ENG 263: The Love Story

Amy Hempel’s “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried” uses gallows humor to enforce the tragedy of the situation the narrator and her friend are in. Gallows humor is always about very unpleasant or serious circumstances, such as death, war, disease, or crime. In this story, the characters use it to deal with the reality inevitable death of […]

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The introduction of these useless facts makes me believe the author included these to tell us that the main characters are not exactly right in the head. The inclusion of the camera in the room made the setting seem like some kind of asylum for the insane and not just a typical hospital in which […]

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Write a love story that includes a scene prompted by one of these images. The story — double-spaced, in 12-pt. Times or Times New Roman font — is due Tuesday, September 20, and should be placed in the Exercise 3 folder on Google Drive. The document should be saved as a Word document and should […]

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Brown’s “Postman” follows Henry, an adolescent boy forced to work at his aunt and uncle’s horse camp during the summer.  Following Henry throughout the story is interesting.  While the story is not written in first person, Brown perfectly places the reader in the head of a boy who moving out of his “ew girls are […]

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I feel like it’s repetitive, or an obvious thing to mention when talking about craft, but the descriptions in “Postman” can simply not be overlooked. Brown uses similes throughout the story as a way to accomplish this, but she does so while avoiding cliche. Two of my favorite examples are the line about the girls […]

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But still he sought her out, he knew he did, catching sight of her and her wild hair like a freakish white crown and waiting to see what she would do next. While entering into the deteriorating caravan, Henry’s Aunt loses her footing; “but Henry’s hands had already flown up, ready to catch her,” (pg. […]

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The story “Postman” is about a boy and his daily life helping at a pony farm owned by his uncle and aunt. The story is also about Henry’s developing sexuality as he shares his days with the girl riders of the farm. Brown explores the theme of blossoming sexuality by utilizing the ten-year-old character, Nicola. Nicola, […]

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In the short story “Burning Bright” Ron Rash is very effective at describing the characters and the events of the story by showing instead of telling. When he does make direct statements, he is sure to then prove the statements later on in the story. This is very effective because it immerses the reader in […]

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Brown’s “Postman” contains a multitude of intimate details that help show the evolving relationship between the girls at the pony camp and Henry. Initially Henry laments at having to help his aunt and uncle at the camp. His first plan was work at an auto shop “retooling motorcycles” but the owner, having little money to […]

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Disclaimer: I did not just notice the first line because it was underlined. Disclaimer 2: Really not sure what to do with/think about this story. Maybe it is a cliché to put so much pressure on an opening line, and maybe at this point in my “writing career” I need to know if it really […]

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