Pivotal Moment

pg. 178 "Dear God, That's it, say Shug. Pack your stuff. You coming back to Tennessee with me. But I feels daze. My daddy lynch. My mama crazy... You must be sleep."

My initial reaction to the letter Celie read from Nettie indicating that "Pa is not our pa!" startled me so much that my mind starting racing backwards remembering all that had previously happened. And then I turned the page to one of the most significant chapters- short and sweet. Celie writes her shortest letter to God yet. Her short, choppy syntax depict perfectly the chaos and daze she finds herself in. Again, Walker throws a curve ball! Shug's demand that she pack her stuff offers a subtle foreshadow to an event that might alter the course of the story...

pg. 202 "You a lowdown dog is what's wrong, I say. It's time to leave you and enter into the Creation. And your dead body just the welcome mat I need."

As Shug announces Celie's departure, I imagine the shock that hovered in Odessa's dining room. This scene is the climax of the story for several reasons. First, Shug gets her way. A woman whose determination and strong will often gets the best of her, she helps liberate Celie from her devastating life with Mr. ____. Second, this is the first time Celie stands up for herself to any man. Through this declaration, theme also comes forth. It is in leaving her current life that she can truly enter into creation. Creation doesn't necessarily mean God's world but all the beauty there is to behold which she's missed over the years due to being under a man's thumb.

A Star-Shaped Hole

First off, O'Brien starts the chapter "The Man I Killed" with a long sentence, depicting a gruesome image of a dead man. The syntax can be connected to The Sun Also Rises when Hemingway used long sentences to show guilt of Jake Barnes; O'Brien may have been feeling similar guilt.

The unwavering image of the dead man's "one eye shut, the other a star shaped hole" reoccurs during several instances throughout the rest of the book (pages 118, 120, 124 127). The image is used as a motif, as a constant reminder of the image O'Brien can't shake of the dead Vietnamese man. Another motif O'Brien uses is the colors red and yellow. He uses it when describing on page 104 "the panes dancing in bright reds and yellows..." where Mary Anne was hiding out with the Greenies. And then again on page 120: "The star-shaped hole was red and yellow." These colors seem to come up when crazy things are happening in the book: Mary Anne changed to the point of no return, O'Brien killed a man.

Fight and Flight

Chapter 26 immediately begins with a bad omen: "In the morning it was raining. A fog had come over the mountains from the sea... The plateau was dull and gloomy, and the shapes of the trees and the houses were changed." All of the diction in this weather description indicates bad things to come. As the day progresses and the chapters proceed, we find ourselves reading about Vicente Girones who was killed during the bull run by a bull who was eventually killed by Romero... the bad omen doesn't let us down! Cohn later beats up Romero, who has the final fight the next day. Jealousy takes over Cohn, and after he hurts Romero significantly, he flees! We don't hear from Cohn the rest of the novel (which in my opinion is a relief!).

On page 222, there is one large exaggerated sentence describing the actions of Romero with his bull before he kills it in the center of the ring. The length of the sentence depicts the smooth, yet exaggerated nature of bull-fighters as they dodge the bulls. Parallelism comes into play as Romero kills the bull "that had sprinted out and killed the man in the morning running" (pg 223). As Romero defeats this bull, his actions are paralleled with the fight he had earlier with Cohn. "The fight with Cohn had not touched [Romero's] spirit but his face had been smashed and his body hurt."

The gloomy weather lingers over the deaths of bulls and men in the run of the last day of the fiesta.

Power of Prayer

With all the references to the Catholic Church, Hemingway is trying to get a point across. For the most part, he thinks some people who call themselves "Catholic" are jokes. As it is constantly discussed, dislike of the church is a common theme throughout the novel. The character Jake is one of those people who calls himself Catholic, but when it comes down to it, he can't "walk the walk." The first night in Spain, Jake finds himself in a cathedral where he begins to pray for everyone he thought of. The syntax changes during his prayer; the sentence drags on as Jake's thoughts shift from topic to topic, seemingly unable to stay in prayer. The length of the sentence enables readers to see the guilt Jake feels for his inability to pray and being "a rotten Catholic." Along with guilt, Jake is feeling sleepy, so his thoughts seem endless and random. He's shameful that he doesn't feel religious when he prays (pgs. 102-103). On page 129, Bill asks Jake if he's really Catholic, as if the answer will effect their friendship. Jake response is simple, but speaks volume: "Technically." How many people today would come up with the same answer!? I believe Hemingway is incorporating his feelings into Jake's character: although we may call ourselves Catholic, it is often difficult to live out that lifestyle in the world and customs that surround us.