Comparing 'What Happened During The Ice Storm And The Fight'

Impulse is a sudden, strong, and unreflective urge or desire to act. In both Jim Heynan’s short story “What Happened during the Ice Storm” and John Montague’s poem “The Fight,” the main characters both have impulses that make them take action; some characters decide to be destructive while others decide to be gentle. In both texts, the role and results of impulse are made clear by the language Heynen and Montague use to describe the actions of their characters. In “What Happens during the Ice Storm”, Heynan uses descriptive language when describing the boys’ actions throughout the story that builds suspense. The author writes,“...each expecting the other to do something. To pounce on a pheasant, or to yell Bang!” This line shows the different impulses the boys felt when coming across the pheasants. This builds suspense because the readers don’t know whether the boys will act on these impulses or not. However, The boys eventually figure out what they are going to do as seen in the line, “Then one of the boys said Shh. He was taking off his coat,

The author writes, “Where I curved in my hand, To count them, one by one, Into his cold palm, a kind of trophy or offering.” This demonstrates the narrator's impulse in a good way; the narrator is worshiping the eggs that he has found and has decided to share them with his classmate. However, after the classmate decided to break the eggs, the narrator has a different impulsive reaction as seen in the lines, “For minutes we fought, Standing and falling in, The river's brown spate,” This demonstrates the narrator's impulse to fight the classmate for breaking the eggs because the narrator believes the eggs should be appreciated and admired. Given these points, Montague is able to portray the boys' different impulses with their actions to events throughout the