Anne Petry's Novel 'The Street'

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Anne Petry's novel "The Street" gives vivid detail of the setting which creates incredible imagery in the story. Even the unmost important details in the story's is given to create imagery. "Fingering its way along the curb, the wind set the bits of paper to dancing high in the air, so that a barrage of paper swirled into the faces of the people on the street," (15-18). This gives clear detail of what is happening in the street by describing how the paper was moving to the wind. By describing how the paper is moving in a happy, uncaring way shows how Lutie Johnson's see the simpliest things. That Johnson's attitude toward her surroundings shows hat she has a very good mood.

Anne Petry's novel "The Street" gives personification to make the story more intresting. Petry's makes the story come alive when she gives a non-living thing a characteristic of a living thing. "And then the wind grabbed their hats, pried their scarves from around their necks, stuck its fingers inside their coat collars, blew their coats away from their bodies," (31-34). Petry gives the wind which is non-living a characteristic of grabbing people hats which is a living characteristic. By how much detail and comparesion between the two showed that Johnson thought that the wind was crazy. That the wind was so strong that it was taking peoples hats …show more content…

The figurative language can give a clear statement of what Johnson feels toward the object or person. "It even blew her eyelashes away from her eyes so that her eyeballs were bathed in a rush of coldness and she had to blink in order to read the words on the sign swaying back and forth over her head," (40-44). This figurative language would be a metaphor that her eyes are being compared to ice. This shows that Johnson's attitude toward the wind and coldness effect her eyes. The ice gives detail that she can't move her eyes for its so