Resurrection Resurrection means to rise from the dead or to revive. Resurrection is the narrator’s primary theme in “Fish.” Many of the narrator’s memories over the course of the story are concerned with little moments in which resurrection has occurred or nearly occurred, for example, the father’s birth a year after his stillborn brother; his…
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Fish by Jill McCorkle – Characters
Father The narrator has two dreams about her father after he dies. First, she dreams that she has put his limp body on a swing, tying his arms to the chains to hold him in place. She is a kid, and he is wearing a robe and slippers. People pass by and tell her that…
Fish by Jill McCorkle – Summary
“Fish” begins with news that a man, sixty-four years old, has just found out that he is dying. The cause—whether cancer or something else—is never given. Family and friends gather to comfort the man, including a woman who nursed him back from pneumonia when he was two years old. She saved him then but cannot…
The English Pupil – Analysis
Reviewers were generous in their praise of Barrett’s collection of eight short stories, Ship Fever and Other Stories (1996), in which “The English Pupil” appeared. Donna Seaman in Booklist comments that Barrett “has used science as a conduit to understanding the human psyche. . . . [Her] stories are precise and concentrated, containing a truly…
The English Pupil – Setting
The Life and Work of Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus was born in 1707 in Sweden. His father was a Lutheran minister. Even as a child, Linnaeus was interested in botany. At the age of five, he looked after his own garden. As a young man, he studied medicine and natural history at the University of…
The English Pupil – Literary Devices
Imagery of the Natural World The Linnaeus of the story has loved the natural world so much that it has embedded itself in his thinking and the way he uses language. When he expresses his thoughts to himself or when the narrator explains his state of mind, it is through metaphors and similes drawn from…
The English Pupil – Themes
Age and Youth, Present and Past There are a series of contrasts in the story between age and youth, present and past, death and life. Linnaeus is bitterly and painfully aware of these two sets of opposing realities, and he attempts to bridge the gap between them. The contrasts bring out the irony of Linnaeus’s…
The English Pupil – Characters
Pehr Artedi Pehr Artedi was a friend of Linnaeus’s youth who became known for his study of fishes. He drowned in a canal in Amsterdam after a night of drinking. Linnaeus edited his book about fish. Falck Falck was a Linnaeus apostle. Linnaeus thinks he sees him standing by the fire. Named in the story…
The English Pupil – Summary
“The English Pupil” begins outside the town of Uppsala, Sweden, on a very cold late December afternoon in 1777. Carl Linnaeus, the famous naturalist, who is now seventy years old and dying, is riding in a horse-drawn sleigh. He orders his coachman to take him to his country estate, Hammarby, which lies beyond city limits….
The Canal by Richard Yates – Analysis
During his lifetime, Richard Yates was read and respected by other writers to a much greater degree than he was read by the general public. His 1961 novel, Revolutionary Road , sold well, and over the years, it continued to be widely known, mostly due to its being assigned in literature classes. But from 1961…