Identities Wd Valgardson Summary

513 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The story of an hour of situational irony

W.D. Valgardson’s, “Identities,” is a shocking, ironic short story that follows the misadventure of a lost man in search of a new identity. Valgardson utilizes dramatic and situational irony in the events of the story to develop the theme: people are often predisposed to passing judgement based on appearance rather than fact. The dramatic irony unfolds throughout the story with the police officer who is suspicious of the protagonist and pursues him. Guilt-ridden and anxious to return home after losing himself in a rougher part of town, the man searches for the nearest phone, oblivious of the police car that “nose[s] out and follows” him. The police officer’s quick judgement of the protagonist emphasizes the theme of how people often judge others …show more content…

of the car,” which is a grey Mercedes Benz - a rare sight to see in the area. Moreover, the police officer “has been trained to see an unshaven man in blue jeans as a potential thief,” further proving the point of how he made his decision based on stereotyping. Consequently, Valgardson’s use of dramatic irony informs the reader of the police officer’s rash judgements, while leaving the protagonist unaware of his situation, which allows him to effectively develop the aforementioned theme. Following the dramatic irony of the story, the use of situational irony occurs on two accounts: first, between the protagonist and a group of intimidating young men, and second, between the protagonist and the police officer. As the protagonist approaches the store, he is daunted by a group of men dressed in “fringed leather vests,” judging them based on their rough exterior. In the face of what he assumes is danger, the protagonist hopes his appearance will “provide immunity” and prevent confrontation with the men. In addition, the protagonist even devises an escape plan in the event that he is accosted, “slip[ing] a ten-dollar bill into his back pocket.” Ironically, the real danger is behind

Show More
Related

  • The Irony of Dave Egger´s Story: Accident

    534 Words  | 2 Pages

    Throughout the commencement of the story, the main character perceives the situation as negative. When he first thinks of the situation, he envisions being confronted with anger: “Walking to the car, which you have ruined, it occurs to you that if the three teenagers are angry teenagers, this encounter could be very unpleasant” (Par. 2). As he approaches the Camaro, he sees the three teena...

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Fourth Of July

    949 Words  | 2 Pages

    The narrator of “Black Men and Public Space” takes a similar approach of exemplifying his helplessness. This narrator explained how he understood the stigma associated with his appearance and did his best to circumvent it, but unfortunately some situations rendered him helpless. In the opening paragraph, he describes a woman’s extremely cautious actions when she became aware of his presence one the dark and desolate street. He later explains how the encounter

    Read More

  • "Passing" in James Weldon Johnson’s The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man

    1106 Words  | 3 Pages

    In 1912, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man was anonymously published by James Weldon Johnson. It is the narrative of a light-skinned man wedged between two racial categories; the offspring of a white father and a black mother, The Ex-Colored man is visibly white but legally classified as black. Wedged between these two racial categories, the man chooses to “pass” to the white society. In Passing: When People Can’t Be Who They Are, Brooke Kroeger describes “passing” as an act when “people effectively present themselves as other than who they understand themselves to be” (Kroeger 7). The Ex-Colored Man’s choice to ultimately “pass” at the end of the novel has been the cause of controversy amongst readers. Many claim his choice to “pass” results from racial self-hatred or rejecting his race. Although this may be true, the main reason for his choice to “pass” is more intense. The narrator’s “passing” is an effort to place himself in a safe living environment, open himself up to greater opportunities and be adventurous and cynical in his success to fool the nation. It is because of his light skin that The Ex-Colored Man confidently knows the world will categorize him as white; thus cowardly disclaiming his black race without actually disclosing his decision.

    Read More

  • Prejudice in "King of the Bingo Game"

    949 Words  | 2 Pages

    The main character is completely alienated from the world around him. He is a black man living in a white world, a man who was born in the South but is now living in the North, and his only form of companionship is his dying wife, Laura, whom he is desperate to save. He is unable to work since he has no birth certificate—no official identity. Without a job he is unable to make his mark in the world, and if his wife dies, not only would he lose his lover but also any evidence that he ever existed. As the story progresses he loses his own awareness of his identity—“somehow he had forgotten his own name.” The author emphasizes the main character’s mistreatment in life by white society during a vivid recollection of an event in his childhood when he was chased by a train filled with “white people laughing as he ran screaming,” a hallucination which was triggered by his exploration of the “old scars” on his body. This connection between alienation and oppression highlight Ellison’s central idea.

    Read More

  • Experiences And Challenges In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

    897 Words  | 2 Pages

    Stories are often left untold or forgotten. The stories that are deemed profound or are remembered are of fact or evident to the masses. The stories that make up history, such as the African Americans’ fight for equality, are made up of concrete events that were witnessed. On the contrary, stories like the narrator’s in Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man are generally overlooked because they are focused on an individual’s experience. This is due to the theory that humanity is naturally self-involved, but also ashamed because the majority of our experiences consist of challenges. The narrator’s story was filled with past humiliations that were the major cornerstones to his identity. He illustrated the significance of embracing our humiliations, or

    Read More

  • False Identity in Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

    1810 Words  | 4 Pages

    In Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man, one of Ellison’s greatest assets is his ability to bestow profound significance upon inanimate objects. During the narrator’s journey from the bar to the hole, he acquires a series of objects that signify both the manifestations of a racist society, as well as the clues he employs to deconstruct his indoctrinated identity. The narrator’s briefcase thereby becomes a figurative safe in his mind that can only be unlocked by understanding the true nature of the objects that lie within. Thus, in order to realize who he is, the narrator must first realize who he is not: that unreal man whose name is written in Jack’s pen, or the forcibly grinning visage of Mary’s bank.

    Read More

  • Autobiography Of An Ex-Colored Man Essay

    1191 Words  | 3 Pages

    The narrator of The Autobiography of an Ex-colored Man decided not to fight for racial equality in America for his fellow African-American, or even for himself, but rather conformed with the white majority thus selecting the uncomplicated path: the path that would lead him to security and safety in the years to come. After struggling with his identity in the white and African-American community as a “colored” man who could pass as white, he decided to discard his “colored” roots and stick with his white origin. By doing such a thing, he was able to live a simple, respectful, and safe life, but he abandoned a very significant part of his identity. He felt slight remorse towards the end of the novel, but self-interest held more importance to him than embracing the cultural heritage of the African-American community.

    Read More

  • African American Individuality Crisis In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

    2826 Words  | 6 Pages

    Identity is one’s conception and expression of his or her individuality. It is who he or she is. It consists roughly of what makes him or her different from others. One’s identity is built based on one’s experiences and external influences. Ralph Ellison in his novel titled Invisible Man discusses the struggles an African American man faces in his identity due to the racial prejudice he is subjected to in American society. In fact the novel was published in 1952, which was a time period where African Americans possessed little rights. Due to the little rights African Americans possessed in American society, they were an easy target for the white community to denigrate and discriminate. The white community humiliated, mortified and physically abused African Americans which led the black community to pass through society as “unknown”. In Invisible Man, Ellison depicts racial labels as a barrier to an individual’s identity.

    Read More

  • Harrison Bergeron Analysis

    1381 Words  | 3 Pages

    A small glimmer of hope in an imperialistic world is only taken away in order to ensure equivalence in an imperfect society. Harrison Bergeron is a classic sociological tale written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. that is based on the sociological aspect of everyone being equal - not one individual could be above another. This short story focuses on the idea of symbolism by using masks and handicaps to force the social norm of being the same while foreshadowing the courage of being unique in a seemingly perfect world, all while displaying irony through the way in which our society runs today. This story relates to today’s society in that both are alike in that individuals want to break free from societies constraints of social norms.

    Read More

  • Identity In Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man

    896 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Ralph Ellison’s novel The “Invisible Man” the common theme is invisibility, the narrator takes the readers on a journey of self discover to find his place in society. Identity in “Invisible Man” is a conflict between self-perception and the projection of others, as seen through one man's story: the nameless narrator. As the novel unravels the narrator is in the process overcoming deceptions and illusions to find the truth about his place in the world. The deception is closely linked with his perception of invisibility, because various character in the novel cant see the narrator for whom he is, but only seeing him for the color of his skin. Some of the characters seem to always use him for the benefit of themselves, as often as his as he is deceived, the narrator does some deceiving of his own.

    Read More

  • Alex Rider Stormbreaker Analysis

    654 Words  | 2 Pages

    First, policemen showed up at Alex’s home to tell him that his uncle died in a car crash. He knew he was about to receive bad news by “the way the police stood there” (Horowitz 2). Alex always knew his uncle to be a safe driver, so when

    Read More

  • Racism and Identity in Ralph Ellison’s The Invisible Man

    2213 Words  | 5 Pages

    In Ralph Ellison’s novel The Invisible man, the unknown narrator states “All my life I had been looking for something and everywhere I turned someone tried to tell me what it was…I was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself the question which I, and only I, could answer…my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: That I am nobody but myself. But first I had to discover that I am an invisible man!” (13). throughout the novel, the search for identity becomes a major aspect for the narrator’s journey to identify who he is in this world. The speaker considers himself to be an “invisible man” but he defines his condition of being invisible due to his race (Kelly). Identity and race becomes an integral part of the novel. The obsession with identity links the narrator with the society he lives in, where race defines the characters in the novel. Society has distinguished the characters in Ellison’s novel between the African and Caucasian and the narrator journey forces him to abandon the identity in which he thought he had to be reborn to gain a new one. Ellison’s depiction of the power struggle between African and Caucasians reveals that identity is constructed to not only by the narrator himself but also the people that attempt to influence. The modernized idea of being “white washed” is evident in the narrator and therefore establishes that identity can be reaffirmed through rebirth, renaming, or changing one’s appearance to gain a new persona despite their race. The novel becomes a biological search for the self due through the American Negroes’ experience (Lillard 833). Through this experience the unknown narrator proves that identity is a necessary part of his life but race c...

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Paralyzed Witnesses: The Murder They Heard

    1111 Words  | 3 Pages

    If an individual is familiar with their surrounding “they are more likely to help” (Altruism and Helping Behavior. Print). In the essay, the authors state “the scene of the crime, the streets, in middle class society “represents all the vulgar and perilous in life” (Milgram, Stanley, and Paul Hollander. Paralyzed Witnesses: The Murder They Heard. Print.). In society, the streets, especially at night, represents the dangerous and negative sides of society due to the crimes and chaos that occur on the streets (gangs, drive-by shootings, robberies, murders, large crowds walking, etc.). The crimes and dangers of the streets cause many people to fear being on the streets alone which leads to external conflicts. When the murder was occurring, the witnesses’ attitudes of the streets prevented them from calling the police due to the fear of the streets and since the witnesses were middle-class, they believed that Genovese was poor, a criminal, or someone who has nothing else to do and was expecting for the=is to eventually

    Read More

  • Invisible Man Essay: Search for True Identity

    2181 Words  | 5 Pages

    The narrator's life is filled with constant eruptions of mental traumas. The biggest psychological burden he has is his identity, or rather his misidentity. He feels "wearing on the nerves" (Ellison 3) for people to see him as what they like to believe he is and not see him as what he really is. Throughout his life, he takes on several different identities and none, he thinks, adequately represents his true self, until his final one, as an invisible man.

    Read More

  • The Ransom Of Red Chief Analysis

    634 Words  | 2 Pages

    Surprise can lead to happiness, or surprise can lead to depression. Situational irony is when somebody expects something to go one way, but it really happens the exact opposite way. Situational irony can also change the reader’s mind in a way they will never believe. In “The Ransom of Red Chief,” O. Henry uses situational irony to amuse the reader. In “The Necklace,” Guy de Maupassant uses a feeling of compassion for the short story. In “The Ransom of Red Chief” and in “The Necklace,” O. Henry, Guy de Maupassant, and any author can use situational irony to affect the reader's emotions.

    Read More

More about Identities Wd Valgardson Summary

Open Document