Text analysis “Three men in the boat”
I’d like to tell you about my analysis of the story “Three men in the boat”. It is a very interesting story written by Jerome K. Jerome. He is one of the popular and well-known English authors. He is famous for writing essays, short stories, and novels. Especially, he is famous for his special humor, all his stories are based on that sparkling manner of writing.
The story "Three men in the boat" by Jerome K.Jerome presents that three men with a dog stayed at the village. The action centers after their decision to stay at one of the shiplake islands for a night. Then, they decided to make a supper, using all the ingredients and remains of food they have. The initial paragraph shows how they'd finished cooking. The last paragraph describes that they've enjoyed an excellent supper. Text is divided into four sections. The climax of the story is episode when dog brings a water-rat and friends decided whether they will put it in the Irish stew or not.
The main character of the story is George. In my opinion, he is very experienced and educated man, because he’ll find a way to solve all the problems, and he knows how to behave in any kind of situation. George is leader, he makes decisions and his friends follow him. Through the story I noticed: “George said”, “George did something”. Also, he is brave but on the other hand prefers to be on the safe side and “not try experiments”, he is careful. George is very economical.
The main theme of the story, in my opinion, is “three friends’ supper”, and the idea of the story is “extraordinary solving of the friends’ problem”. Actually, this phrase from the text may also show the idea: “I don’t think I ever enjoyed a meal more. There was something so fresh and piquant about it. ..Here was a dish with a taste like nothing else on earth.” It means their great success in cooking supper. The mood in the story is rather emotional and ironic, realistic. In some parts its cheerful, in some – quite and restful, lyrical for example in describing nature. Tonality in the story is very enthusiastic, rather bright and emotional.
Now I’d like to tell you about the realization of the idea on different levels. As for the choice of words, in this text author uses more bookish words, than colloquial. In the beginning, in the description of Sonning author uses bookish words to create the mood (for example: undertaking). He also uses colloquial words in the description of cooking process (get rid of, etc). Choice of vocabulary tells us about the characters of the story.
To express the idea, author uses many stylistic devices such as irony – because he wants to show humorous situations; metaphors, such as fairy-like nook, extraordinary shape, smothered in roses; epithet, for example, sweet Sonning; and zeugma – scraping potatoes/scraping ourselves. The story is full of funny comic situations, and he uses these stylistic devices to make them brighter. These devices help reader to understand the main idea of the text better.
All in all, the text presents that you can do something good even if you are not sure, you must try something new. As for my impression, after reading this story I realized, that before having something one should make it. So, I guess Jerome K. Jerome gives a wise lesson to his readers. I recommend this interesting story to everyone.
Angel Pavement
John Boynton Priestley, OM (13 September 1894 – 14 August 1984), known as J.B. Priestley, was an English novelist, playwright and broadcaster. He published 27 novels. Angel Pavement is his novel, published in 1930, it established him as a successful novelist. It is a social panorama of the city of London, seen largely through the eyes of the employees of the firm Twigg & Dersingham, on the first floor of No. 8, Angel Pavement. One of the problems raised in the novel is the problem of upbringing.
The plot of the extract revolves around Mr. Smeeth and his speculations about his own family. The central idea of the extract is misunderstanding between two generations. The author’s message is that many parents could not understand either intentions or system of values of their children. The key of the extract is dramatic. It could be divided into two parts- the “dialogue” part and the “speculations” part.
First part begins with a dialogue, which presents us a picture of an ordinary family: the mother making some dish, the father helps her, their daughter sits and watches them. Everything seems to be fine and clear. But the second part reveals the true situation in that seem-to-be-ordinary family.
It begins with the impatient grunt of Mr. Smeeth, he is upset by his daughter. Once he was fond of her, but now he is irritated. The usage of detached construction “and, for that matter, he was still fond of her” sets some border between her childhood and adolescence. He is not satisfied by her “way of acting, of looking, of talking”, by this enumeration, the author describes almost every situation of their life. Speaking about the language of the author, if we compare it to the language he used in “Dangerous Corner” – it is different. He uses such epithets to draw the portrait of Edna: “smallish girl, greyish-greenish-bluish eyes, prettyish” and they point out that she wasn’t a complete human, according to these epithets she was still in development. The contrastive phrases “being neither child nor an adult, neither dependent nor independent” underline the previous statement. Her being at home is characterized by such epithets as “languid and complaining, shrill and resentful, or sullen and tearful” thus making us understand that she was, as the author said in “a very silly, awkward age”. But the situation changed abruptly when she receives a call from her friends, by the simile “This contrast, as sharp as a sword” the author states that her behavior at home and among her friends was very different. She was not interested in the life of her family, instead, being with her friends she “sprang into a vivid personal life of her own, became eager and vivacious”. These numerous epithets reflect her young and hoity-toity nature.
The next paragraph is devoted to the son of Mr. Smeeth – George, who is older than Edna, she is 17 and he is 20. The age gives us a hint that he is probably set his life priorities and somehow more confident in his point of view to his own life. But that is only partially so, according to the author: “He had no desire to stick to anything, to serve somebody faithfully, to work himself steadily up to a good safe position”. So George just tried one thing after another, selling wireless sets, helping some pal in a garage, but his father believed that even working hard he could not get any positive promotion or results. “The point was, that to George, there was nothing wrong, and his father was well aware of the fact that he could not make him see there was anything wrong. That was the trouble with both his children.”- this is the climax of the whole extract, the description of a problem which could not be dealt with, the fact that is inevitable and unavoidable.
Their father, Mr. Smeeth “no longer understood them”, his children a kind of foreigners, because they belong to a younger generation that exists in a different world. Their behavior, their sub-culture, their manners and way or thinking is different from people of older generation. The generation gap problem raised in this very extract is urgent though it exists many and many years. The following inscription was on the pot, found in Mesopotamia, it was made about 3000 BC “This young people are filthy to the core. Young people insidious and neglectful. They will never be like the young ones of the past. Young generation of today will not be able even to preserve our culture.” And this was written by Socrates “Our youth love luxury, they are ill-bred, they taunt the authorities and did not respect the elders. Our children are tyrants, they do not stand up when an elderly man enters the room and they come athwart to their parents.” So the problem is not new and there is only thing that one should do – accept it, and try to undergo it.