“A Day in the Dark” was first published in the jour Botteghe Oscure in 1955. It appeared in Mademoiselle magazine in 1957 and then became the title story in Bowen’s 1965 collection of short stories. In a review of that collection, F. L. H. Jr. praises Bowen’s detailed descriptions of setting, concluding that “Miss Bowen…
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A Day in the Dark – Story – Setting
The Decline of the Big Houses At the end of the story, Bowen uses setting details to further illuminate Barbie’s transition. She becomes as powerless as the paper boat the river carries away, “traveling at uncertain speed on the current, list[ing] as it vanished under the bridge.” She does not have “the heart to wonder…
A Day in the Dark – Story – Literary Devices
Point of View In his review of A Day in the Dark , Edwin Morgan writes, “in this rich selection of her short stories the communication is often an ambiguity or a mystery which the imagination of the reader must try to unravel or complete.” One way Bowen accomplishes this is by relating the plot…
A Day in the Dark – Story – Themes
Innocence and Experience In “Day in the Dark,” Bowen presents a version of the conflict between innocence and experience. The innocents in the story are not necessarily pure, and the experienced become sinister. Barbie arrives at Miss Banderry’s with an innocent heart, firmly believing that her love for her uncle is above reproach. But during…
A Day in the Dark – Story – Characters
Miss Banderry Given the status her family once held in the town of Moher, Miss Banderry is most likely Anglo-Irish, a group in Ireland that made up the governing class. Her family was in the milling business and owned a profitable farm nearby. After her brother lost control of the family mills, she gained ownership…
A Day in the Dark – Story – Summary
“A Day in the Dark” is set in Moher, a town on the west coast of Ireland. The story is narrated by Barbie, who looks back on herself as a fifteen year-oldgirl and begins this story with a description of a row of houses under the bridge and the center of her town—its intermingling of…
Aftermath by Mary Yukari Waters – Analysis
Like many of the stories in Waters’s acclaimed collection The Laws of Evening , “Aftermath” focuses on the life of an individual dealing with post–World War II conditions in Japan. The protagonist, Makiko, is a young widow whose husband has been killed while fighting the Allied forces during the war, and the plot is driven…
Aftermath by Mary Yukari Waters – Setting
Although Waters published “Aftermath” in 2001, the work is set in Japan right after the end of World War II. On August 14, 1945, following several military defeats and the United States’ dropping of an atomic bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan’s emperor Hirohito surrendered unconditionally to the Allied powers, which…
Aftermath by Mary Yukari Waters – Literary Devices
Setting The short story takes place in Kyoto, Japan, shortly after the end of World War II. When the story opens, Toshi is playing dodge-ball in a city park called Imamiya, and other scenes in the story take place in Makiko and Toshi’s home and on the grounds of the Tanabata Day festival in the…
Aftermath by Mary Yukari Waters – Themes
Memory One of the major themes of the story is memory, particularly how memory influences the present and how individuals hold onto and let go of memories. The main character Makiko is preoccupied with retaining memories of the pre-war years, and she tries to recall specific events and feelings from the time her husband was…