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Cloudstreet By Tim Winton

755 Words4 Pages

In Cloudstreet, Tim Winton relays the various struggles of the Pickle and Lamb family who have had little moments worth celebrating; however, the beginning of the chapter Wax Harry is about the birth of Rose’s son, who Fish wants to name Wax Harry, due to the waxy appearance of the newborn baby. The arrival of the baby brings the two families together and leaves them all in merriment. Diction, figurative language, imagery, point of view, and sentence structure- these are elements that contribute to the last paragraphs mood of celebration and relief.
The first lines of the last paragraph of Wax Harry personify the house by stating that “the room sighs, the house breathes its first painless breath in half a century,” marking the beginnings of …show more content…

The image that the word spills conjures is that of the house being so full of merriment that it cannot be contained in the house, and therefore it must spill out onto the streets. The people on the streets, however, are said to be already celebrating, adding to the already celebratory mood by joining it with more celebration. The paragraph finally ends with a period, which is the only period throughout the whole paragraph. The paragraph starts off by stating that the house sighs and lets out a long breath and the lack of ending punctuation gives the paragraph the feeling of letting out one big breath as it continues until it finally comes to a stop only at the very end. It is a long and breathless celebration, similar to a sigh of relief.
Winton plays with sentence structure, imagery, point of view, and figurative language to add a celebratory and whimsical tone to the passage Wax Harry. The beginnings of the last paragraph sets the tone by making the house a person who responds and is reflective towards its environment. The middle of the passage illustrates the voice of God bringing the people up and shaking the misery from the house, only to end with celebration joined by even more celebration. The passage finishes with a period, ending the all-out celebration and allowing the reader to sigh in

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