The Lesson by Toni Cade Bambara

Abstract
            Sylvia is a young girl living in the "slums". Throughout the neighborhood there are many other kids; most of them are cousins to Sylvia. None of these kids receive any education because their parents never have time to worry about them. Miss Moore is a large black lady who mentors these kids. She takes them on educational field trips. Sylvia always dreads going with Miss Moore because she's boring. All the kids get ready and take a trip into the city to fifth avenue. Once they get to fifth avenue they are all in shock to see all the nice clothing and toys in the windows. Miss Moore said that they could go into the toy store and look around but Sugar and Sylvia hesitate because they feel out of place. At the end of their visit to the toy store Miss Moore asks what they leaned and Sugar says that she learned that one toy boat is the same amount of money that could support their family's cost of food for a year. 


Response

            While reading, “The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara I felt it was all based on money and the social class of people. The criticism I immediately felt related to this story was Marxism. At the start of the story you know from the word choice that the narrator must not be well educated. The first few words are, “Back in the days when…” this shows that proper grammar is not being used. Whenever I read and hear someone with poor grammar or vocabulary I think that means they’re not well educated, which in this story is true. Sylvia the narrator lives in the “slums” they way Miss Moore states it. This makes Sylvia part of the lower class of socioeconomic standing.

            It is apparent that education is not important to these kids or their parents. When the children are talking to Miss Moore they talk about how they don’t know where their parents are. In one case one of kids says he doesn’t even have a home. This shows you just how poor the value of education is to these families because their parents don’t even manage to take them to school. In the story Sylvia states that she doesn’t even live with her mother. She lives with her aunt. Her mother lives up the street in an apartment with another lady. Sylvia states that she doesn’t know what they do but she suspects they sit around and drink.

            The children go on a field trip into the city with Miss Moore one day. She hands Sylvia five dollars to pay for the cab. This make Sylvia excited and she can’t imagine what she could all buy with this money. At one point in the story she wants to stop the cab and get out and run away with the money. This just shows how in need Sylvia is for money and how sacred it is to her.

            They arrive on Fifth Avenue and see that there are many people roaming the streets. The stores are all expensive and Miss Moore tells the children that the will walk around and look in the windows at all the different things to buy. At one point a kid spots a toy boat and the price says a thousand some dollars. The children can’t believe that someone would pay that much for a toy. Miss Moore tells the children that they can go into the toy store and look around. All the kids rush through the door eager to get in, but once Sylvia and Sugar reach the doors they stop. The feel like their being looked at as they enter. They are different than the others in the store. They also notice that the store is quiet. They expected it to be loud with songs and children playing with toys. This is such an experience for Sylvia and the other children because their families don’t have money for toys. They can barely supply their families with food. That is why they are so astonished with the toys and how expensive they are.

            When all the children are done looking they all come outside. Miss Moore asks them what they thought of the store and what they learned. Surprisingly Sugar speaks up saying that the cost of the sailboat could pay for what all the children eat in one year. Sugar expresses how she can’t understand why anyone would ever pay that much for a toy. This is the turning point in the story because this is the whole reason Miss Moore took them in the field trip. So they could see how others live and how people use their money on different things.

            As the story ends Sylvia starts thinking about how people become rich and why can’t she? It ends up all coming down to education. You must have a good education in order to get a good job and make money. Sylvia sees how people with money live better lives and are happier. I think this is turning point for Sylvia and will inspire her to learn more so she can get to where people are that she saw on her field trip that day in the city. She even states it at the end of the story that, “But ain’t nobody gonna beat me at nuthin.” This shows that Sylvia is determined to be better than her mother and the people that live in the slums.

Happy Endings By Margaret Atwood

Abstract
      John and Mary have met and there are different options you can read to end they story. One ending is that they both have good jobs and a beautiful house. They have two children and they travel with them. Eventually John and Mary grow old and die. The second ending is that Mary loved John, but John didn't love her. He used her for food and sex. Eventually Mary knows he's seeing another women and she kills herself. John gets married to the other woman Madge. The third ending is that Mary feels bad for John and so she stays with him although he has a wife. Mary is seeing a guy named James. One day John comes into Mary's apartment and finds James and Mary in her bed. This makes John mad so he goes out and buys a gun and kills them both and himself. His wife Madge mourns, but ends up marrying Fred. The fourth ending or D is about Madge and Fred. They survive and tidal wave and continue their life through the first ending stated above. The fifth ending is Fred and Madge and Fred dies of heart trouble so Madge devotes her life to charity work. The last ending or F is that Mary is a spy spying on other spies and John is a revolutionary in Canada and they continue on with ending A or one. In the end it comes down to however the story goes John and Mary will still die and that's truly the end.




Response
      When I started to read this story I was expecting to have a few endings to a story and they'd all be happy and fun to read. This was my initial thought because the story is titled, "Happy Endings". I was hoping to read about fairy tales with a princess and a prince. That is definitely not what I ended up reading. This whole story is based on the words happy and ending. When you think of happy you think of a good family with riches to share and the couple who are in love. The word ending just means the end of someone's life, which is death.
       As the options arise you find out that the two people you started with John and Mary, and you read different scenarios on how they live their live and how they're going to die. The main point here is that they are both going to die at some point, which the title explains when it says "endings". This is what Margaret Atwood is trying to convey throughout this whole reading John and Mary die; she even states it at the end of the story after option F. 
        Everyone is going to have an end to their life and that's death. It's the way you go about your death that defines it as being a sad or happy ending. While the whole time I'm thinking of unrealistic stories in which the ending of their life is based on the events prior to death. I never stopped to think that the ending to your life really isn't happy at all because you are leaving the world you have gotten to know so well to go to an unknown place that you're not familiar with at all. I think this whole story in a way was a play on words. It takes that thoughts you were thinking and totally destroys them. The title is completely morphed and becomes meaningless the more options that you read through the more it becomes apparent that endings will never be happy no matted what journey you take.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love By Raymond Carver

Abstract
         Mel and his wife Terri have their two friends Nick and Laura over. As they sit around the table drinking before they go out to eat they start talking. The main topic they talk about is love and how it's defined. At first Terri tells about her and Ed's love for each other and how he'd abuse her while saying he loved her. Mel said that wasn't love. Then Mel told a story about and older couple he saw in the ER. They were both in body casts and lived although no one expected them too. He explains how the man became depressed because he couldn't see his wife. This is pretty much the conclusion of the story and no definition of love is ever found.


Response

“What We Talk About When We Talk About Love” confused me on what meaning Raymond Carver was trying to express. I understood that all the characters were trying to define what they thought love was. They all justified what they thought it was by their own experiences. No one person would agree with another because they never had the same experiences.

As I evaluate this story based on formalism I find one thing very apparent. At the beginning both couples are respectful of each other and love each other. Mel loves Terri and keeps telling her that. Then Terri begins telling the story about her ex Ed and how he loved her so much. He one time dragged her by her feet around the house and told her he loved her as he was doing this. Terri knew that this was true love and that Ed truly meant it. When Terri and Ed broke up Ed was still following her and finally he killed himself. This was representing the love that he had for Terri or at least that’s what she thought. He died for her and that’s true love, from Terri’s viewpoint. Mel found that to be unacceptable. There is no way anyone can hurt the one they truly love. Terri and Mel always disagreed with this scenario and they discussed it no longer.

As the story continues you can see how the love that Mel and Terri have fades. Mel starts to drink more and more gin. As a heart doctor he has to work every day and never has the nights off because he is on call. This one night he is free and so that’s why he’s having dinner with his wife and friends. That’s also why he is drinking so heavily because he needed to relieve stress. This drinking starts to make Mel’s talking and thoughts blurred throughout the story. This relates to the story because its gets more scattered and confusing towards the end. In the end I don’t even understand the definition of love if there even is one.

Throughout this whole story there is no apparent definition found. They just give examples but never explain how this relates to love and how it’s defined. I think love it hard for them all define because as Mel says they are young and there is so much more to their lives to learn. They won’t know what love is until they’re older and they’ve lived their life to the fullest. This is how the story is constructed too. There is no definite answer in the end because we must find it out on our own; no one can define it for us. We must define love by the actions we take and the relationships we have.

Where are you going, Where have you been? By Joyce Carol Oates

Abstract
         Connie is a fifteen year old girl who is into her appearance and being popular. Her mother always criticizes her and tells her that she is worthless in a sense. When Connie and friends would go out they'd go to the "mall". Although actually they went across the street to a diner where all the older kids hung out at. Connie loves the attention that she receives from the guys when she walk through the diner. One night she is asked by Eddie to go to his car with him, and Connie follows. The rest of the summer Connie does the same thing and meets many other guys. One day she is home alone and hears a car pull up in the driveway. She goes to the door to see who it is and finds out it's a guy that noticed her earlier when she was at the diner with Eddie. This guy claims he's only little bit younger than Connie and says that she should go for a ride with him in his gold car. She declines and he keeps persuading her to come with him. At last he gets mad and comes up to her door and says he won't come in as long as shes comes out and leaves with him. She finally gives in and goes outside to meet this man.  


Response

The roles women play society has changed over the years, but one thing that will never change is the effect they have on men. All women have the desire to impress men, and will do anything to achieve it. In the short story, “Where are you going, Where have you been?” Connie, the main character is caught up in her appearance and how to convey herself to the male species. She dresses up and does her hair just to go to the mall with her friends.

During the summer her and her friend’s get bored at the mall so they walk over to the diner across the road. This is the hot spot for teens in her town. It is known that all the older teens go here to hang around out. As she walks through the diner she is looking to impress the guys around her. All women do this at some point in their life, and they know that the guys will stare. By Connie taking part in this act contributes to what happens later in the story.

            One night when Connie is flattered by Eddie and is walking to his car she sees a guy that shows interest in her and he says, “Gonna get you, baby”. Connie doesn’t think anything about this encounter at all, until the day an unknown car pulls up to her house, one Sunday afternoon. Connie is immediately confused and excited about a guy coming to see her. She stands in the doorway as he talks to her and tries to lure her into his car to go for a ride. Connie keeps refusing, and doesn’t understand how this guy knows where she lives. He continues to tell her that she’s his lover.

As I look at this story I realize that this closely relates to the scenario that many teen girls encountered when being attacked by The Pied Piper of Tucson. This man was a serial killer in the 1960s that would lure girls to him by his good looks and wealthy background. The character of the mysterious man in this story directly relates to The Pied Piper of Tucson. They both stumbled up their stuffed shoes to make them appear taller. They both had the cole black hair with the make-up painted face. I feel like Joyce Carol Oates was directly affected by this killer, and so she decided to write at story about him and how a girl felt when being preyed upon by him.

            Not only can you conclude that women are taking roles in impressing men, but also the history behind this story greatly affects how Joyce Carol Oates writes. The way Connie dresses and portrays herself makes more susceptible to the Arnold Friend. She made herself be noticed and that’s what hurt her. So maybe, as a teen girl I can see how impressing someone isn’t helping yourself, although you may think that it is. Just be safe and in the end Connie should have listened to her mom.

            The history behind this story is shocking, and I can’t believe it is based on a serial killer. Everything that is explained about Arnold Friend is similar to The Pied Piper of Tucson. Also the fact that this story was written to Bob Dylan shows that it’s probably a response to one of the songs that he recorded.

A & P By John Updike

Abstract
       Sammy is checker at the A & P grocery store. One day his attention is drawn to three girls who walk in with just heir bathing suits on and no shoes. As they walk though the store he analyzes each girl and their figure. As they approach to check out they choose his cash register. Sammy is checking them out as his manager walks in and scolds the girls for just wearing bathing suits and tells them the store policy. This embarrasses Sammy and he quits as the girls walk out of the store.




Response
           The thoughts of guys and how they perceive women is shown in this story, “A & P” written by John Updike. The narrator of this story is Sammy, who is checker at the grocery store. He sees three girls walk into the store in just their bathing suits. By instinct men or boys are going to stare in amazement at a women’s body. Throughout this story that’s all the Sammy focuses on is their body’s.

            His superego or imagination starts to kick in when he talks about Queenie, which he labels one girl because she’s the leader of the pack. He imagines that her walk, which is stepping from heels to her toes, resembles how she walks in her everyday heels. Her slender body dressed pale pink swimsuit making her appear as a clean and untouched palette. This intrigues Sammy because of his mind wanders about the girl and the life she lives. He never once questions why she is just in her swimming suit because she looks good in it. This is different for the other girls that are with her, and all of this is because of the image that they give off to males.

            Now as Sammy comes back to his conscious mind or ego. He wonders why they’d be wearing swimming suits when the beach is 5 miles away, not to mention that the grocery store is in the middle of town. Why would girls take the trouble of going here? Is it because they wanted to make an impression on the men of the store? Did they do it for their own satisfaction to make themselves feel better?

            None of these reasons would seem logical when looking at it from the larger girl’s perspective. Why would she want to show her body off?  From the perspective that Sammy saw her from she had folds of skin over her suit and you could see the tan lines from the previous suits she had worn. This had to be uncomfortable for her to do. Did she maybe do it out of a dare that the other girls convinced her to do? I don’t understand the whole reason for them coming into the grocery store dressed like this?

            I feel like the author was trying to prove a point to young people in society. He was trying to show us that not all guys are bad and that just because they stare at a girls doesn’t mean they’re a pig. It relies solely on how girls dress. The men or boys wouldn’t stare at them if they dressed moderately and didn’t show their body off so much. Therefore this makes young adults at fault for their own decisions. If they want to recognize then they should wear more obvious clothing, if they don’t want to be looked at dress modestly.

            

A Good Man is Hard to Find BY Flannery O'Connor

Abstract
        A family of five plus their grandmother is taking a road trip to Florida. As they get ready to leave the grandma suggests that they go through Tennessee because that's where she grew up. Her son, Bailey disagrees and says they are going through Georgia instead. As the drive they stop at a bar-be-que place called Red Sammy's.While they are there  grandma talks to the owner ans tells he's a good man for not making to men pay for their fuel service. They are again on their way to Florida when grandma lies to the children about a secret board in a plantation house she knew not too far off the road they're on. Bailey turns are and heads to the plantation house, but along the way they get into an accident. Everyone is in confused state as a car approaches them with three men in it with guns in hand. Grandma realizes that one the men is the misfit found in that paper earlier. The two other guys take the family back into the woods a few people at a time and kill them. Finally Grandma is the only one left and she takes the misfit by surprise and he shoots her three times in the chest.


Response

           The thoughts of Grandma are what take over this whole story. She always expresses her opinion and thinks it’s her way or the highway. She is very self-centered and wants people to go along with what she thinks is right. Her instinct or Id is to tell everyone that they are good people. She only does this to make herself seem like a better person. She changes her morals depending on the person she is talking to and what they’ve done.

Her superego comes into play later in the story when they get into the car accident. This is evident because when she finds out that one of the guys is a misfit she doesn’t do anything, and remains calm. This behavior doesn’t make sense because they whole story she is worried about meeting up with misfit. She believes that he is a good man because he came from a good family, even though in the paper he was proven to be a bad guy. What makes her change her mind? Is it that just because he was raised by a good family that justifies him being okay?

Grandma’s morals change in a way because she thought that bad people doing bad things were terrible to be around, but then the misfit comes along and she’s fine with him. I think this is because the misfit says he did nothing wrong and he still got put in prison, just like Jesus. When the misfit refers to Jesus that immediately catches Grandma’s attention because she is a Christian and she tells the misfit he must pray. This is how the misfit connects with Grandma and makes him a good man in her mind. This is defined by her ever-changing morals that she lives by throughout her life.

Grandma’s ego isn’t really apparent until she finally recognizes that all of her family has been killed off. She cries for Bailey and she can’t believe her son has been killed. She still trusts the misfit though because he said he wouldn’t kill a lady. As she falls into the ditch and is followed by the misfit with his gun she says that he is her child. This is because she realizes that she is just like the misfit. She has done things all her life and been punished for no reason. This has angered her all her life without her realizing why.

These thoughts that are throughout the story are strong and matter-of-factly because they are spoken from the stubborn Grandma. Flannery O’Connor is definitely trying to show that people beliefs can be strong, but that doesn’t mean they’re right or that they won’t change over time. 

The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Abstract
         The Lottery is a story that focuses in a small town and how they gather for the traditional lottery drawing. As you read this story in bewilderment you begin to understand how important this lottery is and how no one is allowed to be home when this take place unless you have a good excuse. Each person who is head of their  family draws a paper and then everyone opens their's up at the same time, in which they see who has the black dot on their paper, The Hutchinson's had it. Then at once the family goes to the front to see who in the family will draw the next black do, it was Tessie, the wife. After that the story ends with Tessie being hit with stones till her death.


Response

          “The Lottery” written by Shirley Jackson was story that completely plays with your mind the whole time you’re reading. I read this story thinking it must be about people buying tickets to win money because that’s how I’d define lottery. It seems as though Shirley wasn’t thinking the same thing as I was. As the story continues Shirley explains how all the people in the town must gather for this event. Although she still doesn’t tell us what’s going on and what this lottery is for. The reason for her doing this is so she can keep her readers in suspense just like the people in the story who are in the lottery. They are waiting to see who will be put to their death, which at the time you wouldn’t know if you were a first time reader of this story.

            The lottery consists of each head person of a family to come up to the front and draw a strip of paper out of a black wooden box. At the time of my reading I didn’t think anything about the symbolism of the box until I finished the story. The color and composition of that box screams the thought of death. The black immediately infers death, while the wooden composition suggests what a coffin would be made of, not to mention that it’s a box just like the shape of a coffin. Throughout this story I think Shirley is trying to give the readers hints on what is about to happen. She wants your mind to think and be so intrigued that you can’t stop reading, which is what the people in this story are doing with the lottery.

I see that the people are brainwashed to think this is a great thing and that no community can live without the lottery. I don’t understand how people are content with one random killing ever year, and it’s not just some person, it’s a person of their community. The community seems like cult in which once you’re sucked in you can’t get out, and you wouldn’t dare speak out against it. Tessie Hutchinson tried speaking out that it wasn’t fair, and she’s the one who ends up getting killed.

This book makes you see how brainwashing can hurt people. You are in control of your own mind, but as soon as you let someone else take hold of it you put your life in danger. This is what the people of this small community are doing. They are letting their past take control of their future, which maybe they don’t have control of. It may be their instinct to think that the lottery is something that must be done because they’ve never seen anything different. It’s as though no one in the community has a superego because they don’t think for themselves or express their own thoughts. They only are worried about the lottery and they show no emotion at all. When Tessie draws the black dot she doesn’t do anything at all, but just stands there waiting for her death.  Why doesn’t she show any emotion? Is it because she was taught to not show emotion or that she has no emotion because this is the typical scene of this community?

             Also you think that her family would show emotion, but they don’t at all. You think that her husband might say he drew the black dot and risk his life for his wife, but he doesn’t. It also says in the book that they have three children. Wouldn’t the children be sad and maybe run towards their mother to say their last good-bye?  No emotions are ever shown throughout this whole story. I think that’s a little odd out of 300 some people, no one shows any emotion. This makes me think that everyone had to brainwashed and thought that randomly killing someone was okay.