Summary Of A Summer Life By Gary Soto

In this autobiographical narrative A Summer Life, Gary Soto vividly recreates the guilt felt by a six-year-old boy who steals an apple pie. Through his visceral reminiscence he shows us the adolescent ignorance about morals and the understanding of religion. The story is a journey about his guilt, paranoia and then - understanding of what he has done. When people have to choose a decision that is based between right and wrong, and they choose wrong, it is often that they then battle the guilt that eats at them after. Soto uses somewhat of a humorous telling of the experience that is shown through imagery, diction, and biblical allusions. Soto easily uses the element of imagery to show the manifestation of his childhood guilt. His face being

Such as when he explains, “...my sweet tooth gleaming and the juice of guilt wetting my underarms”(Soto). This kind of description can nearly make the reader feel uncomfortable, it shows his guilt now turned to paranoia when thinking that everyone now knows what he has done. “even that didn’t stop me from clawing a chunk from the pie tin and pushing it into the cavern of my mouth”(Soto). Again the same explanation can be met with this line from the story. He acknowledges his sin and choose to somewhat accept his fate that he can never turn back from. His guilt still haunts him, but even his six-year-old self can understand that you cannot change what you have already

In the first line, “I knew enough about hell to stop me from stealing”(Soto). It is made apparent to the audience that Soto is religious, but at his age it is unlikely that he fully understood everything about it. He knows that stealing is wrong, but as a child the ignorance from his lack of experience in life hinders him from making rational choices such as choosing right from wrong. Soto also refers to the story of Adam and Eve from the Bible. “I knew an apple got Eve in deep trouble with snakes because Sister Marie had shown us a film about Adam and Eve being cast into the desert,”(Soto). Soto believes that his actions as a child would have an equivalent consequence such as when eve stole the sacred apple and caused herself and Adam to be banished from paradise along with the rest of humanity. Children often do not understand that sometimes the bible and its stories are not to be taken so literally, we learn over time that these stories are meant to teach certain lessons, not to scare children into