Every person is likely to feel a sense of discontentment at some point . This feeling could stem from many different aspects of a person’s life such as their job, house, financial situation, etc, and this in turn inspires an incentive to do something else with their life. In “Saturday at the Canal” , Gary Soto utilizes various literary devices including imagery, symbolism, and personification. These literary devices serve to convey the feeling of desire and motivation to pursue life’s journey.
From analyzing the text it’s obvious to the reader that the narrator is dissatisfied with where he’s at in life. The first stanza is an insight into the atmosphere of his high school, and the word choice and imagery play a role in depicting his disgruntled
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One example of symbolism is the water and canal itself. The water is a representation of freedom because it flows out of town going where it wants to. In the last two lines of the poem, the author says “ our eyes followed the water, white-tipped but dark underneath, racing out of town.” (Soto 1). When the poem mentions the water racing out of town that’s the narrator’s way of alluding to the water’s seeming independence from the town. Another symbol that represents freedom in the poem is the postcard of San Francisco. This is the most obvious, yet one of the most powerful symbols. The reason for this is because to the narrator San Francisco is where he belongs, it represents a lifelong goal for him, and is the epitome of pursuing life’s journey. San Francisco is known for having an artistic atmosphere and for being a place where one can be themselves, and it seems as though this is what draws the author to the city. As he states in the lines 13-14 “And to be with people who knew more than three chords on a guitar”( Soto 1), this tells the reader that he views San Francisco as a place where talented people flock to, and he wants to be apart of that. The last use of symbolism in the poem is the reference to the narrator’s hair. The lines 15-16 describe the hair as “ shoulder …show more content…
The author uses personification in lines 16-17 where he writes “ the shadows of this loneliness gripped loose dirt.” ( Soto 1). This use of personification is the narrator’s way of helping the reader to further understand the loneliness he experienced in life. The last use of personification relates back to the water in the last line where he describes it as “racing out of town”. The water racing out of town represents what the narrator wishes he could do. He is envious of the water’s ability to come and go as it pleases and that’s why he phrases this line in that
The opening stanza sets the tone for the entire poem. Updike uses symbolism to portray the sad, disappointing life Flick ...
One symbol appears throughout chapter three, the turtle. It is a symbol for the migrants and how some people will go out of their way to knock them down, “the driver saw the turtle and swerved to hit it” simply because they want to, they want to feel like they are powerful (Steinbeck 22). However, some of the people go out of their way to avoid hurting the migrants, “she saw the turtle and swung to the right, off the highway, the wheels screamed and a cloud of dust boiled up” because they know that it would be immoral to hurt something, although they have more power (Steinbeck 22). Another example of a symbol is Rose of Sharon’s pregnancy, it holds new life for the family, except when the baby is born it is “a blue shriveled little mummy” that “‘Never breathed’ said Mrs. Wainwright softly. ‘Never was alive.’” symbolizing how the Joads never really had a chance (Steinbeck 603). They believe in their hearts that they persevere throughout their trials, but in the end they realized their certain doom as soon as they left for California, maybe even
Everyone wants to fill the void within themselves, and most humans try to accomplish this by finding jobs they enjoy, but it seems that most of them ultimately fail. When you are younger you look to your parents to show you the way, but as you approach adulthood you start to feel more of a sense of rebellion toward them instead of the admiration you once had. The writer makes the poem universal by saying he didn’t want to end up like his father, something most children in north america could relate to. It’s also easily linked to our society in north america because of the way our schooling system is set up, in a way that you must commit to what you’re going to do for the rest of your life when you’re still too young to vote, and our system being this way makes it easy to end up regretting what you choose. Humans in modern society are expected to make many commitments for a range of things- relationships or sports teams, even major life decisions, and it’s obvious that our natural need for commitment is prevalent in our everyday life. Consequently, this need for making commitments can end up leaving people making poor decisions or at least taking a route you’ll end up wanting to renounce in the
O. Henry once said, “The true adventurer goes forth aimless and uncalculating to meet and greet unknown fate.” The poem goes a lot a deeper than the words on the page, the items and decisions within it really make you see things differently. Three symbols really stuck out to me; adolescence, sadness, and timelessness.
The poet expresses a lot of emotion through the imagery that she uses. At the beginning of her poem, we can see a silent frustration, as we read: “do not fool yourself that I have fallen off the face of the earth and/am just another statistical write-off.” She shares how frustrating it is to be ostracized in a class where no one understands her, or makes any attempt to do so, and expresses this through smooth sarcasm. In the education system, Cree students were always expected to drop out, so it made no difference when or how many did drop out, because it was assumed they would all drop out eventually. They assumed that it was either because the Cree people didn’t care about their schooling, or didn’t have the mental capacity to learn, so as a result the staff also failed to care. This naturally, did not make it easy for the Cree students who did care, and who did try their best, and the speaker was also one of these people. She indicates that she is very annoyed with the education system because of all the stereotyping that was happening between students and teachers alike, but also because the classes are extremely boring to her, for she
The cars that “flare up and burn out and flare up” as the speaker watches them go by with his eyes closed - a fact that indicates the symbolic nature of the imagery - is precisely a metaphor for the movement of the city, one with explosive speed and fiery intensity (Paz 1). A drastically different image, however, is presented right beneath in stanza 2: “On a bench an old man talks to himself” (Paz 1). The nameless person, referred to plainly as “an old man,” is implied to be less lively than his surroundings, the city portrayed earlier, because of his advanced years. In fact, he is simply sitting “on a bench,” immobile, in contrast to the movement of the city and its cars. The fact that he “talks to himself,” instead of interacting with others in a city of millions where, in contrast, just around him “a couple embraces by an iron railing / she laughs and asks something,” conveys a sense of idleness (Paz 1). However, despite the fact that the old man is still - immobile and inanimate - in opposition to the vibrant Mexico City in which he
During the poem the speaker does not address his readers. The readers are simply overhearing a man assessing the society in which he lives as he daydreams about what is could be and yet what it is not. It is evident that his goal is to get the readers to look down upon this society which is so caught up in daily routine; prohibiting anyone from having freedom of imagination. This detachment that is created between the speaker and his readers incorporated with the boring monotone at the very beginning of the poem gives the readers a negative impression of the society before they begin to analyze the actual words of the poem.
Symbolism is strongly represented through Kaplan’s short story. The symbols represented are the ocean, the killing of the doe and the woods. Visiting the ocean for the first time at the Jersey Shore was new for Andy. Since then she had been awfully frightened of the ocean. She believes the ocean to be a huge, vast that constantly moved, keeps shifting
Personification is an important theme throughout this poem. In lines 1-2 it says, “The mountain held the town as in a shadow I saw so much before I slept there once:.” Also in lines 3-4 it says, “I noticed that I missed stars in the west, where its black body cut into the sky.” This is an example of personification. In lines 5-6 it says, Near me it seemed: I felt it like a wall behind which i was sheltered from a wind.” Most of the examples showing personification in this poem, are displayed in the first couple of lines of the poem.
At this point of the story it is reflective of a teenager. A teenager is at a time in life where boundaries and knowledge is merely a challenging thing to test and in some instances hurdled. Where even though you may realize the responsibilities and resources you have, there is still a longing for the more sunny feelings of youth.
The next literary device to be discussed is imagery. As previously stated, many sentences could serve as excellent example of imagery, however the sentence that most portrays an idea is on line 40; “The slop was sweet and gold-colored in the afternoon sun.” The line tells you how messy the pie was (slop), and then to tell you exactly what the pie mess looked like, it tells what color it was, and if the environment affected its color (gold-colored…afternoon sun). The idea behind Mr. Soto’s usage of imagery may seem simple, but it makes sure that the point is carried across to the reader.
John Cheever is an American writer best known for his powerful criticism of American middle class. His stories are characterized by his attention to detail parts of his life inside his careful writing. Cheever lives drives the reader to his short fiction, “The Swimmer,” where he details the exploratory journey of Neddy Merrill. A main character who has name himself as a pilgrim. Neddy decides make an exploratory journey to swim his way home across his neighbors’ pools which represents the surface of his life. A life filled with swimming pools, parties and alcohol. Cheever focused in portraying a man with a perfect life on the surface with a content family, a high social status and many friends, which suddenly disintegrates through the story by an alcohol abuse. Therefore, this story stand as a metaphor for life, delivering the reader this message: life is short and valuable, and every actions performed brings its own reactions.
Symbolism embodies Hughes’ literary poem through his use of the river as a timeless symbol. A river can be portrayed by many as an everlasting symbol of perpetual and continual change and of the constancy of time and of life itself. People have equated rivers to the aspects of life - time, love, death, and every other indescribable quality which evokes human life. This analogy is because a river exemplifies characteristics that can be ultimately damaging or explicitly peaceable. In the poem, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” Langston Hughes cites all of these qualities.
Throughout the poem two phrases are repeated many times, emphasizing their importance, and giving them more power. As they are repeated the reader is shown the indifference of the narrator when he says, "First they came for the ..." "and I did not speak out Because I was not a..." (Niemöller, 1-6). These phrases and their interchangeable endings show how the narrator does not care who is facing troubles as long as it is not them. This indifference is detrimental because it shows a lack of empathy and cares for others in the narrator. Niemöller's repetition of these two phrases during his poem highlights the narrator's consistent disregard for people different than them. A shift in the pattern of thinking of the narrator is seen when he says, "Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak for me." (Niemöller, 7). After repeatedly ignoring the injustices against others the narrator realizes their mistake when they find themself in the same situation as the people they had previously ignored. This change in how the narrator thinks shows how their lack of action to help others face their injustices was done so partly in ignorance. The narrator had not yet realized that everyone faces struggles at a point during their lives, and that the only way to get through them is by supporting and having the support of
Life is full of obstacles that people must overcome in order to continue. Garcia Lorca uses intense images such as watching preserved butterflies come back to life and where the mummified hand of a boy lies. His use of surrealistic events helps the reader understand Lorca’s emphasis on the brutality and disgusting outlook of life. The struggle in life to survive is a major component i...