The Chaser By John Collier Summary

The short story by John Collier has exposition, climax, conclusion, allusions, magical realism, imagery, symbolism, archetypes, irony and some themes. The author succeeds in making short stories and the audience is for the young adults and any man or women who are in a relationship. Collier makes it possible to have his readers imagine what’s going to happen next and makes them wonder what happened in the end.

The story starts off slowly then picks up, and then at the goodbye there’s no tying up the loose ends and the ending needs to be imagined by the reader if Alan got what he wanted. It starts off slowly by introducing the main character, how he’s feeling and the setting. The old man’s introduced after the description of his home was given. Then they started talking. It climaxed by the old man saying if he didn’t sell love potions he wouldn’t make a killing out of the potions. The actions that Alan gave are normal but a bit exaggerated.

Most of “The Chaser” alludes to Greek and Roman myth about Odyssey, the story mentions sirens. The Odyssey starts with war and wanting to go back home and has

Circe the sorceress, she fell in love with Odysseus, the witch wanted to keep him as a husband but he got away. Odysseus found out before he left Circe that some of his men turned to pigs while drinking the potion in the caldron, he beg Circe to help him out with going home to his wife Penelope with the help of Hermes.
Although seeing the pop culture in the 1950’s; the advertisements in the comic books like “Judy Canova” sell love perfume sample bottles for a dollar .In the first story in issue three the main character Judy Canova tries to “Hook me a rich feller” and she does more than she has to do so. These characters want to go way beyond into pleasing themselves than pleasing their mate.
There is magical realism in the story, the setting could be anywhere in the U.S and the old man seems as though he’s a trustworthy man at the time with the rocking chair and the newspaper in his hand. The old man seems as though he’s mortal too and he was cordial to Alan because a friend of a friend referred him over to the old man. The potion itself is magical, the ones on the shelf are for killing and the other potions in the drawer are for obsessing.
The old man is like a salesman of the sort, selling Alan junk that he doesn’t need and want. Alan wants to have those potions because he wants his lover to go gaga over him. Well the story is more real than it is fiction: there are no broomsticks, no magical statues to worship, and no paraphernalia that is magical that would refer to the old man. “The Chaser” is not the “Harry Potter” series but it’s the precursor to the magical world of Harry Potter.
The imagery of the short story is exceptional, the sense of sight is mostly used.

There is the dark creaky stairs, the sign, the glass bottles in the drawer being dusty and used. The expressions of objectivity, joy, and fear are present in most of the work. There should be a reason why there are 12 glass bottles of poison during Alan’s visit, maybe the apostles during the Last Supper? Is it that Jesus got killed by the apostles because they secretly knew Judas would betray him and didn’t do anything because of dread, so as not to not be marred a traitor in history? There is plenty of irony in this piece, mostly with religion and domesticated women. Newhous’s article mentions about the cookbooks that were published at the time and some pages include recipes for canned food, the problem is it was looked down upon because it is unwomanly to not be slaving in the kitchen

(533).
The themes are no one could escape death but unequivocal love could outlast anything. True love never dies, but carnal love does when you are in the ground. Money doesn’t buy love, it is earned. Although it is thought that sin, to yourself and to others are the hardest to get rid of especially in the eyes of God because there should be suffering that comes with controlling what should become naturally. The life cleaner the old man speaks of is like washing away the sin of lust and envy, either Alan takes it or Diane. Committing suicide is also sin against God in the Bible because the love ones that you leave behind suffer a gaping hole that would take time to heal. Murdering someone so that you could get rid of the problem is improper in the Commandments, it is easy to commit wrong but it’s hard to gain back grace in God and of the people you aggrieved in the past.
In the article, “Attacking the Washington Femmocracy”, Storss stated that some women became “government girls” who were supposedly lusting for sex because the Reds wanted to recruit mostly good looking men and women. McCarthy believed that Communist at the time are trying to infiltrate the government and blacklisted almost everyone in Hollywood. When you think of the 1950’s you also think of the brink of WWII and of the beginning of the Cold War. The ideology of the Communist is that they are atheist and that no one owns any property because it’s the governments. Don’t want to be like McCarthy but the old man could represent Communism because he sees people and things as they are worth and not by how they are perceived. He could represent McCarthy too. The old man values money more than life, but Alan is just starting life but he would just be like the old man. Alan would be desperate for the poison. It could change a life forever and the body would be an empty shell.