Short Story Analysis - Weebly
Short Story Analysis -- Gordimer
Story Name Plot summary characters Setting structure/ syntax/diction point of view/ meaning/tone symbols/
use/effect dialogue tense/language voice theme/irony imagery/motifs
Jump
Some Are Born to Sweet Delight
|A man is in a hotel room. While there, he recalls his past and how he got to that point. He was arrested while taking photos, as a spy. In prison, he realigned himself.
________________
-Family rents out room to foreigner (Rad)
-Nice to sick girl (Vera)
-Inert, talk (Rad)
-Sex in Park
-Pregnant
-Worried about abortion
- decide on marriage
- send to Rad’s Fam.
-Rad packs bomb in suitcase
-plane explodes, all die. |The man is never named
His mom (indirect character)
Girl in his room
Commander
-Vera: The girl, optimist, searching for happiness, naïve.
-Vera’s parents : don’t trust Rad, typical
-Rad: terrorist, quiet, reserved, “I’ve chosen you” |Primarily the inside of a hotel room, but settings vary with his memories of the War, the prison, etc.
There is music playing in the room that makes him remember.
Emphasizes author’s use of boundaries.
England (?)
-hate Irish, old empire in 1st paragraph.
- foreign tension
- divide and mistrust |Very little to no dialogue. Memories of conversations not in quotes.
Man’s thinking process is scattered.
Follows the music.
Hard to realize when there is dialogue.
No quotation marks
Dashes
No defined dialogue
- Ambiguity: Dashes as dashes + quotes
Personal |Varies between past and present tense.
Detatched descriptions (surreal)
Blurred transitions
Basic language
- but not simplistic
Past tense |Usually 3rd Person Limited.
Sometimes shifts into 1st person as the man.
Third person
Isolates Rad
Shows more of Vera, but is still the outsider’s view
-persuades reader to believe Vera
|Impersonal & detached tone
Answers third person questions in first person narrative. (Sudden switches back to “He”)
Author blurs transitions and dialogue to make moments dreamlike. Emphasizes disorientation and confusions of the man.
Author making a statement about the nature of war and brutality (bad on both side, confusing)(futility)(choices we face in these situations.)
Terrorism is bad/ pointless
-kill innocent people( don’t know why killed
-satisfies no one
Violence = (
Relationships – Don’t truly know people.
Irony
-lover was a terrorist
-title
- Baby born to death
Indifferent tone
Exasperated |Jumping – Parachutes in war, man considers jumping (suicide) as an answer but stops.
Music – Plot follows structure of the music playing. (brings him to the past)
Room described with imagery.
Baby
- birth/ life
- innocence
Plane crash
- death of society
- potato famine deaths
Allusion
- William Blake’s “Auguries of Innocence” | |
Short Story Analysis -- Gordimer
Story Name Plot summary characters Setting structure/ syntax/diction point of view/ meaning/tone symbols/
use/effect dialogue tense/language voice theme/irony imagery/motifs
The Moment Before the Gun went Off
_________
Safe Houses
|
Farmer accidentally shoots farmhand (who is actually his son)
________________
A criminal named Harry meets a wealthy woman, Sylvie, on a bus, pays for her bus fare and ends up going to her house. They end up having an affair while her husband is away. He leaves to go to a small town and gets arrested. |
Marais van Der yver
Lucas
____________
“Harry”
Sylvie
Husband (not present)
Servant (only black in the story |
South Africa
( Changes of scope coordinates with tone
_____________
Johannesburg; bus; Sylvie’s house |
Dialogue signaled by dashes – very little dialogue
______________
Much dialogue, esp. compared to Gordimer’s other stories; mostly just between Harry and Sylvie.
The story is very much “in the moment” although it is written in past tense. |
Past tense, perspective changes, third person omniscient.
_________________
Limited dialogue; mainly descriptions; blatant, unhindered diction is unassuming; lays ground work for you to draw your own conclusions (ex: whether or not there actually is a husband, if he’s actually coming home.
Ambiguous: who is ignorant? Harry? Sylvie? Servant? Who is lying? |
Third person omniscient
______________
3rd person limited (pretty much only “Harry” |
Tone changes with perspective irony: everyone perceives the incident as a racist hate crime nut he is truly mourning the accident.
Irony: the hunting brings them together but results in the boy’s death.
____________________
Dramatic irony of woman’s lack of knowledge of man’s criminal nature
Theme: finding safety in secrecy -> naïveté
Tone: detached; the content of the man’s thoughts is secretive, plotting, questioning
Big question throughout: how much does Sylvie know?
Why does he go to a place that is not safe? After his temporary freedom with Sylvie (freedom to have a relationship – not to be an outsider), “Harry” knows that this experience is as free as he will ever be able to live, so he submits to authority and is taken off to jail. |
Imagery of the funeral and the moment before the gun went off.
_________________
The fling between “Harry” and Sylvie represents freedom from his reality (criminal restrictions) | |
Short Story Analysis -- Gordimer
Story Name Plot summary characters Setting structure/ syntax/diction point of view/ meaning/tone symbols/
use/effect dialogue tense/language voice theme/irony imagery/motifs
The Ultimate Safari
_________
Once Upon a Time
|A family unit: kids, grandmother and grandfather, escape a war zone in Mozambique via a game preserve in S. Africa. Hardships / lions/ grandfather goes MIA/ little food / lots of suffering/ very sad. The group finds the refugee camp. White reporters interview grandmother; realization: we have no home. Uplifting stuff. (
____________
Anecdote – Frame
Narrator hears a sound at night and fears for safety and lack of security – prompting her to tell a “children’s” story.
Story – Mounting paranoia in suburbs due to increasing conflict nearby, first by riots and then by loafers and tsotsis. Ultimately the addition of barbed wire causes a child to be caught after hearing a story of a prince climbing through a briar patch. |Grandmother
Little girl (narrator)
Older brother
Younger brother
Group they travel with
reporter
__________
Narrator (author?)
Man and his wife
Little boy
Gardner
Housemaid
Cat
Rioters
Bums
Dog |Mozambique war zone:
Bleak / hardships
Kruger Park:
Lions
Desert
No food
Unforgiving
Refugee camp:
Bleak
No hope of return
Fishbowl
_____________
South Africa in terms of places and people (tsotisis and baas), along with objects.
References to apartheid and separation of races. Back story for conflict. |Short dialogue with no quotations
Mostly first person POV, internal conversation
______________
No dialogue.
Framed
Reverse fairy tale: a standard story structure of beginning, middle, end BUT the ending is not happily ever after.
|Simple – from child’s eyes
Lack of maturity or appreciation of the gravity of the situation
_________________
Simple grammatical structure, but elevated diction. Past tense for both parts, typical of story telling. All CAPS used for the signs. |
Little girl
First person
Simplistic
Immature
Naïve
Limited
Reader must infer plot changes
______________
First person POV in the frame. Third person omniscient for the story.
Distant but concerned. |“Ultimate Safari”:
White people go on safari for fun.
Reality of survival for natives.
Ironic detachment of the outside world from those involved in conflict.
____________________
Irony in the title.
Parody of a fairy tale ending in tragedy.
Play on words in title.
Basic theme of fear of the unknown. “Protection” ultimately harms the people erecting protection.
Sheltering of an issue does not create protection. It ruins what you try to protect.
Distant tone.
Ambiguous ending…? Make a case. |Symbols:
Shoes – humanity
Grandmother = perseverance
Reporter = ignorance
Vultures = death and helplessness
Lions = danger
Roof = protection
Images:
Lion attack, descriptive detail, reader feels fear
Motif:
Fine line between humans and animals
______________
Protection = retardation of life.
Warning signs symbolize protection.
South Africa setting comes from imagery and description of surroundings.
Walls are a motif of_________? | |
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