A Comparison Of Love In A Haunted House And Hills Like White Elephants

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“The Japanese Quince”, “A Haunted House”, and “Hills Like White Elephants” all have themes of love, but each type of love is different from each other. One is the story of someone afraid to face their love, due to being ashamed. “A Haunted House” shares the love of a ghostly couple as they find their love in a young couple. “Hills Like White Elephants” reveals the terrors of a love gone wrong. Although, each of these short stories have different tone, mood, imagery, diction, and detail they all use stream of consciousness to give insight to the characters’ thoughts and emotions. “A Haunted House”, steps into the mind of a specific character, where as the other two are narrated by an outside source that exposes the thoughts and feelings of the protagonists. “The Japanese Quince” by John Galsworthy …show more content…

Looking through the eyes of the current resident living in the hanted house, a ghostly couple rambles through what once was theirs looking for their “treasure”. Searching feverishly for the missing piece that would cure their restlesness, it seems as though they cannot grasp what they’ve lost. At the conclusion of the short story, the previous inhabitants find their desired treasure in the love between the living couple. This was the treasure the past couple had forgotten - true love. Wolf’s diction establishes the relationship between the couples and the house. Incorporating the word “beat” into her work while describing the house, Virginia coorelates the house to a heart, where love resides. Next, alliteration is used to romanticize the hunt for this hidden object. While the old couple attempts to remember where they left it, they reaize that it is “So fine, so rare, coolly sunk beneath the surface the beam I sought always burnt behind the glass” (Wolf 1). The S sound exemplifies the poetic nature of this story, something that is constanly used to portray the emotion of love.

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