1. General Santos Doctors Medical School Foundation Incorporated
Analysis of literary
Articles
Fiction stories
Alemar Allecer BSMT 2A
10/15/2012

2. A Wrinkle in Time
Summary
A Wrinkle in Time is the first in a series of four book that follow the adventures
of MegMurry and Calvin O'Keefe. The book begins by relating Meg's personal struggles
at school and her inability to fit in with the crowd. This is also a problem for her younger
brotherCharles Wallace. Everyone thinks he is dumb, though both children are
extraordinarily intelligent - indeed, Charles Wallace could easily be considered a genius.
Beyond that, Charles Wallace also has the unique gift of being able to read the minds of
others.
Charles Wallace befriends a strange group of women living nearby - Mrs. Whatsit,Mrs.
Who, and Mrs. Which. These three ladies soon take the children on a strange journey,
promising to help them find and rescue their father who has been missing for two years.
One afternoon, after meeting Calvin near the ladies' house, the three are swept off to
another planet, Uriel, through the process of the tesser - the process of wrinkling space
and time.
On Uriel, the children are given a view of the Dark Thing, a massive blackness that
threatens to overtake the universe and that is threatening Earth. It is only through the
work of great figures such as Jesus and Buddha and Gandhi, as well as other great
artists and scientists, that keeps the Dark Thing from overtaking earth. The ladies tell
the children that this is what their father is fighting.
After a visit with the Happy Medium, an oracle who tells them what path they must
follow, the children are taken to the planet of Camazotz, a planet overtaken by the Dark
Thing. On Camazotz, everyone acts exactly like everyone else and all creativity has
been expunged from the planet. The children meet the Man with the Red Eyes who tries
to "hypnotize" them into following IT. Charles Wallace eventually gives in with the hope
of defeating the Dark Force, but he is taken in by the powerful evil.
They are then taken to see Meg's father who has been imprisoned by IT. After Meg
heroically rescues him from his glass chamber, Charles Wallace, still under IT's
influence, takes them to see this IT. IT turns out to be a large, dismembered brain. It
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3. pulses and tries to hypnotize both Calvin and Meg, but Mr. Murry saves them both by
tessering off the planet just as they are about the fall under its power.
On another planet, Ixchel, Meg is healed by a giant, tentacled beast called Aunt Beast.
Aunt Beast shows her the meaning of true love and soon gives her the strength to offer
her self to save Charles Wallace. Alone and back on Camazotz, Meg confronts IT face
to face, and, using the only power that IT does not have - love - is finally able to defeat
it. IT only wields the power of hate, and almost overtakes her, but Meg's love for her
brother is stronger than the hate of IT. As she and the rescued Charles Wallace
embrace, they are tessered back to earth where they are reunited with their family.
Themes
Madeleine L'Engle's fantasy works are in part highly expressive of her Christian
viewpoint in a manner somewhat similar to that of Christian fantasy writer C.S. Lewis.
She was herself the official writer-in-residence at New York City's Episcopal Cathedral
of St. John the Divine, which is known for its prominent position in the liberal wing of
the Episcopal Church.[7] L'Engle's liberal Christianity has been the target of criticism
from more conservative Christians, especially with respect to certain elements of A
Wrinkle in Time.
Another major Biblical reference is the hymn of praise sung by the centaur-like beings
on the planet Uriel which translates to a very close paraphrase of lines from Isaiah and
the Psalms "Sing unto the Lord a new song, and His praise from the end of the earth, ye
that go down to the sea, and all that is therein"; similarly, the alien that Meg calls 'Aunt
Beast' quotes a line (without attribution) from Paul'sEpistle to the Romans concerning
being called and justified according to God's purpose, another line from the same is
earlier cited by Meg's father.
The theme of picturing the fight of good against evil as a battle of light and darkness is a
recurring one. It is manner reminiscent of the prologue to the Gospel of John which is
also quoted once. When the "Mrs Ws" reveal their secret roles in the cosmic fight
against "the darkness" they ask the children to name some figures on Earth (a partially
dark planet) who fight the darkness. They name Jesus, and later in the
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4. discussion Buddha is named as well, along with various creative artists and
philanthropists. The three women are described as ancient star-beings who act as
guardian angels.[9]
Further, the theme of "conformity" and the "status quo" are present. It is a generic
theme that is within every society (within every society there is a powerful dominant
group that challenges the minority group. Very few of the powerless members of this
group are resilient). In this case, IT is the powerful dominant group that manipulates the
planet of Camazotz into conformity (i.e., they all have the same rhythm). Even Charles
Wallace falls prey (due to flattery) and is hence persuaded to conform. It is thanks to
Meg that she and her family are able to break from conformity.
Main Characters
Meg Murry
Square PegA Wrinkle in Time begins with Meg alone in her attic bedroom, feeling weird,
wrong, and out of place in every way. Charles Wallace Murry.
Boy Genius, UndercoverCharles Wallace looks like a five-year-old boy, but he talks like
a professor and thinks like a psychic and a physicist rolled into one.
Calvin O'Keefe
Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Who's the Happiest of them All?On first sight, Calvin O'Keefe
might not seem to have much in common with Meg and Charles Wallace.
Mrs. Whatsit
The Clothes Don't Make the WomanMrs. Whatsit is the most human-like of the three
Mrs. Ws (at least until she turns into a freaking winged centaur), but there's always
more to her than meets the eye.
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5. Mrs. Which
Mrs. Which seems the least material but the most powerful of the three Mrs. Ws. She
also seems to be the most distant from human reality: she's the one who forgets that
humans need three dimensions.
Mrs. Who
Of the three Mrs. Ws, Mrs. Who seems the vaguest. Perhaps that's because even her
words are not her own: nearly everything she says is a quotation from somewhere else.
While Mrs.
IT
One brain to rule them all, one brain to find them, one brain to bring them all, and in the
darkness bind them! IT is the evil genius of Camazotz bent on world domination, and
he's all brain.
Mr. Murry
Mr. Murry enters the story three quarters of the way through the novel. Until that point,
he exists in Meg's childhood memories as the father who called her affectionate
nicknames, played math game.
Mrs. Murry
If the Murry twins form Meg's idea what healthy normality looks like, her mother is an
example of impossible perfection:Meg looked up at her mother, half in loving admiration,
half in sullen resent.
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6. Aunt Beast
Aunt Beast is one of the alien creatures that inhabitsIxchel, the planet the Murrys and
Calvin land on after tessering off Camazotz.They were the same dull gray color as the
flowers.
The Happy Medium
Oh, puns, we love you so. The phrase "happy medium" long precedes the Medium's
appearance as a character in the book: in the first chapter, Mrs. Murry says to Meg,
The Prime Coordinator
The Prime Coordinator, a.k.a. the Man with the Red Eyes, introduces Meg, Calvin
Wallace, and Calvin O'Keefe to the power of IT.
Sandy Murry and DennysMurry
Sandy and Dennys are twins, and might as well be clones for the amount of individual
characterization they get. (They do get more differentiated in the sequels, and Many
Waters is devoted .
Fortinbras
As the Murrys' pet dog, Fortinbras's main role is to run around and bark at things. But
his bark has a bite: it's his uneasiness that clues the Murrys in that they're about to get a
visit .
Symbolism, Imagery & Allegory
Tesseract
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7. What the heck is a tesseract? We'll let Charles Wallace explain:"Well, the fifth
dimension's a tesseract. You add that to the other four dimensions .
The Black Thing
The Black Thing is the like Sauron, Darth Vader, and Voldemort all rolled into one, and
it's coming to a planet near you.
Camazotz and IT
IT, speaking through its various mouthpieces, portrays Camazotz as giving Disneyland
a run for its money as the Happiest Place in the Universe
Religion
A Wrinkle in Time is no The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, but religious language
and imagery does keep popping up. Is it coincidence that Charles Wallace asks Calvin
to read him the Book .
The Tempest by William Shakespeare
The Tempest first pops up in the text among Mrs. Who's plethora of quotations:"We are
such stuff as dreams are made on." She smiled broadly.
Setting
The scenes of A Wrinkle in Time occur in the home of the protagonist and on a variety
of planets. In this type of fantasy novel, the willing suspension of disbelief is essential to
a deeper understanding of the story. The reader must embrace the other worlds as
symbolic of larger abstract ideas.
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8. Point of view
Third Person (Limited Omniscient)
A Wrinkle in Time has a third-person narrator, but one that's hovering over Meg's head
most of the time. When the kids tesser for the first time, we see it through Meg's eyes,
and throughout the novel we rarely get commentary on what's happening beyond what
Meg is aware of. One of the few instances of such commentary happens on Ixchel, the
planet of the beasts:
Here the third-person narrator steps out of Meg's perspective for a moment to give us
additional information about why Meg is acting the way she is. While on the one hand
this distances from Meg, it also creates sympathy for her at a time when she's being
annoying...which works to bring the reader closer to Meg in the end. Most of the time,
however, the narrator stays within Meg's limitations, which means that we, as readers,
learn about what's going on and why at the same time she does.
Genre
Classics, Science Fiction
A Wrinkle in Time is published as a children's or young adult book, and like much
children's literature, it features young protagonists who go off on a quest in the absence
of their parents. In A Wrinkle in Time this quest takes them to other planets, where they
meet strange and fantastical beings. At the end, the object of their quest is achieved,
though in not quite the way they expected, and they return to the normal, every-day
world.
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9. Tone
Sympathetic
Most of the text is either from Meg's point of view or dialogue between the characters,
so the narrative voice isn't really a strong perspective. But in the detailed narration of
Meg's experience, we get the sense that the author cares deeply about these
characters, and wants us to care too, and so does her best to make us feel along with
them (see "Narrative Point of View" for more on this).
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10. The Time Traveler's Wife
Summary
When Henry DeTamble meets Clare Abshire in a Chicago library they both understand
that he is a time traveller, but she she knows much more than this about him as he has
not yet been to the times and places where they have met before. He falls in love with
her, as she has already with him, but his continuing unavoidable absences time
travelling - and then returning with increasing knowledge of their future - makes things
ever more difficult for Clare.
In Chicago, the special collections librarian Henry DeTamble has a genetic anomaly that
allows him to travel in time; however, he is not able to control the moment or the destiny
of his voyages. When the stranger Clare Abshire meets him in the library, she invites
him to have dinner with her in his favorite restaurant Beau Thai where she confesses
that she has been in love with him since she was six years old. Henry leans that he had
visited her many times in the real state of her parents and he falls in love with her.
Sooner they get married, but the life of Clare becomes troubled with the successive
unexpected travels of her beloved husband.
Theme
Niffenegger identifies the themes of the novel as "mutants, love, death, amputation, sex,
and time".Reviewers have focused on love, loss, and time. As Charlie Lee-Potter writes
in The Independent, the novel is "an elegy to love and loss".] The love between Henry
and Clare is expressed in a variety of ways, including through an analysis and history of
the couple's sex life.
Characters
Clare Abshire
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11. Choice vs. DeterminismWhen Clare first meets Henry as a six-year-old, she's a good Catholic
schoolgirl, who believes in God and good manners (aside from stepping on her brother's toes,
maybe).
Henry DeTamble
Henry – Reluctant Time Traveler or Unreliable Husband?In various passages in The Times Traveler's
Wife, Henry explains that the inevitable cause of his time travels is stress.
Alba
Alba – The Old SoulHenry and Clare name their daughter Alba, after a "white fortress on the hill." Her
name mirrors her strength and assertiveness .
Annette DeTamble
Under her artist name "Annette Lyn Robinson," Henry's mother has made a name for herself as a
famous opera singer. Richard, Henry's father, tells Clare about Annette .
Richard DeTamble
Richard DeTamble is a violinist for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. After his wife, Annette, dies in a
car accident when Henry is five, Richard's life becomes meaningless.
Mrs. Kim
Mrs. Kim has been a mom to Henry since his mother died when he was five. Henry calls her "Kimy,
his buddy." After Henry's mother's death, she not only takes care of Henry, but his father as well.
Lucile Abshire
Clare's mother, Lucille Abshire, is a very troubled, unpredictable woman. During her first date with
Henry in the present, Clare explains, "My mother is kind of off in the clouds."
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12. Philip Abshire
Philip Abshire, Clare's father, is a lawyer, specializing in wills. "Master of his features," he does a great
job at playing the affable, smiling head of the family.
Mark Abshire and Fiancée Sharon
Mark is studying to be a lawyer, like his father. Clare and Mark have never had a very friendly sibling
relationship. Six-year-old Clare relates,
Alicia Abshire
Alicia is Clare's younger sister. Henry describes her as, "matter-of-fact and kind, but a little odd, absent"
Grandma Meagram
Grandma Meagram lives with Clare's family. She is blind. One day when seventeen-year-old Clare
takes her out for a walk, they run into Henry and Clare introduces the two.
Great Aunt Dulcie
Great Aunt Dulcie participated in the Abshires' Christmas dinner when Clare brings Henry to meet her
family for the first time. Henry describes Dulcie as "pink-haired and tiny."
The Abshire Family Staff
Etta works as the housekeeper for the Abshire family. She's German and runs the household like a
tight ship. Clare says, "She's really more almost our mom." Nell is the cook.
Gomez and Charisse
Gomez and Charisse have been Clare's best friends since she moved to Chicago. She describes
Gomez as "beautiful, tall and broad…large, an entirely different sort of beauty from Henry'.
Ingrid
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13. Ingrid is Henry's girlfriend before he meets Clare. Clare describes her as "blond and beautiful in a very
German way, tall and dramatic" She appears to be a bit in awe of the woman.
Celia
Celia is a friend of Ingrid, Henry's ex-girlfriend. Clare meets her for the first time during a concert at the
Aragon, shortly after she witnesses an argument between Henry and Ingrid.
Ben
Ben is one of Henry's close friends. He has been infected with HIV by his ex-boyfriend, and still
struggles with accepting his predicament. .
Helen
Helen is one Clare's oldest school friends. She's one of the girls who witnesses the Ouija board reveal
Henry as Clare's future husband.
Dr. David Kendrick and His Wife
When Henry visits Dr. Kendrick in his office for the first time, he tells him about his condition and
predicts that Kendrick will work with him in the future on finding a cure.
Dr. Amit Montague
Amit Montague becomes Clare's doctor throughout her many miscarriages and her final successful
pregnancy with Alba.
Henry's Colleagues at the Newberry Library
Matt works with Henry at the Newberry Library. Although Henry is chronically unreliable and Matt has
discovered Henry naked in the library stacks several times.
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14. Symbolism, Imagery, & Allegory
Museums - The Store Houses of Time
Since Henry was a little boy, he has loved museums. When his parents promise to take
him to the Field Museum of Natural History, he's so excited that he can't sleep the night
before, thinking about "the wonders to be seen there.
Time as a Tape Recorder
In an effort to explain to six-year-old Clare how a time traveler's life works, Henry likens
time to a tape recorder. First he describes normal life to Clare: "…you put in a tape and
you play it from beginning to the end, right?… That's how life is" Then he contrasts his
life to that first version.
Henry and Clare's Dreams
Both Henry and Clare experience very vivid dreams that provide glimpses into
suppressed hopes and fears. Not surprisingly, they precede or follow important
emotionally-charged events in their lives.
Setting
Chicago and South Haven, IL
The Meadow in South Haven
The meadow near the Abshire family home represents the cradle of Clare's relationship
with Henry. It's where she meets him for the first time when she is 6 years old and
Henry is 43. The meadow becomes their meeting place throughout Clare's childhood
and teenage years. It's where Henry and Clare share their first real kiss and where they
make love for the first time.
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15. Meadowlark House in South Haven
Housing an impressive 24 rooms and a staff of a gardener, a cook, and a housekeeper,
Meadowlark House is Clare's big family residence.
The Newberry Library in Chicago
The Newberry Library is where Clare and Henry's relationship begins in Henry's
present. In many ways, the setting acts as microcosm of Henry's daily life.
Henry and Clare's House in Chicago
After Clare complains that she has no space in their tiny apartment to work on her art,
Henry uses his time traveling skills to rig the Lottery and Clare suddenly finds herself
with $8 million to her name.
Point of view
This simply means that he can travel in time. But Henry has no control over his time
travel. It can occur at anytime, anywhere. It is actually time travel that leads him to his
wife, Clare the artist. Did I mention that Clare was only six years old when she first met
Henry? The story shows us the story from their first meeting and how they keep
reconnecting with each other throughout time. Although, it is not done in that precise
order.
Genre
Reviewers have found The Time Traveler's Wife difficult to classify generically: some
categorize it as science fiction, others as a romance. Niffenegger herself is reluctant to
label the novel, saying she "never thought of it as science fiction, even though it has a
science-fiction premise".InNiffenegger's view, the story is primarily about Henry and
Clare's relationship and the struggles they endure.
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16. The Great Gatsby
Summary
Nick Carraway, a young man from Minnesota, moves to New York in the summer of
1922 to learn about the bond business. He rents a house in the West Egg district of
Long Island, a wealthy but unfashionable area populated by the new rich, a group who
have made their fortunes too recently to have established social connections and who
are prone to garish displays of wealth. Nick’s next-door neighbor in West Egg is a
mysterious man named Jay Gatsby, who lives in a gigantic Gothic mansion and throws
extravagant parties every Saturday night.
Nick is unlike the other inhabitants of West Egg—he was educated at Yale and has
social connections in East Egg, a fashionable area of Long Island home to the
established upper class. Nick drives out to East Egg one evening for dinner with his
cousin, Daisy Buchanan, and her husband, Tom, an erstwhile classmate of Nick’s at
Yale. Daisy and Tom introduce Nick to Jordan Baker, a beautiful, cynical young woman
with whom Nick begins a romantic relationship. Nick also learns a bit about Daisy and
Tom’s marriage: Jordan tells him that Tom has a lover, Myrtle Wilson, who lives in the
valley of ashes, a gray industrial dumping ground between West Egg and New York
City. Not long after this revelation, Nick travels to New York City with Tom and Myrtle. At
a vulgar, gaudy party in the apartment that Tom keeps for the affair, Myrtle begins to
taunt Tom about Daisy, and Tom responds by breaking her nose.
As the summer progresses, Nick eventually garners an invitation to one of Gatsby’s
legendary parties. He encounters Jordan Baker at the party, and they meet Gatsby
himself, a surprisingly young man who affects an English accent, has a remarkable
smile, and calls everyone “old sport.” Gatsby asks to speak to Jordan alone, and,
through Jordan, Nick later learns more about his mysterious neighbor. Gatsby tells
Jordan that he knew Daisy in Louisville in 1917 and is deeply in love with her. He
spends many nights staring at the green light at the end of her dock, across the bay
from his mansion. Gatsby’s extravagant lifestyle and wild parties are simply an attempt
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17. to impress Daisy. Gatsby now wants Nick to arrange a reunion between himself and
Daisy, but he is afraid that Daisy will refuse to see him if she knows that he still loves
her. Nick invites Daisy to have tea at his house, without telling her that Gatsby will also
be there. After an initially awkward reunion, Gatsby and Daisy reestablish their
connection. Their love rekindled, they begin an affair.
After a short time, Tom grows increasingly suspicious of his wife’s relationship with
Gatsby. At a luncheon at the Buchanans’ house, Gatsby stares at Daisy with such
undisguised passion that Tom realizes Gatsby is in love with her. Though Tom is
himself involved in an extramarital affair, he is deeply outraged by the thought that his
wife could be unfaithful to him. He forces the group to drive into New York City, where
he confronts Gatsby in a suite at the Plaza Hotel. Tom asserts that he and Daisy have a
history that Gatsby could never understand, and he announces to his wife that Gatsby is
a criminal—his fortune comes from bootlegging alcohol and other illegal activities. Daisy
realizes that her allegiance is to Tom, and Tom contemptuously sends her back to East
Egg with Gatsby, attempting to prove that Gatsby cannot hurt him.
When Nick, Jordan, and Tom drive through the valley of ashes, however, they discover
that Gatsby’s car has struck and killed Myrtle, Tom’s lover. They rush back to Long
Island, where Nick learns from Gatsby that Daisy was driving the car when it struck
Myrtle, but that Gatsby intends to take the blame. The next day, Tom tells Myrtle’s
husband, George, that Gatsby was the driver of the car. George, who has leapt to the
conclusion that the driver of the car that killed Myrtle must have been her lover, finds
Gatsby in the pool at his mansion and shoots him dead. He then fatally shoots himself.
Nick stages a small funeral for Gatsby, ends his relationship with Jordan, and moves
back to the Midwest to escape the disgust he feels for the people surrounding Gatsby’s
life and for the emptiness and moral decay of life among the wealthy on the East Coast.
Nick reflects that just as Gatsby’s dream of Daisy was corrupted by money and
dishonesty, the American dream of happiness and individualism has disintegrated into
the mere pursuit of wealth. Though Gatsby’s power to transform his dreams into reality
is what makes him “great,” Nick reflects that the era of dreaming—both Gatsby’s dream
and the American dream—is over.
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18. Theme
On the surface, The Great Gatsby is a story of the thwarted love between a man and a
woman. The main theme of the novel, however, encompasses a much larger, less
romantic scope. Though all of its action takes place over a mere few months during the
summer of 1922 and is set in a circumscribed geographical area in the vicinity of Long
Island, New York, The Great Gatsbyis a highly symbolic meditation on 1920s America
as a whole, in particular the disintegration of the American dream in an era of
unprecedented prosperity and material excess.
Characters
. Nick Carraway
While the title The Great Gatsby might suggest that the central puzzle of this novel is
“The Great Gatsby,” we disagree. Gatsby himself is, after all, almost shockingly simple
once you.
Jay Gatsby
Origins: Jimmy GatzLong before Gatsby was “great,” he was a small town kid with big
dreams.
Daisy Buchanan
Gatsby’s entire fortune, and his entire life, really, are built upon the hope that someday
he might rekindle his old love with Daisy.
Tom Buchanan
Tom Buchanan is Daisy’s husband, an extremely wealthy man, a brute, and an athlete.
He’s selfish and does what he needs to get what he wants.
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19. Jordan Baker
Nick might end up "halfway in love" with Jordan, but he consistently describes her as
cynical, having seen too much and heard too much to be fooled by anybody.
George Wilson
Poor George. He really gets the short end of the stick in this one. And, seeing as he’s
one of the few characters without staggering flaws.
Myrtle Wilson
We get the feeling that Myrtle Wilson is not an especially smart woman. Strung along by
Tom, Myrtle is convinced that he loves her and would leave his wife for her if he could.
The whole bit about.
Meyer Wolfsheim
We don’t know a lot about Meyer Wolfsheim – and we’re not supposed to. Beyond the
fact that he’s a business associate and a friend of Gatsby’s.
Owl Eyes and Klipspringer
These two odd characters sum up two extremes of the kinds of ludicrous, hilarious,
bizarre people that populate Gatsby’s parties, drinking his liquor and gossiping about
him.
.
Symbolism, Imagery, & Allegory
Gatsby's "books"
An owl-eyed man at a Gatsby party sits in awe in the library, murmuring with
amazement that all the books on Gatsby’s shelves are "real books." But does Gatsby
even read them? The image works..
The Owl-Eyed Man
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20. Speaking of those books, what’s up with that guy in the library? We almost listed the
owl-eyed man as a character, but then we realized we know absolutely nothing about
him. Even Nick reduces...
The Eyes of Dr. T.J. Eckleburg and the Valley of Ashes Below Them
The first time we see the eyes of T.J. Eckleburg, the image is intertwined with Nick’s
description of the valley of ashes. The ashes are, as ashes tend to be, "desolate" and
"grotesque."
The Green Light
The green light on Daisy’s house that Gatsby gazes wistfully at from his own house
across the water represents the "unattainable dream." But the green light also
represents the hazy future.
Colors
Sometimes we sound like art snobs when we talk about The Great Gatsby ("Look at the
use of green! Such marvelous blues," and so forth). Honestly, it seems like there’s a
little too much color.
Setting
Long Island and New York City in the early 1920s
The story is set in New York City and on Long Island, in two areas known as "West
Egg" and "East Egg." The story is set in the early 1920s, just after World War I, during
Prohibition, a time period that outlawed the manufacture, sale, or consumption of
alcoholic beverages. This is significant not only because Gatsby’s ill-gotten wealth is
apparently due to bootlegging, but also because alcohol is conspicuously available,
despite being illegal, throughout the book. Indeed, the characters are seen drinking
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21. expensive champagne – suggesting that the wealthy are not at all affected by these
laws.
Point of View
First Person (Peripheral Narrator): Nick Carraway
The story is told in the first person, through the eyes of Nick Carraway. The primary and
most visible story is about Jay Gatsby and his devotion to his dream. Other stories, also
told through Carraway's eyes, include Tom's reconciliation with his wife Daisy, Nick's
own relationship with Jordan, and Nick's evolving friendship with Gatsby. Nick is only
able to tell these stories through his limited omniscience. At times, he is able to narrate
scenes despite not being present - but he rarely takes advantage of this fact. Although
the story is told in the first person, Nick Carraway is able to easily become part of the
wallpaper. His major character trait - reserving judgment - allows him to be almost an
"invisible" narrator, similar to a traditional third-person omniscient point of view.
Ultimately, however, if we lost Nick's point-of-view, we would never understand the
evolution of his character. He is the invisible man until the end of the book, when
suddenly, he has opinions about everybody.
Genre
Literary Fiction, Modernism
Almost anything on the Shmoop module list would probably fit under the category of
"literary fiction": it's an umbrella term for a story or novel that focuses more on character
development and style than on page-turning plots. And it's this kind of fiction that you
usually read for school: books that provoke discussion over what it all means (Life, the
Universe, and Everything).
Tone
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22. Cynical, Ironic
Nick is one cynical little cookie. Even though Nick reserves explicit judgment on the
characters, Fitzgerald still manages to implicitly criticize through his narrator's tone.
Invisible Man
Summary
Invisible Man is autobiographically narrated in the first person by the protagonist, an
unnamed African American man who considers himself socially invisible. Ellison
conceived his narrator as a spokesman for black Americans of the time:
So my task was one of revealing the human universals hidden within the plight of
one who was both black and American...[9]
Ellison struggled to find a style appropriate to his vision. Wanting to avoid writing
"nothing more than another novel of racial protest," he settled on a narrator "who
had been forged in the underground of American experience and yet managed to
emerge less angry than ironic." To this end, he modeled his narrator after the
nameless narrator of Dostoevsky's Notes From the Underground, which similarly
applies irony and paradox toward far-reaching social criticism.[10]
The story is told from the narrator's present, looking back into his past. Thus, the
narrator has hindsight in how his story is told, as he is already aware of the
outcome.
In the Prologue, Ellison's narrator tells readers, "I live rent-free in a building rented
strictly to whites, in a section of the basement that was shut off and forgotten during
the nineteenth century." In this secret place, the narrator creates surroundings that
are symbolically illuminated with 1,369 lights from the electric company
Monopolated Light & Power. He says, "My hole is warm and full of light. Yes, full of
light. I doubt if there is a brighter spot in all New York than this hole of mine, and I do
not exclude Broadway." The protagonist explains that light is an intellectual
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23. necessity for him since "the truth is the light and light is the truth." From this
underground perspective, the narrator attempts to make sense out of his life,
experiences, and position in American society.
Themes
Identity
Identity in Invisible Man is a conflict between self-perception and the projection of
others, as seen through one man's story: the nameless narrator. His true identity, he
realizes.
Race
While most the narrator's difficulties throughout the novel are associated with his race,
Invisible Man is a novel aimed at transcending race and all the other ways humanity has
used to categorize..
Lies and Deceit
Invisible Man is about the process of overcoming deceptions and illusions to reach truth.
(One of the most important truths in the book is that the narrator is invisible to those
around him.)
Ideology
Invisible Man promotes a political philosophy of appealing to the emotional individual. It
rejects all forms of ideology, arguing that ideology misses the trees for the forest, so to
speak .
Memory and the Past
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24. Most of Invisible Man takes place in the narrator's memory, which inherently brings up
issues of how well memory works – in other words, the nameless narrator character is
choosing specific.
Power
Power infuses nearly all of the relationships depicted in Invisible Man. More specifically,
white male power threads its way throughout the novel. Even in situations where there
are no white males.
Admiration
Admiration is particularly salient towards the beginning of Invisible Man, when
thenarrator takes Dr. Bledsoe and Mr. Norton to be role models. By the end of the
novel.
Ambition
In Invisible Man, admiration tends to fuel ambition. As the narrator admires Dr. Bledsoe,
so his ambition is to one day serve as Bledsoe's assistant.
Love
Love is notable in Invisible Man because of its absence throughout most of the novel.
The narrator rejects it because it would interfere with his ambitions.
Women and Femininity
In Invisible Man, the situation of white women is drawn parallel to that of black men –
both are oppressed by white male society.
Characters
Narrator
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25. Throughout the course of the novel, our nameless narrator is mistaken for a reverend, a
pimp, a gambler, a fink, a unionist, a Southern Negro, a New York Negro, a rapist, a
lover, a doctor, and a gangster.
Dr. Bledsoe
Dr. Bledsoe is the president of the narrator's college, and the narrator looks up to him
until he turns out to be a big phony.
Mr. Norton
A wealthy white man who helped found the narrator's college, Mr. Norton is described
by the narrator as a "symbol of the Great Traditions.
Brother Jack
Brother Jack, our main contact with the Brotherhood is a pretty mysterious character. A
white male.
Brother Tod Clifton
When we meet Brother Tod Clifton, he at first seems like a possible rival for the narrator
– he's young, bright, good-looking, and has been working for the Brotherhood for three
years.
Ras the Exhorter
Ras the Exhorter is a "mahn" (as he puts it) from the West Indies. He is a black
nationalist and strongly opposed to Brotherhood activities.
Sybil
Sybil has basically one scene in the entire novel, but boy, is it intense. Drunken Sybil
wants to be raped by a black man, and it somehow comes across as touchingly
vulnerable.
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26. Trueblood
A poor, uneducated black man who lives on the outskirts of the narrator's college
campus, Trueblood fits the negative black stereotype to a tee – and is amply rewarded.
Rev. Barbee
Reverend Barbee is a religious man from Chicago who details the Founder and Dr.
Bledsoe's quests to found the college.
Emerson
The son of a wealthy white man, Emerson is the only white guy in the novel who seems
to genuinely care about racial progress and helping the narrator.
Mary Rambo
A kind and motherly woman who sees plenty of potential for the narrator to contribute to
racial progress, her only flaw, as far as the narrator is concerned, is that she talks too
much.
Rinehart
OK. So the real Rinehart never actually appears in the novel. Details, details. After the
narrator dons some colored glasses and a hat, just about everyone in Harlem begins
mistaking him .
Brother Hambro
In Chapter 23, we finally meet the man responsible for the narrator's training. Brother
Hambro turns out to be a tall lawyer who (no surprise here) thinks in incredibly
macroscopic terms.
Symbolism, Imagery & Allegory
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27. Liberty Paints
The narrator's first job is in a highly patriotic paint company most famous for its Optic
White paint color.
Vision and Sight
When there's a lot of talk about eyeballs in a book called Invisible Man, you know
something's up with sight.
Sambo Doll
When the narrator further examines the paper doll that Clifton was selling, he realizes
that Clifton controlled the doll with a thin black string that was invisible to the audience.
The Battle Royal Briefcase
We think it's symbolic that the narrator receives the briefcase as a naïve kid, and then
hangs onto it for the rest of the novel.
Setting
The American South and Harlem, New York in the late 1930s
The narrator is born and raised in the American South, only to wind up in the New York
City neighborhood of Harlem, which is a major center of African-American culture. The
narrator finds the contrast between the North and the South incredible – he is amazed
to find white drivers obeying the directives of a black policeman, on the subway he
stresses out about being in close proximity to a white woman, and in the diner he
wonders if it's insulting to tip a white waiter. In the North, then, the narrator experiences
a certain amount of unprecedented racial freedom.
Point of view
First Person (Central Narrator)
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28. The invisible man is our narrator throughout the entire novel, sandwiching the bulk of his
story with a prologue and epilogue from his manhole. Since we hear his story from his
point of view, we can't be sure whether all the memories are entirely factual. Instead, we
understand the story to be his perception; he is speaking out about his experiences and,
as he says in the epilogue, hopefully shedding light on things we might not have
realized, or perhaps helping us feel more connected with similar experiences. Even
though the story is told with other readers in mind, this is very much our narrator's show
– it's his personal development that we witness, and no one else's. This treatment of
other characters actually mirrors the way he himself has been treated; aside from the
narrator, everyone in Invisible Man is pretty one-dimensional. Instead of complex
individuals, we have set types: a member of the black establishment, a wealthy white
philanthropist, a black nationalist, a utopian visionary, and so on.
Genre
Literary Fiction, Coming-of-Age, African-American Literature
Invisible Man is literary fiction because of its in-depth exploration of one man's psyche
and its innovative style.
Tone
Frank, Thoughtful
The narrator tells it like it is – or, at least, how he perceives it. And although his story
could easily have degenerated into a sob story of racial injustice, anger, and hate, the
narrator's frank and thoughtful tone allows for a more reflective edge to the story. It
probably helps that he's telling his story from hibernation, allowing him to capture the
truth to the moments in his life.
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29. The Metamorphosis
Summary
Gregor wakes up one morning to discover that he's become a "monstrous vermin" .As
he struggles to come to terms with his new body, he realizes that he's late for his job as
a traveling salesman. First his mother, then his father and sister, knock on his bedroom
door in an effort to get him out of bed. His supervisor, the office manager, arrives to
inquire about his absence. With his parents pleading with the office manager outside his
bedroom door and his sister sobbing in another room, Gregor manages to crawl to his
bedroom door, open it, and reveal to everyone his shocking new form. His mother
collapses, and the office manager runs out of the apartment in horror. His father grabs a
newspaper and the office manager's cane and chases Gregor around the living room.
Gregor finally manages to crawl back to his bedroom door, but he gets stuck. His father
firmly shoves him into the room and closes the door behind him.
Perplexed and horrified by Gregor's new body, both Gregor and the family settle into a
routine in the following weeks and months. While Gregor gets to know the capabilities of
his new body – and his new taste for rotten foods – Grete, his sister, becomes his
primary caretaker, feeding him twice a day and cleaning his room.
One day, Grete discovers that Gregor enjoys crawling all around the room, including
over the walls and the ceilings. Grete and the mother proceed to move the furniture out
of Gregor's room to give him more space to roam. While up to this point Gregor has
hidden himself whenever anyone walks into the room, he plants himself on top of a
picture on the wall in an effort to express his wish that the furniture remains in his room.
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30. When the women return to the room, the mother sees Gregor and faints. Grete runs into
the living room to get the mother some spirits, and Gregor follows. When Grete turns,
she is startled by Gregor and runs back into Gregor's room. Flustered, Gregor scurries
around the living room until he plops onto the table in the middle of the living room,
exhausted.
After a brief while, the father returns home. Grete explains what has happened. The
father, infuriated, chases Gregor around the living room and throws apples at him. One
apple lodges into Gregor's back, paralyzing him. Suddenly, the mother runs from the
room and begs the father to spare Gregor.
It takes a month for Gregor to heal from his wound. The door to Gregor's room is left
open in the early evenings so that he can witness the family's nightly routine. While the
father dozes in his bank messenger's uniform in a chair, the mother sews lingerie and
Grete studies shorthand and French. The family hires a new cleaning woman, an old
widow, who regularly chats with Gregor, much to Gregor's dismay. The family also takes
in three boarders to make ends meet.
One night, the boarders invite Grete to play violin for them in the main room. Gregor is
enthralled with Grete's playing, and creeps out into the middle of the room, in full view of
all the spectators. At first amused, then horrified, the boarders declare that they intend
to move out the next day without paying any rent. After the boarders retreat, the family
confers. Grete insists that Gregor must be gotten rid of at all costs. Gregor, who is at
this point still lying in the middle of the room, makes his way back into his room.
Famished, exhausted, and depressed, Gregor dies early the next morning.
A few hours later, the cleaning woman discovers Gregor's corpse and announces his
death to the family. After kicking out the boarders, the family decides to take a day off
and take the trolley out into the country.
Themes
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31. Man and the Natural World
If human beings are traditionally distinguished from animals by their capacity for
thought, language, and social feeling, how do we categorize Gregor, who seems to
exhibit all of these human capacity.
Life, Consciousness, and Existence
Much of The Metamorphosis is spent in Gregor's head as he struggles to come to terms
with his new form. At times he seems to be able to think abstractly about his condition
(as an insect) in ways ..
Morality and Ethics
Forgive the short dip into Philosophy 101 here, but we promise – it'll pay off in the end.
A major German Enlightenment philosopher by the name of Immanuel Kant came up
with the ethical principles.
Transformation
By starting out with Gregor's metamorphosis into a bug, The Metamorphosis plays
around with some interesting questions as to the significance of transformation. We're
never told exactly how or why...
Identity
Gregor's transformation into a giant bug touches on larger issues of identity for himself
and his family.
Isolation
Early in The Metamorphosis, we learn that Gregor dearly wishes to quit his job and be
free of his family obligations.
Family
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32. Kafka's Metamorphosis toys with the traditional family structure where the father is at
the head. Instead, the story begins with Gregor, the son, as the sole provider and the
father as a weak,..
Society and Class
Kafka's stories are known for their exploration of the nightmare of bureaucracy and the
dehumanizing effects of modern life – all of those things we think of when we use the
term "kafka-esque...
Characters
GregorSamsa
Let's take a look at two ordinary young men. Both of them are hardly chick magnets.
Neither of them is particularly witty, smart, or rich – in fact, they're kind of wimpy.
However, both of them.
Grete Samsa
The first time Grete, Gregor's sister, appears in the story, we don't see her. Like the
other family members, she's just a voice behind a wall, trying to get Gregor to open up
his bedroom door.
Mr. Samsa
Mr. Samsa, Gregor's father, looms as a domineering figure in the novel. With Gregor
incapacitated, Mr. Samsa can no longer malinger as a helpless invalid…
Mrs. Samsa
Mrs. Samsa is the sympathetic yin to Mr. Samsa's domineering yang. She's constantly
proclaiming her maternal love for her poor, poor son Gregor .
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33. The Cleaning Woman
The cleaning woman seems to be a relatively minor character in the novel. In Part 3 she
comes sweeping in, taking a job that no one else wants.
The Middle Boarder
The middle boarder appears to be the leader of the three boarders who room at the
Samsas' home.
The Other Two Boarders
The other two boarders don't do much except nod and follow the middle boarder's lead.
They're the Oates to his Hall, the Garfunkel to his Simon, the other two Supremes to his
Diana Ross.
The Office Manager
The office manager makes a brief appearance in the beginning of the story. He's really
only in the story so that we can hear some of the rumors about Gregor's misbehavior
and his possible misuse .
The Maid
Before the cleaning woman arrives, the Samsas have a maid, a frightened young
woman who spends most of the time locked in the kitchen.
Symbolism, Imagery & Allegory
The Vermin
You could say the entire story is an allegory. After all, the setting seems so ordinary that
it's tempting to see Gregor's transformation as a symbolic one, rather than an actual
one. Maybe he's on...
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34. Religious Imagery
While religion doesn't play a huge part in the story, there are some religious elements
sprinkled here and there. Some critics argue that Kafka chose the German word for
vermin –
The Picture Frame
For a discussion of the photograph of the lady in furs, check out the theme "Morality and
Ethics." But let's talk about the frame around the photograph. That's right – the frame.
When we see...
Setting
The Samsas' Apartment
The story doesn't give us a specific geographical location or historical date. With the
exception of the very last paragraph, where the Samsas take a trip out to the country, all
of the action takes place in the Samsas' apartment. The apartment overlooks a busy city
street, and a hospital is across the way within viewing distance from Gregor's window.
(The story doesn't mention whether anyone can look in. Pity the poor convalescent who
looks out his or her hospital window to see Gregor twitching across the way.) It is ironic
that the Samsas can be so centrally located without attracting more attention to the fact
that there is an extraordinarily large bug living in their apartment.
The apartment itself is modest. Sandwiched between his parents' room and Grete's,
Gregor's room opens out onto the living room. By confining all the action to the
apartment, the story highlights Gregor's isolation from human society.
Point of view
Third Person/Limited Omniscient
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35. The story is mainly told through the perspective of GregorSamsa, as if the narrator were
planted with Gregor's human consciousness inside Gregor's insect body. We discover
aspects of Gregor's body as he himself discovers them. If he itches, we don't know why
until he looks to see what's making him itch. If he's hungry, we don't know what he likes
to eat until he discovers his preference for rotten foods. The narrator does break out of
Gregor's perspective on occasion and weaves into the minds of other characters, most
notably in the last few paragraphs of the story after Gregor dies.
Genre
Magical Realism, Modernism
Written in 1912 and published in 1915, Kafka's Metamorphosis falls squarely in the
genre of Modernist fiction. The fate of Gregor, lonely traveling salesman, expresses the
common Modernist concern with the alienating effects of modern society. Like other
Modernist works, the story uses the stream-of-consciousness technique to reflect the
psychological complexity of its main character. Kafka's novella is also notable as a
modern work of magical realism with its juxtaposition of fantastic occurrences – the
guy's a bug – in a realistic setting.
Tone
Dispassionate
A really famous writer, James Joyce, once said that a novelist shouldn't make his
opinions known in fiction: he should remain disinterested, as if he were standing outside
his creation "paring his fingernails" (source). Reading The Metamorphosis, you get the
sense that Kafka has some pretty well-manicured nails. The story itself is sensational,
absurd, grotesque – but the actual tone of the story is about as dispassionate as an
article in The International Journal of Electrical Engineering.
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