The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty By James Thurber

In, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” James Thurber uses his personal experience and symbolism to connect the historical climate at the time for the purpose of developing the conflict between man vs. society. The main character, Walter Mitty, goes through his day while battling icy waters as a lieutenant and performing surgeries on millionaire bankers with some of the best doctors in America. As he goes along, readers are able to see how technology and the war had impacted people’s lives during that time period, and how his unique way to escape reality comforted the thousands who seemed lost themselves. James Thurber had a very strenuous childhood, losing eyesight in his right eye, and slowly losing eyesight in his left eye as well when he

While many had accepted this belief, many were still fearful of their constantly changing surroundings. When, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” was published in 1939, World War II had just begun. In the short story, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” The main character, Walter Mitty, is fixing his car. While the action is common for us today, in 1939 cars were new and the addition of the piece in the story correlates with the changing technology of Walter’s time. He seems excluded from his surroundings as they are all bizarre and unusual things for him to see normally. His vivid imagination can also be correlated with the impact of war on the homefront. Many people wanted to escape the lives they were in, and it seems Walter Mitty has found a solution to break free from reality, but he is always interrupted by other characters in the book. Thurber’s correlation of imaginative internal conflict to realistic, but still as intimidating external conflict helps readers understand why, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is arguably the best of his stories and is still cited as an exemplar of its form during that period,”(James Thurber) Several people could relate, if not directly, then to aspects of what Mitty was going through because the introduction of unfamiliar technology and World War II were shocking and frightening