In the excerpt from “Cherry Bomb” by Maxine Clair, the narrator makes use of diction, imagery and structure to characterize her naivety and innocent memories of her fifth-grade summer world. The diction employed throughout the passage signifies the narrator’s background and setting. The narrator’s choice of words illustrates how significant those memories were to her. Specific words help build the narrator’s Midwestern background with items like the locust, cattails and the Bible.
The tone of chapter 11 in John Steinbeck's, “The Grapes of Wrath,” is sympathetic, sad and hopeless. His word choice and syntax show how the sad houses were left to decay in the weather. His use of descriptive words paints a picture in the reader's mind. As each paragraph unfolds, new details come to life and adds to the imagery. While it may seem unimportant, this intercalary chapter shows how the effects of the great depression affected common households.
In the second passage the narrator talks about how she admires the people who go out and do the jobs no one else wants to do. One example of this shared theme is this quote from “To Be of Use,” ‘I want to be with people who submerge in the task, who go into the field and harvest and work in a row and pass the bags along, who are
In the novel, Out of the Dust, by Karen Hesse, Billie Jo is a girl living in the Dust Bowl in the 1930’s. She goes through tough times with her father, her family, and herself. Hesse uses descriptive and intense texts as well as using free form in her poems to increase her power through her words. Sometimes it goes too far with her descriptions. The words and sentences she uses are powerful but too graphic for an average student.
The quotes, “Nineteen miles to the nearest sign of civilisation- a shanty on the main road” and “One of the children died while she was here alone. She rode nineteen miles for assistance, carrying the dead child” go hand in hand displaying the alienation and harshness of living in the bush. The first quote, “Nineteen miles to the nearest sign of civilisation- a shanty on the main road”, shows how isolating the area can be, with no houses
In these lines, the speaker uses a metaphor to compare dirt to something as irrelevant as the background with the main characters shining in the front. It shows their initial view of dirt and what they saw it as. Olds was able to produce a feeling of realization where the speaker looks back on how they used to think and this mood we're left with was done with pathos because it has a feeling this type of way. However, later throughout the poem, we see that there's nothing but praise for dirt, which demonstrates the speaker's change in perspective.
He looked up at the tinted sky, illuminated by scattered stones. “This world…is cruel.” Kayn Hayes sighed, raking his hand through his dirtied blond hair. It was a deep, meaningful breath, with a tale behind it. Maybe once before somebody may have liked to listen to the tale, maybe not.
The scene then changes to the narrator’s childhood, a lonely one at it. “I lay on the bed and lost myself in stories,” he says, “I liked that. Books were safer than other people anyway.” The main narrative starts as he recalls a
In the short story “Powder” by Tobias Wolff the author writes a story about a father and a son with a troubled relationship as they try to go home on Christmas eve. During this time period it is about the 1920’s around the time of the Great Depression. When the stock market crashed it affected the father, the son and this story. The obvious conflict is between the mother and the father because the son has been brought home late by the father and has been given one last chance to take his son out and bring him home on time. This paper will discuss how the word usage throughout the story helps us to determine that the conflict is growing and beginning to reach its peak.
The rural landscape evokes the American Midwest. The geometry of the hills and road as well as the toy-like atmosphere and depiction of the cars entail a sense of irony that is often seen in Wood’s artwork. This irony is furthermore reinforced by the vivid color palette making allusion to a childlike drawing. Together with the curves of the road, the positioning of the cars and the telephone pole in the foreground, they come in contrast with the dark shadowing and the gray clouds approaching from the background. These elements manage to create a sense of urgency and motion.
In the novel, The Catcher in The Rye, the author J. D. Salinger generates/creates a period in the life of a young protagonist. J. D. Salinger’s novel explores the different practices of storytelling by utilizing a distinctively constructed character. In this essay, the main topics to be discussed is the narrative’s point of view, the style and genre that are relevant to characterization in Salinger’s novel. A narrative point of view is the way a story is told.
Diction is an extremely important aspect of writing and it usually affects the writer’s whole story. Almost all authors utilize diction to impact the mood and tone of their writing. Diction is the choice of words or phrases that a writer intentionally chooses to influence other aspects of their story. Authors use commonly use diction to develop tone and mood in their stories. Tone is the author’s attitude towards a specific subject.
The short story “Identities” by W. D. Valgardson, tells the story of an up-class man being wrongly stereotyped resulting in his untimely death. The effective use of contrast in this story helps readers to understand the protagonist. Contrast is the strategy in which the writer describes the difference between two or more neighbourhoods, characters, or perceptions. Contrast is initially displayed in Valgardson’s detailed description of the protagonist's neighbourhood and the poorer side of town. The character's community is expressed as innocent, honest and spotless.
The town was gray. It would make one think of disparity and sadness. The tudor houses were decrepit, as the townspeople hadn’t had the chance to rebuild their houses since the winter had come and gone just a month ago. The trees were beginning to reanimate, with buds sprouting from the limbs.
The authors want their audiences to use these tales and examples as life lessons and hope for them to utilize these sources in their future lives. These two ideas are presented through the use of figurative language, mainly metaphors. In addition, the similar tone of these pieces allows the author to connect more deeply with the readers. Toni Morrison’s Nobel lecture, folktales, and several poems illustrate how metaphors and tone are used to describe experience and caution the readers.
