ENG1501 Short Story Analysis

ENG1501 Short Story Analysis ‘Supermarket Soliloquy’ by Moira Crosbie Lovell Think about before reading the short story 1. Look up the word ‘soliloquy’ online or in a dictionary and write down its meaning. What does this make you think the story will be about? 2. Read the story twice and summarise what happens in it in in no more than four sentences. 3. Underline any words that you do not understand and look up what they mean online or in a dictionary. Write down the words and their meanings. Close reading Narration 1. Read the first four paragraphs of the story again. The fourth paragraph is one line long and reads: ‘Just like life’. This is the key to understanding what this story is about: the narrator compares a visit to the supermarket to different experiences in life. 2. Identify the kind of narrator used and justify your answer. Write a paragraph in which you explain the effect of this kind of narration. Plot and setting 1.The plot in this story is unusual. What is more important: the action that takes place or the thoughts of the narrator? Write a paragraph in which you explain your answer. 2. The title of the short story gives a very clear indication of where the story is set. Write a paragraph in which you explain how significant the setting is to the story’s overall meaning. Symbolism In the following sections, we are going to look at a few examples of the extended metaphor in the story in detail but there are other examples that we are not going to cover here. Find these on your own and make sure that you understand them. 1. Read the extract below carefully: As you move towards the cheese trough, you catch a glimpse of yourself in an unexpected mirror. You have an urge to charge it with gross misrepresentation. A distortion of yourself leers up at you as you lean over. Your face is a creased feta cheese white. 1.1 What literally happens in this section? Explain it in your own words. 1.2 The last sentence in the section is a metaphor. Explain the effect of the metaphor (i.e. what is being compared to what? What do these things have in common? What is the effect of this?). 2. Read the following paragraph which comes directly after the one quoted above: Other cheeses present a range of past complexions; chubby, baby-smooth Mozzarella; frecklefaced Pepato; bride-white Camembert; tanned Red Cheshire; jaundiced Cheddar. You cast a furtive eye on the blue-veined Gorgonzola up ahead and settle, after all, for the feta. 2.1. The words in bold are different kinds of cheeses. Look up pictures of each of these cheeses online if you do not know what they look like. 2.2 Now look up online or in a dictionary what the word ‘complexion’ means, if you have not already done so. 2.3 Think about the words used to describe each of the cheeses: ‘baby-smooth’; ‘frecklefaced’; ‘bride-white’; ‘tanned’; ‘jaundiced’. What figure of speech is being used here? Write a paragraph in which you explain the effect. (Think back to the narrator’s statement, ‘Just like life’.) 2.4 Why do you think the narrator chooses the feta cheese after all? Write a paragraph in which you explain your answer. To answer this question, you need to think carefully about the progression in the description above (from ‘baby-smooth’ to ‘jaundiced’). Consider what you think the ‘blue-veined Gorgonzola could represent