Plot Summary Of The Skating Party

Imagine your two favourite people in the world hanging on a cliff. If you could only save one of them, who would it be? It would be a difficult choice that no one would want to make. However, that was what Uncle Nathan had to experience in “The Skating Party” by Merna Summers. In “The Skating Party”, the protagonist, Maida was walked through the events that led up to Nathan ending up never getting married. The story possessed an engaging plot, with the intentional suppression of detail creating suspense. One of the primary recurring themes in the story was one of unpredictable emotion.

In the “The Skating Party” by Merna Summers, we learned about Uncle Nathan’s past. In the introduction, we were introduced to Maida, who was being told about the time her uncle wanted to get married. The conflict of the story was that Nathan really liked two girls, Delia and Eunice. When Nathan discovered that Delia was already married, he decided to pursue a long-lasting relationship with Eunice in the rising action. Eventually, Eunice and Nathan became engaged and had a skating party to celebrate. At the climax of the story, Eunice and Delia went off skating together and fell through the ice. In the falling action, Nathan came in time to save one of them, Delia. Finally in the resolution, Nathan admitted that he was fully aware of who was who and he saved Delia instead of Eunice.

The intentional suppression of information drove the suspense in the story.

I felt that we weren’t given enough information when we learned that Uncle Nathan didn’t save his fiancee. I wanted to know more from Nathan’s perspective rather than Maida’s mom; even though I knew what happened in the end, I needed to know why it ended that way. Nathan fed us information that pieced everything together very gradually to keep the suspense. It was the underlying reason why it made us hooked until the

end.

One of the major themes of the story was uncertain emotions. This was a major theme, as Nathan tried to focus on Eunice and forget about his feelings for Delia. However, it was proven that he still had feelings for Delia. A lot of the time, under pressuring circumstances, we reveal our true colours and how we truly feel. When Eunice and Delia fell through the ice during the skating party, that was the case. Nathan had the chance to save a life and he unpredictably saved Delia with full awareness of his choice. Nathan’s awareness could be seen when he stated, “...I could see their hands on the edge of the ice...The one pair of arms had white fur around them. And I reached for the other pair." (Summers 200) A few symbols in the story were Nathan’s farm which represented Nathan’s desire for a simple life, the stone man represented poor decision making and regret, and the ice was a symbol for vulnerability and unpredictability.

In conclusion, “The Skating Party” by Merna Summers created a unique plot and love triangle, the suspense of the story was overwhelming and led the reader to the end, and the motif was unforeseeable emotions. I felt that the motif and ending to the story were quite relevant in real life and they wasn’t farfetched at all. People react very differently under pressure and they tend to be poor decisions. Merna Summers did a good job in connecting with the reader as the story was simple but had a meaningful subtext. I saw that Uncle Nathan didn’t get the future he was hoping for and he regretted his choices and it was an epiphany. From Nathan’s troubles, I saw that you should always keep a cool head when the going gets tough and to always think ahead so you don’t regret your decisions in the future.