Summary Of John Updike's Short Story A & P

In John Updike’s short story “A&P,” Sammy is the narrator and cashier at the grocery story A&P. The author uses dynamic characters with immensely different personalities to portray conformity and rebellion in our society. Through out the story Sammy challenges conformity and social norms at his work place for personal reasons. Sammy is very bitter character and taken as a realist which fuels the story. Queenie, a rebel against conformity, sparks Sammy’s emotions after the way she is treated by his boss Langel when she walks into the grocery store with nothing but a bikini covering her skin. The setting of the “A&P” takes place in the 1960s when women in America were deeply frowned upon for too much skin showing while dressed in their attire. The author used the grocery store A&P as his setting because almost all stores have a

The author uses Sammy, the narrator, to drive the story, and give the reader vivid details of his surroundings and key components in the story. The setting of the 1960’s makes the theme in this story unique because of all the controversy over women’s fashion that took place in this time era. The grocery store was a great setting for the author to choose and allowed the story to be more dynamic, and it also allowed the involvement of different kinds of people that made Sammy portray different emotions to the reader. Sammy and Queenie are symbols of disregard to norms and conformity in this story. Sammy makes an irrational decision while trying to catch queenies decision and realized after his failed attempt that he had just made life harder on himself. Although Sammy quit, he found a sense of freedom in these girls, He wanted to be different just like them and that is what he pursued after the right motivation. The Author used Sammy to show that being different is a good thing, but making irrational decisions in pursuit of non-conformity can leave you with