The following essay is a critical comparison of ‘The Weekend’ by Makhosazana Xaba and ‘Going’ by Amy Hemphel. This essays main focus is the characteristics of Voice and exactly how they were manipulated to achieve the desired outcome of both the short stories. The comparison will include a breakdown of the characteristics and how they were applied to each short story, resulting in the required effect. This essay is broken down into four different headings; your voice, persona, character voice and point of view. Under each of these headings will be a critical comparison between both stories and the use of these techniques. All information used will be taken from articles and the short stories in the course reader, ‘ENGL 308 Contemporary Literature …show more content…
Their voices could be brought about by many different techniques such as their choice of words, the order in which they are used, imagery and rhythm. There’s emphasis on authors to say things clearly and precisely to ensure that their language is as different as they can make it. These techniques are used to avoid over doing the writing when they aren’t equipped to write that particular way. Each and every author has developed a different voice, and that is evident in ‘The Weekend’ and ‘Going’, between Hemphel and Xaba. In Going’ by Hemphel we see the use of techniques such as idioms, It is somewhat very formal and direct, it’s easy to read and understand while at the same time it may seem confusing as there are plenty of figures of speech, ‘she’s a sport, this nurse’, which are included in the short story and they may also symbolise something other than what is directly put to the reader. These techniques are evident in getting the desired effect of a school boy as the language is intelligent and reference is made to a school teacher, this shows that the narrator is in fact a student and this aids in the readers seeing and understanding the story through his telling of it through past and present recollections.( Janet 2006:44), (Hempel
Last but not least, O’Connor confirms that even a short story is a multi-layer compound that on the surface may deter even the most enthusiastic reader, but when handled with more care, it conveys universal truths by means of straightforward or violent situations. She herself wished her message to appeal to the readers who, if careful enough, “(…)will come to see it as something more than an account of a family murdered on the way to Florida.”
"Unit 2: Reading & Writing About Short Fiction." ENGL200: Composition and Literature. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2011. 49-219. Web. 19 Apr. 2014.
Authors of great stories often use good technical writing skills. The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast two short stories: Where Are you going, Where Have You Been by Joyce Carol Oates and Hills Like White Elephants by Earnest Hemingway. The comparison and contrast will be done based on their use of plot, point of view and character development.
With an evident attempt at objectivity, the syntax of Passage 1 relies almost entirely on sentences of medium length, uses a few long sentences for balance, and concludes with a strong telegraphic sentence. The varying sentence length helps keep the readers engaged, while also ensuring that the writing remains succinct and informative. Like the varying sentence length, the sentence structures vary as complex sentences are offset by a few scattered simple sentences. The complex sentences provide the necessary description, and the simple sentences keep the writing easy to follow. Conversely, Passage 2 contains mostly long, flowing sentences, broken up by a single eight word sentence in the middle. This short sentence, juxtaposed against the length of the preceding and following sentences, provides a needed break in the text, but also bridges the ideas of the two sentences it falls between. The author employs the long sentences to develop his ideas and descriptions to the fullest extent, filling the sentences with literary elements and images. Coupled...
“Short Stories." Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jelena Krstovic. Vol. 127. Detroit: Gale, Cengage Learning, 2010. 125-388. Literature Criticism Online. Gale. VALE - Mercer County Community College. 28 February 2014
Although the greater picture is that reading is fundamental, the two authors have a few different messages that they seek to communicate to their audiences. “The Joy of Reading and Writing” depicts how reading serves as a mechanism to escape the preconceived notions that constrain several groups of people from establishing themselves and achieving success in their lifetimes. “Reading to Write,” on the other hand, offers a valuable advice to aspiring writers. The author suggests that one has to read, read, and read before he or she can become a writer. Moreover, he holds an interesting opinion concerning mediocre writing. He says, “Every book you pick has its own lesson or lessons, and quite often the bad books have more to teach than the good ones” (p.221). Although these two essays differ in their contents and messages, the authors use the same rhetorical mode to write their essays. Both are process analyses, meaning that they develop their main argument and provide justification for it step by step. By employing this technique, the two authors create essays that are thoughtful, well supported, and easy to understand. In addition, Alexie and King both add a little personal touch to their writings as they include personal anecdotes. This has the effect of providing support for their arguments. Although the two essays have fairly different messages, the authors make use of anecdotes and structure their writing in a somewhat similar
A narrative is specified to amuse, to attract, and grasp a reader’s attention. The types of narratives are fictitious, real or unification or both. However, they may consist of folk tale stories, mysteries, science fiction; romances, horror stories, adventure stories, fables, myths and legends, historical narratives, ballads, slice of life, and personal experience (“Narrative,” 2008). Therefore, narrative text has five shared elements. These are setting, characters, plot, theme, and vocabulary (“Narrative and Informational Text,” 2008). Narrative literature is originally written to communicate a story. Therefore, narrative literature that is written in an excellent way will have conflicts and can discuss shared aspects of human occurrence.
Short stories are temporary portals to another world; there is a plethora of knowledge to learn from the scenario, and lies on top of that knowledge are simple morals. Langston Hughes writes in “Thank You Ma’m” the timeline of a single night in a slum neighborhood of an anonymous city. This “timeline” tells of the unfolding generosities that begin when a teenage boy fails an attempted robbery of Mrs. Jones. An annoyed bachelor on a British train listens to three children their aunt converse rather obnoxiously in Saki’s tale, “The Storyteller”. After a failed story attempt, the bachelor tries his hand at storytelling and gives a wonderfully satisfying, inappropriate story. These stories are laden with humor, but have, like all other stories, an underlying theme. Both themes of these stories are “implied,” and provide an excellent stage to compare and contrast a story on.
Ross, Steven M. ""Voice" in Narrative Texts: The Example of As I Lay Dying." PMLA94.2 (1979): 300-10. JSTOR. Web. 23 Mar. 2014.
In the story “Two Kinds”, the author, Amy Tan, intends to make reader think of the meaning behind the story. She doesn’t speak out as an analyzer to illustrate what is the real problem between her and her mother. Instead, she uses her own point of view as a narrator to state what she has experienced and what she feels in her mind all along the story. She has not judged what is right or wrong based on her opinion. Instead of giving instruction of how to solve a family issue, the author chooses to write a narrative diary containing her true feeling toward events during her childhood, which offers reader not only a clear account, but insight on how the narrator feels frustrated due to failing her mother’s expectations which leads to a large conflict between the narrator and her mother.
There is a famous expression about three demands of writing fiction. It goes, “Make them laugh, make them cry, make them wait.” By following these needs, an author can spark interest in his or her work. In the novels The Catcher in the Rye and Lord of the Rings, the novelists utilize the latter requirement, “Make them wait.” This essay will show how the authors use that specific demand in their novels.
This voice creates a story within a story. They describe the lives of a suburban group of people in a dramatized tragedy. The characteristics of the narrators' story reflects how they are able to convey a sense of sereneness in a time of pain. They make the reader unexpectedly interested and ...
Eileen Baldeshwiler’s “The Lyric Short Story” discusses the two different branches of short story—the “epical” and the “lyrical” (231). Baldeshwiler highlights the separate functions of the forms by focusing on their stylistic differences. The epical short story, according to Baldeshwiler, relies heavily on “external action” that is “fabricated mainly to forward plot, culminating in a decisive ending that sometimes affords a universal insight” (231). Further, the plot and characters are “expressed in the serviceably inconspicuous language of prose realism” (Baldeshwiler 231). In other words, the characters, plot, and overall tone of the piece adhere to reality. In opposition to this style, Baldeshwiler explains that the lyrical short story “concentrates o...
For my first paper I'll talk about voice, and how it affects the conversations that we have with other people, and how we perceive certain voices to sound in stories, and other works that we read. I think that in general voice is a type of mystery, and that it is one of those things that we really can't understand. When looking at a piece of writing I think that a clear and concise voice is one of the things that makes a piece work. This is my own feeling, and it might not agree with others, but when I'm reading a story, and it is full of good stuff like conversation, and heart felt feelings, I feel that the author is able to tell me what he/she is trying to say, I think that it has a better impact on the reader compared to the writing that goes on about nothing, and seems to only have one monotone voice.
...res that make these books continue to live on for centuries. Due to the constraints of the essay not all aspects of the narrative perspective could be discussed and the role they play with the novellas.