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Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Analysis

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 A reviewer from  Kirkus Reviews  calls the story “superb,” and R. Z. Sheppard, in a review for  magazine, specifically praises the character Beale: “In ‘Someone to Talk To,’ a journalist who won’t stop gabbing about himself long enough to ask a question is worthy of Evelyn Waugh.” Gail Caldwell of the  Boston Globe , however,…

Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Setting

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 Guatemala Though other Central American governments have mounted violent counterinsurgency campaigns, the description of the Indians’ persecution in “Someone to Talk To” bears a strong resemblance to the history of Guatemala in the 1980s. Though the Guatemalan army had used death squads to quash insurgents since the 1960s, the slaughter of political dissidents and their…

Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Literary Devices

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 Point of View  “Someone to Talk To” is written in the third person limited omniscient; however, because the reader has access to only Aaron Shapiro’s thoughts and emotions, and no one else’s, the effect is similar to that of a first-person narrative. This is important, because otherwise readers would not experience the psychological upheaval that…

Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Themes

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 Loneliness and the Need to Be Heard  The main character of “Someone to Talk To,” Aaron Shapiro, is coping with the departure of his live-in girlfriend of six years. In addition, he is far from home, in an unfamiliar country torn by years of civil war. As the story progresses and the reader learns more…

Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Characters

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 Beale  Later that evening, Shapiro performs the concerto at the acoustically challenged hall. When he had performed the piece seventeen years earlier, his performance was described as “ affirming .” Now, in this hall, though he does his best, “it had simply sat over them all—a great, indestructible, affirming block of suet.” Outside the hall…

Someone to Talk To by Deborah Eisenberg – Summary

Posted on October 5, 2022October 5, 2022 by JL Admin

 The story begins as Caroline, Aaron Shapiro’s live-in girlfriend of six years, is leaving him for another man (identified only as “Jim”). She leaves him with both a broken heart and her cat, ironically named Lady Chatterley (“Jim, evidently, was allergic”). As she walks out the door, she tells Aaron, “I’ll always care about you,…

Paris 1991 – Analysis

Posted on September 30, 2022September 30, 2022 by JL Admin

 In her short story “Paris 1991,” Kate Walbert immediately contrasts light and dark. The story opens with Rebecca’s arrival by plane “into the city of light [where] she descends in darkness.” This first juxtaposition of light and dark imagery illustrates the tension between illusion and reality in the story, as Rebecca’s fanciful imagination clashes with…

Paris 1991 – Setting

Posted on September 30, 2022September 30, 2022 by JL Admin

 A Woman’s Place and Purpose  During the first few decades of the twentieth century, feminist thinkers on both sides of the Atlantic engaged in a rigorous investigation of female identity as it related to all aspects of women’s lives. Some criticized the institution of marriage, identifying patterns and inequities within the traditional sex roles arrangement…

Paris 1991 – Literary Devices

Posted on September 30, 2022September 30, 2022 by JL Admin

 Imagery  Walbert uses selected images to convey a scene, focusing on certain details to describe a street or view through a window. Her style is reminiscent of the Imagists, including Ezra Pound and Amy Lowell, a group of American and British poets in the second decade of the twentieth century who were noted for the…

Paris 1991 – Themes

Posted on September 30, 2022September 30, 2022 by JL Admin

 Self-fulfillment  Although readers do not get many details about Marion’s life, Rebecca suggests that her mother experienced the same kind of discontentment as does she. When she buys the devil postcard, Rebecca implies that Marion lived vicariously though her daughter’s travels, ones that she, as a married woman during the 1950s and 1960s in the…

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