More handpicked essays just for you.
Literary theory analysis essay
Two kinds of literary analysis questions
Two kinds of literary analysis questions
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
There are three things involved in reading; the author, the reader, and the story. The author creates the story that the reader reads. Because the author is the one who writes the story, he is able to manipulate what the reader sees, and by extension, feels. This is what makes the author so powerful. In order to get their message across to the reader, they manipulate the story in a way that the reader can empathize with and receive that message. This is what the authors Barbara Lazear Ascher, Lars Eighner, and Barbara Ehrenreich do in their respective short stories “On Compassion”, “On Dumpster Diving”, and “Serving in Florida”. Ascher, Eighner, and Ehrenreich use different techniques to convey different stories with the same purpose, to get the reader to rethink their way of life based off of these stories. …show more content…
In “Serving in Florida” Ehrenreich describes from the first person, her experiences as trying to live on a low-income, and the stories that she can see of those around her.
She details the life that they live, focusing on their jobs and living situation. Ehrenreich looks at two aspects of their low-income lives. The first is management, how they act and treat her and her fellow workers. This is one of the first things she mentions in her short story. “I could drift along like this, in some dreamy proletarian idyll, except for two things. One is management” (Ehrenreich 129). By doing so she immediately establishes that she resents management for whatever
reason. Ehrenreich then proceeds to condemn them, listing several reasons. She describes management in a way that demonizes them, making them look bad to the reader. “…managers are there for only one reason—to make sure that money is made for some theoretical entity, the corporation” (Ehrenreich 130). This establishes that the motive is money, and greed is a trait often seen in villainous characters. So in order to maximize profit these managers sacrifice the work life quality of the workers below them. This is made clear several times throughout Ehrenreich’s story, such as when she mentions that “Off-duty employees are henceforth barred from eating at the restaurant, because ‘other servers gather around them and gossip’” because such activities look unappealing to customers in the management’s mind (Ehrenreich 131). While looking at management, Ehrenreich briefly mentions how her and her co-workers are treated and affected by management’s demands. By doing so she creates a point where the reader can sympathize with the workers. Essentially these workers are the second aspect that Ehrenreich focuses. More specifically she looks at how people’s overall lives are with low-income. She goes into great detail of what her perception is of how well her fellow coworkers are faring after about a week of working with them. She briefly mentions how much they are making, what their expenses are, and what their housing situation is at. All of these people are clinging on to their homes (most of which are hotels and trailers). These are several examples that demonstrate what the low-income life is like. Ehrenreich does not anonymize her coworkers. She puts names to these stories, which makes it easier for someone to read and recognize that they are also human beings. Ehrenreich’s intention in doing so is for the reader to accept her underlying message to rethink their lives and be thankful for what they have. Eighner’s “On Dumpster Diving” is similar to “Serving in Florida” not only by its message, but that they are both first person accounts to living in a low income or homeless situation; however the greatest difference is how the two authors get the message to the reader. Unlike Ehrenreich in “Serving in Florida”, Eighner does not rely on many anecdotes of others. Instead he focuses on himself as a dumpster diver, telling his story as if he is giving advice to other people who wish to dumpster dive. He makes statements that could only be made from experience, occasionally giving a relevant anecdote that he himself experienced. In doing so he gives the reader insight into the life of a dumpster diver, so the reader sees what goes in the minds of the people who carelessly throw things away and the minds of the dumpster divers themselves. Eighner mentions a wide range of objects he has salvaged, including food, drink, clothes, and tools. This brings to the reader’s attention two things: that many people are wasteful, and that dumpster divers are resourceful, perhaps because of their situation. The reader will then likely look at his or her life, and evaluate it based off of Eighner’s experiences, and then strive to be less wasteful with that he or she has. To ensure that the reader gets this message, Eighner expresses himself to further encourage the reader to reevaluate his or her lifestyle. When it comes to food, Eighner says “I just hate to see food go to waste and so I eat much more than I should. Something like this drives the obsession to collect junk” (145). By making this statement, he makes his philosophy clear to the reader, making it more likely for the reader to adapt it. On the other hand, Ascher uses a similar yet different approach than Ehrenreich and Eighner. In his short story “On Compassion”, Ascher uses anecdotes of separate and unrelated events. This provides her multiple opportunities to get the reader to rethink their lives based off of these stories. , The way Ascher presents these anecdotes clearly presents a bias. In other words the story favors one party over another. These anecdotes she shares are all stories she witnessed but never interacted with. She does not know the names of these people, so she chooses to keep them anonymous, describing them only in a vague way. These stories share a common structure, a person encounters a homeless person by circumstance and gives him a bit of food or a bit of money, and the two go their separate ways. In Ascher’s first anecdote, this encounter is between a man, and a mother with her baby in a stroller. She depicts the man with a smile of dreams or madness, a buttonless shirt missing a sleeve, baggy trousers, and dreadlocks; a person that “…does not know his part” (Ascher 47). She describes the exchange, “The mother grows impatient and pushes the stroller before her, bearing the dollar like a cross. Finally, a black hand rises and closes around green” (47). The way Ascher describes this encounter makes the man appear bad, an undesirable figure, and a nuisance that the mother wanted to get rid of. She asks the reader “Was it fear or compassion that motivated the gift?” to get them to think more critically of the situation (47). Because of the wording in this passage, the reader will come to the conclusion that it was fear that motivated the gift. However, Ascher does not strictly demonize the homeless and unfortunate in her stories. In her story about the bread shop owner, she makes it appear that the shop owner is genuinely compassionate. She leaves these stories open-ended so that she can ask the reader questions like “What compels this woman to feed this man? Pity? Care? Compassion?” (Ascher 47). By imposing these questions on to the reader, and with her own input, Ascher challenges the reader to analyze and understand the situation. By reading the anecdote the reader can infer as to what the probable answer is, which vary from anecdote to anecdote. This is an effective method of telling the stories, and can lead to the reader questioning his or her motives when it comes to charity. Towards the end of “On Compassion”, Ascher talks about what compassion is, and the emotions that cause and come from it, which makes it apparent that that is what she wants the reader to be motivated by when being charitable. In these short stories written by Eherenreich, Eighner, and Ascher, the reader is presented with the lives and experiences that the authors witnessed or went through themselves. Experiences that the reader may never experience themselves. The authors present these stories with the intention to get the reader to assess and rethink their way of life based of their stories. They do this by using their own unique perspective of the situation to bring attention grabbing details to the reader. This emphasized part is the common theme between the three pieces, exploring the reasoning behind one’s actions. In doing so, they cause the reader to reflect upon their current lives and reevaluate them.
She blames capitalism for the injustices of the world, slightly more than easy bad management techniques. A company should be shown that would benefit from a union and it will be shown to all around that one that will promote even better from decent, gentle management decisions. Most irritating, she’s constantly negative about the whole lot, even the positive experiences she has. When one of her colleagues offers to allow her move in with her and her family, not only does Ehrenreich turn the proposal down, but she still describes it sneeringly as a "touched by an angel moment." Does she have to dribble with irony when writing about an authentic type deed?
Like most people whom conduct experiments, Ehrenreich must first establish credibility of her knowledge of this subject. She does this in her introduction in numerous ways. Ehrenreich comes out saying that she has a Ph.D in biology but has a fancy for writing. She starts off with her exposure to low wage paying jobs by using her sister and her husband a companion for over a decade. Her sister, who use to work for the phone company as a sales representative, a factory work and receptionist who described it her experiences as “the hopelessness of being a wage slave”. Her husband use to work for $4.50 an hour in a warehouse before he was fortunate enough to land a good paying job with the union workers the Teamsters.
The biggest appeal that Ehrenreich makes is after she ends up walking out of the housekeeping job/waitress job because she cannot handle it anymore." I have failed I don't cry, but I am in a position to realize, for the first time in many years, that the tear ducts are still there and still capable of doing their job." (Ehrenreich, 48) This is the biggest appeal because Ehrenreich is quitting on the whole project. She is basically telling the readers that it is impossible for her, a "well-off", woman to live the life of a low wage worker.
She puts herself in the mindset of many women in her position by getting a job as a waitress, getting a small apartment, and working minimum wage to get by day to day. Ehrenreich’s states, her main goal is “to lift poor women out of poverty as well as raise their self-esteem.” (p. 224.) This is a powerful statement Ehrenreich makes because she is not doing this for the sake of experimenting she honestly wants to make a difference in American women lives. The story shows Ehrenreich’s experience as working as minimum waitress in Hearthside as well as describing her coworkers and their
She uses a string full of rhetorical questions throughout her article, as well, to make us contemplate whether people do deeds out of compassion, fear, or something else. She uses rhetorical questions such as “Was it fear or compassion that motivated that gift?”(6), “...what compels this woman to feed this man? Pity? Care? Compassion? Or does she simply want to rid her shop of his troublesome presence?”(9), and “Could it be that the homeless, like those ancients, are reminding us of our common humanity?”(14). These questions make the audience think and contemplate why these people did these acts of kindness. Ascher includes some of these rhetorical questions at the end of both of the narratives to force the readers to quickly analyze the situation and decide what the motivation was. As a result, I can conclude that one woman did it out of fear while the other did it out of compassion; therefore, this proves that people are not born compassionate, but they develop the quality later on in life. This is more effective instead of just expressing how she personally feels about each
As people age they will often still recall a good childhood story. A well told, meaningful story can go a long way when attempting to argue a point or convey information. In the essays, ''The Myth of The Latin Women: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria" by Judith Ortiz Cofer, "Gains and Losses" by Richard Rodriquez, and "Piecing It All Together" by bell hooks, the authors connect to the reader and create a better audience through their writing. Through the portrayal of a story the authors help the reader understand their point of view, they transfer information to the reader with better ease, and keep the reader engaged the authors argue a point or convey information more efficiently.
The juxtaposed contrasts that she often uses are seen explicitly in anecdotes or implicitly in conscious thoughts. Such contrasts first appear in the first paragraph. Even before Ehrenreich makes any substantial effort to join the poor working class, she is hit with this sudden unease of being recognized. At that time, it is clear that she has not relinquished her middle class status since she feels ashamed of being identified as a poor worker. In the world that the author originally belongs to, name and reputation are considered important to one’s standing in society yet in the working class realm, as Ehrenreich later finds out, one is often “unnoticed” and names are “unuttered.” Not only are names forgotten but one’s ability and education are also ignored when looking for jobs. Oblivious to the “rule” for hiring for unskilled jobs, Ehrenreich initially worries about her over-qualification but only to be shocked when she realizes the employers are not even interested. Whereas jobs for the middle class often demand higher education and past accomplishments, jobs for the low-wage workforce are simply depended simply on luck or as Ehrenreich claims “ being in the right place at the right time.” One can convey this as part of a corporate scheme to ensure the
When looking into works of literature, some stories seem to be similar to others. They can have a similar setting, point of view, theme, or sense of language and style. However, all of these points could be very different as well and could cover different theme or style. Flannery O’Conner’s “Good Country People” and Alice Walker’s “Everyday Use” have some contrasting elements, such as their points of view and use of symbolism, but their similarities in the underlying theme, language, and the setting of these stories reveal how these two stories are impacted by education on both the individual and their family.
Appealing to the reader’s emotions through stories is a commonly used technique, and Scelfo uses it beautifully. She starts the article out by introducing the reader to a young girl named Kathryn Dewitt. Whether they mean to or not, the reader develops some kind of emotional connection to this young girl. They feel as if they are a part of the story, for when
Ehrenreich notices how troublesome a minimum wage workers life is by her pretending to be a minimum wage worker as well. A strength of Ehrenreich's argument is that she was able to show examples of how some of her coworkers lived poorly. An example that she gives is, “Gail is sharing a room in a well-known downtown flophouse for $250 a week. Her roommate,a male friend, has begun hitting on her, driving her nuts,but the rent would be impossible alone.” (25). Some of her coworkers had to go through tedious situations as can't get out of them because they can't afford to live on their own. This shows a strength in Ehrenreich's argument because it give more credibility. Another strength in her argument is she went to go experience low wage work first-hand. She said, “Maybe when I got into the project, I would discover some hidden economies in the world of the low-wage worker” (3). Ehrenreich realized that the only way that she was going to get the answer was by doing the job for herself even though she didn't want to at first. By her experiencing this first-hand she is able to strengthen the argument because she will be able to effectively convey her message. If someone else were to conduct the experiment then there would have probably been a lot more holes throughout the
Many people think that reading more can help them to think and develop before writing something. Others might think that they don’t need to read and or write that it can really help them to brainstorm things a lot quicker and to develop their own ideas immediately (right away). The author’s purpose of Stephen King’s essay, Reading to Write, is to understand the concepts, strategies and understandings of how to always read first and then start something. The importance of this essay is to understand and comprehend our reading and writing skills by brainstorming our ideas and thoughts a lot quicker. In other words, we must always try to read first before we can brainstorm some ideas and to think before we write something. There are many reasons why I chose Stephen King’s essay, Reading to Write, by many ways that reading can help you to comprehend, writing, can help you to evaluate and summarize things after reading a passage, if you read, it can help you to write things better and as you read, it can help you to think and evaluate of what to write about.
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
In this book, Ehrenreich tries to work in three different places to see what it is like to work as a minimum wage worker. Ehrenreich worked as a server in Florida, housekeeper in Miami, and sales person in Minnesota, and still she didn’t make enough money to live comfortable. As she says, “Something is wrong, very wrong, when a single person in good health, a person who in addition possesses a working car, can barely support herself by the sweat of her brow. You don’t need a degree in economics to see that wages are too low and rent too high”(Ehrereich’s 199). She notices how hard it is for poor people to try to survive when they have to work with a minimum
In conclusion, it is hard to grasp the true meaning of the story unless the story is read a second time because of the author's style of writing.
Literature is rarely, if ever, merely a story that the author is trying to tell. It is imperative that the reader digs deep within the story to accurately analyze and understand the message the author is trying to portray. Authors tend to hide themselves in their stories. The reader can learn about the author through literary elements such as symbolism, diction, and structure. A good example of this is Robert Frost’s poems The Road Not Taken and Nothing Gold can Stay in which he uses ordinary language unlike many other poets that became more experimental (Frost, Robert. “1.”).