Ernest Hemingway's Essay 'By Flannery O' Connor

In the passage a servant describes the class difference between himself and his masters. He is discontent servant whose ideas about his masters portrays his belittling and resentful attitude towards them.
The repetition of the word “nasty,” demonstrates the narrator’s resentful attitude towards his masters. In the text the author states that his masters “dabbled in nasty mud” and, “dabbled in nasty science.” This statement shows that the narrator is disgusted with the work that his masters are doing because he himself can’t do experiments or play with mud because he is, “forced to work,” because his class is lower than his masters, but also conveys that he thinks he is better because he does not do those things. Furthermore the narrator states,

“It often falls heavy enough, no doubt, on people who are really obliged to get their living…” Again in this excerpt the narrator is speaking about the difference in class, how he has to clean up after his messy masters while they get to play around all day, experimenting with spiders and photography. The author conveys the narrator’s jealousy through selection of detail when the author writes, “obliged” because it means to be required to do something. In this the reader can infer that the narrator is forced to clean up after his masters and therefore resents them for it. This conveys his envious attitude toward his masters.
The author continues to use repetition to convey attitude when the word “poor” is repeating creating a sense that the narrator is belittling towards his employers.

The author states, “your poor empty head” and “your poor idle hands.” The narrator fakes sympathy in this text. The use of repetition conveys the narrator’s sarcasm because he pretends to be sympathetic when he really thinks very low of them. The author wants the reader to see the narrator’s belittling attitude towards his masters, which allows the reader to understand how the narrator feels about his social status. The author uses the word “idle,” to emphasize that the narrator feels that his employers have no use. The narrator states, “the idleness that splits flowers and pokes its way into spiders’ stomachs.” He is suggesting that his masters are do useless experiments and the narrator continues and states that you should be thankful that you “must” think of something and that you “must” do something. This conveys that the narrator believes that his masters do the nasty things they do because they have nothing else to keep them busy. Which he is resentful that they have free time to do those things but also thinks of himself more highly that he is not “idle” like them.
In the end the reader comes to realize that its not the science that the servant suggests is stupid or nasty but that it is his masters. This teaches the reader of the difference in classes at the time and also how the lower class felt about the

upper class. Which is that in some cases the working class resented and belittled their employers because of the privileges that they had. Finally this teaches readers the importance of the representation we have now that makes sure that both the working class’ and the upper class’ point of view is known.