Everyday Use

Dee is a jerk. She seems to despise everything she used to be which she makes obvious when she says "[Dee's] dead." By taking on a new name, she thought she could become the person she wants to be and leave her simple life behind. While she keeps trying to push her past away by rejecting her name and the house where she grew up, she also seems to be seeking her heritage. Her search for heritage seems fake. If she hated the quilts when she was offered one, why would she become so upset when she couldn't have them? She's trying to impress the man she's with by showing a love for African things like the quilts her grandmother made even though they hold no value for her. She has been ashamed of her heritage and race for her entire life, and her mother knows that. She made the right decision in not giving "Wangero" the quilts.

Bartleby the Scrivener

The other three workers in the Lawyer's office are introduced before Bartleby in this story. The author wants to set Bartleby apart from the rest of them. Turkey is a good worker in the morning, but he doesn't work well at all in the afternoon. The Lawyer must yell "[b]ut the blots, Turkey" because of Turkey's sloppiness. Nippers, the exact opposite of Turkey, is always the victim of both "ambition and indigestion." Nippers wants to be a good worker, but the indigestion which he endures in the mornings makes that impossible until the afternoon. Ginger Nut is twelve, so he doesn't count. The author contrasts Bartleby with each of these characters. He's a hard worker and produces more than the Lawyer could have imagined. By showing the reader the seemingly sub-par workers first, the author makes Bartleby seem like the ideal worker. This increases the reader's surprise when Bartleby refuses to review the copies he's made.

Hunters in the Snow

I'm going to answer the eighth question for this one. In the final two sentences of the story, the narrator confirms that Tub and Frank had no intention of helping Kenny. The narrator tells us that "[t]hey had taken a different turn a long way back" when Kenny believes he's being taken to the hospital. The use of the word "different" implies a kind of choice rather than an unintentional mistake. Tub and Frank don't want to save Kenny's life. If they wanted to save him, they wouldn't have stopped at a tavern on the way to the hospital or chosen a different turn. The stop at the tavern was a hint that Tub and Frank were not concerned about saving Kenny's life, but the last two sentences confirm that they truly were not. This final twist makes both characters seem like liars. When Tub shot Kenny, he seemed to want to help, but both Frank and Tub become less trustworthy as the story goes on.

Short Stories So Far

So far, I like the short stories unit. The works we've read (I know it's only five, but still) are more interesting than poems were. Edward was creepy, but Emily Grierson won that battle when she kept a corpse in a bed in her house because Colonel Sartoris was a control freak. He made his own daughter crazy by driving away all suitors. I guess her way of keeping a man in her life was killing him while he was surrounded by items she bought for him (page 289). It makes sense that she would want him to have a part of her since he was the only man she ever had any relationship. The fact that she could lay next to a corpse and feel like she had company is disturbing even though it seems almost logical in a crazy kind of way. Was she actually crazy, or did she just have daddy issues?

Interpreter of Maladies

I guess I should have expected that Mrs. Das wasn't faithful to her husband. I kind of feel like an idiot for missing that. Anyway, she is emotionally almost completely separated from her family. I can't imagine how a mother could become that way. Based on Lahiri's description of Mrs. Das, her life isn't bad at all. I think that the Das family represents the idea of the typical family trying to appear to be perfect at the beginning of the story. At the end, the family sounds absolutely crazy. Bobby's incident with the monkeys and the parents' reactions and physical descriptions create a disheveled image. The story is about the change in Mr. Kapasi's attitude toward Mrs. Das from admiring her physical features (page 158) to surprised (page 163). He didn't really know her at all, and as her attitude changes, his infatuation loses intensity.

How I Met My Husband

I think I'll take number seven for this one. Firstly, I don't like Alice Kelling, and I think that Munro created her that way on purpose. Alice is definitely an antagonist once she enters the story. She seems to create an immediate threat for Edie when she arrives and picks up the relationship Edie wants with Chris Watters. Alice's presence also seems to give Chris a strong desire to leave as quickly as possible. It's almost ironic that Alice becomes so upset when she believes that Edie has been with Chris (she calls Edie a "filthy little rag" and a convenience of society on page 144) because Alice is just like Edie except for the fact that she follows him. Alice truly believes that she and Chris have a real relationship. Wouldn't he tell her where he was going if he wanted to be with her? Alice sped up the plot of the story and also foiled Edie. Edie was able to give up on Chris eventually, but Alice follows him like a sad puppy looking for love.

A Rose For Emily

First of all, I doubted that this story would be as creepy as it sounded. I was wrong. Way, way wrong. I'm gonna go with the third question from the assignment sheet for this one. The conclusion of the story was definitely foreshadowed. It seemed to me that Emily would still have her father's body in the house based on the way she talked about him. When she said "See Colonel Sartoris," I thought before I finished the story that she had easy access to his body. That coupled with the horrible smell which came from her house led me to believe that she had kept her father's body in the house until Barron was introduced. When the narrator said that Barron was last seen at Emily's house, I still thought that her father's body was in the house too. The fact that Barron was never seen leaving was a huge clue that his body had to be in the house. The fact that she had never had much of a relationship with a man before Barron makes her actions slightly more understandable and predictable but still incredibly creepy.