men, as nothing but tools she can sharpen and destroy, lives through lust and an uncanny ability to blend into any social class makes her unique. Her character is proven as an unreliable narrator as she exaggerates parts of the story and tries to explain that she is in fact not guilty of being a mistress, but a person caught in a crossfire between two others.
The second person point of view helps the reader to connect with the girl in this story. It shows the reader a better understanding of this character and how she is being raised to be a respectable woman. This point of view also gives us an insight on the life of women and shows us how they fit into their society. Through this point of view, the reader can also identify the important aspects of the social class and culture. The daughter tries to assert a sense of selfhood by replying to the mother but it is visible that the mother is being over whelming and constraining her daughter to prepare her for
In James Joyce’s Araby, a young boy finds himself in love with an older girl. The girl, Mangan’s sister, refuses to love him back and instead ignores him. This crushes the boy and makes his hunger for her even more stronger. He sometimes finds himself hopelessly alone in the darkness thinking about her, awaiting for the day she would recognize his devotion to her. “ At night in my bedroom…her image came between me and the page I strove to read (805).” “At last she spoke to me (805).” She asked him if he was going to attend a popular carnival called Araby. Unfortunately, she was unable to go, and it was up to him to bring her something back. This became his journey and adventure that he could not wait for. “I wished to annihilate the tedious intervening days (805).” When he finally arrived at Araby he found himself, once again alone in the darkness, due to the fact that it was closing time. Nearly all the stalls were closed down already, except one. When he approached to the open stall to buy a special present for his loved one, he was by the saleswomen’s mean and annoyed tone of voice, when she asked him if he would like to buy anything. “She seem to have spoken to me out of a sense of duty (807).” His only response was a disappointed “No thank you (807).” He was obviously heartbroken and shocked that he was unable to accomplish his task, and make the love of his life love him the same way he loves her. This young boy is introduced to disappointment of disillusionment through the themes of isolation, dark and light images, and hopelessness an decay.
In the story, the narrator is forced to tell her story through a secret correspondence with the reader since her husband forbids her to write and would “meet [her] with heavy opposition” should he find her doing so (390). The woman’s secret correspondence with the reader is yet another example of the limited viewpoint, for no one else is ever around to comment or give their thoughts on what is occurring. The limited perspective the reader sees through her narration plays an essential role in helping the reader understand the theme by showing the woman’s place in the world. At ...
In “Araby”, James Joyce details the transition of a young Irish boy into his adolescence. Looking for love and excitement, the narrator becomes obsessed with pleasing his best friend’s sister, eventually ending up at a special festival to buy her a present. Disappointed by the bad- natured shopkeepers and its closing down, he reaches a frustrating epiphany about the fine line between reality and his wistful dreams. Through the use of fanciful imagery and detached characterization, Joyce demonstrates how romance belongs to the realm of the young, not the old, and that it is doomed to fail in a word flawed by materialism and a lack of beauty.