B paper

Short stories can be judged in many different ways, but what makes a good story is all the elements of short stories corresponding with the central idea, an interesting and thought provoking story, and the presence of a character that is either relatable or interesting. The elements must link together to help the reader make connections through the story, and in turn help understand the overall idea. The story itself must be engaging or the reader will not feel enticed enough to analyze the story, let alone read it. Finally the character(s) in the story must appeal to the reader either with an interesting personality, or must be easy to associate with, so that the reader will want to see what happens to the character next.

“Nobody Listens When I Talk,” by Annette Sanford is a story about a girl, and a summer in her teenage years. Marilyn, the girl experiencing the summer, is sitting on a porch swing because she has a broken leg. As Marilyn sits on the swing people begin to tell her that she should experience life, instead wasting it on the swing. Her mother tells her that she should be up and doing things like cooking or cleaning. Her father tells her that she should be taking advantage of the fact that she is young and carefree. Her friend tells her that she should be experiencing many different guys. All these people tell her what she should be doing with her life, but she never really pays any attention to any of the suggestions. Marilyn does not ever really respond to these suggestions, because she believes that, even if she were to speak her mind about the subject, no one would listen. So instead she sits and recollects memories of her past. With her lack of activity she becomes one with the world she lives in; she no lon...

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...o you are and accept yourself. Now with this story there is not much in the way of language to support this, but when it comes to point of view it more than makes up for it. The story makes the reader think about who they are, and question whether they are okay with it. It is this provocation of thought that hooks the reader and makes them want to read more and delve deeper into themselves to find out more about who they are. The character, Marilyn, is very bland in the beginning, but as you read on she becomes very relatable, and it almost feels like we are in her place experiencing the constant conflict of who she is and who everyone wants her to be. We hope she can overcome this obstacle and be a better person for it; however, she is still very conflicted at the end making it even more relatable to real life, because not everything can end as a happily ever after.