Character Analysis on ‘The Story of An Hour’

A character is a man that in a story or an imagined person who inhabits a story--

although that simple definition may admit to a few exceptions. As we know in the main
characters of a short story, human personalities that become familiar to us, although, some
writers of some fictions make a non human character as the character in their fictions. From
popular fiction, both classic and contemporary, we are acquainted with many stereotype
characters. Called stock characters, they are often known by some outstanding trait or traits.
They are especially convenient for writers of literary. Most of them, however, attempt to
create characters who strike readers not as stereotypes but as unique individuals, like in short
story ‘The Story of an Hour’. The character was described not as many women in common.
Women who just got sad news about their husband’s death they definitely would feel sad, but
in this story the character was different.

The story of an hour is about a woman that has afflicted with a heart trouble because
her relation with her husband. Te woman called Mrs. Mallard. She was young, beautiful, and
with a fair. This is can be seen in quotation:

She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and
even a certain strength. (8th paragraph, line 1)

Quotation above tells that she was a young, has a beautiful face, calm, and has
strength to face her repression. It also finds that she has repression in her life because of her
husband’s treat. She is not as many women have heard sad news about their husband’s death.
She just got news about her husband’s death, but she did not show that she was shock and sad
like many women in common. Firstly, she felt sad but it was no long time to end her sadness.
It is stated in quotation of the story:

She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a
paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden,
wild abandonment, in her sister’s arms. When the storm of grief had spent
itself she went away to her alone (3rd paragraph, line 1-4)

From the quotation, we could see that Mrs. Mallard has no long time to feel the better
after she felt sad of her husband’s death. She could accept the news with no paralyzed
inability as many women who will feel so sad with paralyzed inability to accept the fact that
her husband had died, “… as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to
accept its significance.” Instead, she felt happy and thought that she would no longer in her
husband’s repression even she will free and comfort to enjoy her life. Her happiness can be
seen in quotation:

She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were
all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the
air. (5th paragraph, line 1-2)

Her feeling changed when she went to her room, she felt so happy, and it seems a new
life after her husband’s death. She can breathe the good air; she felt more comfort by looking
out the window like in the spring season. She thought that she will continue her life in
happiness without her husband. The evidence also can be in this statement; “…a little
whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath:
“Free, free, free!” (Paragraph 11, line 2), and “…free Body and soul free!” (16th paragraph,
line 1). Those statements can be considered as the evidence of her feeling when she in her
room enjoyed her freedom. One thing that always crossed in hr mind was the word ‘free’, so
that she would be no one to live for during those coming years with repression; she would
live for herself. She thought that she could get rights to impose a private as men. It is can be
found in quotation:

There would be no one to live for during those coming years; she would live
for herself. There would be no powerful will bending her in that blind
persistence with which men and women believe they have the right to impose
a private will upon a fellow creature. (14th paragraph, line 1-4)

Quotation above shows that Mrs. Mallard was often got pressure her husband and she
thought she would get the freedom as her husband has it. Her husband had given her a kind
intention or a cruel intention as she looked upon her husband attention.

Setting Analysis on ‘A Rose for Emily’

Setting of a story, it can mean its time and place. It can prompt characters to act, bring
them to realizations, or cause them to reveal their inmost natures. The idea of setting includes
the physical environment of a story; a house, a street, a city, a landscape, a region. But
besides place, setting may involve the time of the story—hour, year, or century. It might
matter greatly that a story takes place at dawn, or on the day of the first moon landing.
Besides time and place, setting may also include the weather. Whether it is a novel, short
story or a story, they all containing a setting. In ‘A rose for Emily’, setting is important factor
and it helps relation in the characters and the plot of the story. In ‘ A Rose for Emily’, the
author details about setting and atmosphere give the reader background as to the values of the
characters, helping the reader to understand the whole meaning of the story.

In ‘A Rose for Emily’, the story begins with Miss Emily funeral, where the men see
her as fallen monument and the women are anxious to see the inside o her house. It can be
seen in quotation:

When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the
men through a sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the women
mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house… (paragraph 1, line 1-
3)

Quotation above shows the story begins when Miss Emily dead, whole people in the
town, then, went to her funeral. People called her as fallen monument because she has fallen
or died and she also became the center of attention until she called as monument. The setting
of ‘A Rose for Emily’ take places in a town called Jefferson, this is proved in, ‘… anonymous
graves of Union and Confederate soldiers who fell at the battle o Jefferson.’ (Paragraph 2,
line 8-9). The house of Miss Emily describe as a big, squarish frame house that had once
been white, decorated with cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome
style of the seventies, set on what had once been the most select street. All this best stated in
the quotation:
It was big, squarish frame house that once been white, decorated with
cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome style of
the seventies, set on what had once been our most select street. (Pararaph 2,
line 1-3)

It is clear enough that Miss Emily house is a big, squarish frame house and white,
style of seventies. The house also described as stubborn and coquettish. It is implied in lines:
But garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the august
names of that neighborhood; only Miss Emily’s house was left, lifting its
stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and gasoline pumps
—an eyesore among eyesores.(paragraph 2, line 3-6).

Those lines describe how garages and cotton gins had have long obliterated the
neighborhood, but it is the only house left. The house, once a handsome, then it became ‘an
eyesore among eyesore’ surrounded by gas station. From those lines, it can be consider that
the town is small an isolated. Then, the interior of Emily’s house described as ‘…smelled of
dust and disuse—close, dank smell.’ (Paragraph 5, line 5) ‘...furnished in heavy, leather
covered furniture... the leather was cracked; and when they sat down, a faint dust rose
sluggishly about their thighs spinning with slow motes in the single sun-ray.’ (Paragraph 5,
line 6-9). The house is described as having a smell of dust and disuse. It was furnished in
heavy and leather covered furniture. The description of the setting is dark and disorder.

In discussing the society or the town, the setting is isolated and people have great
interest to Miss Emily, they respect her, they always curious about her. It is can be found
when people talking about her, they never talking about her badness. They also fully give
attention to her and also a great deal of gossip that regularly circulates about her with great
interest. .evidence about people interest in Miss Emily can be seen in this quotation, Miss
Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the
foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip…, …so when she got thirty and was
still single, we were not pleased exactly, but vindicated,..(paragraph 25, line 5-9) and when
her father died, it got about that the house was all that was left to her; and in a way, people
were glad (paragraph 26, 1-2). And then was best implied in quotation:

At first we were glad that Miss Emily would have an interest, because the
ladies all said 'Of course a Grierson would not think seriously of a
Northerner, a day laborer.' But there were still others, older people, who said
that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige --
without calling it noblesse oblige. (Paragraph 31, line 1-5)

Quotation above shows that people were glad when Miss Emily would have interest.
This is a comment on Emily's relationship with construction worker. So from that evidence, it
can be considered that the story placed in an isolated area with the neighbors have great
interest in Miss Emily

Point of View analysis on ‘The Tell-Tale Heart’

In analysis a story is important to be aware of point of view: who is telling the story.
An attempt to understand the relationship that exists between the narrator and the characters
and events in the story will make reading more rewarding. There are two kind of narrator:
participant and non participant narrator. Then, the narrator also divided into the first-person
narrator, Third-person objective that is the Third-person character reports the story, and
Third-person subjective that is the third-person reports the story, but the reader are also
allowed to go into the narrator’s mind. The author is free to report the thoughts and emotions
of a central character.

When the focus centers on a single individual in the story, or relies on the character’s
voice or thoughts, the point of view is limited. When stories or novels have several focal
characters, the point of view is unlimited. Third person narrators with unlimited access to the
thoughts of characters are often called omniscient (meaning “all-knowing”). From those
explanations, after reading and understanding the story entitled ‘The Tell-Tale Heart’, the
narrator in the story is first-person narrator and participant as the character in the story. It can
be seen in the whole text the narrator uses ‘I’. He tells the story with saying ‘I’, in this story is
the man or the mad man who killed the old man.

‘The Tell-Tale Heart’ story is told from limited omniscient point of view because the
narrator tells the whole story from the beginning until the end. He tells his feelings and things
happened, and he also knows other characters, their characteristic and conditions. However,
he cannot tell details about them. For instance, He tells that the old man was sleeping and
laying on the bed and he described about him. It can be seen in quotation:

I say I knew it well. I knew what the old man felt, pitied him, although I
chuckled at heart. I knew that he had been lying awake ever since the first
slight noise, when he had been turned in the bed. His fears had been ever
since growing upon him. He had been trying to fancy them causeless, but
could not. ( paragraph 7, line 6-10)

Quotation above shows that the narrator knows about the old man’s feeling when he
got fear because he heard a strange voice in his room as he slept. The narrator told that he had
been got fears then the narrator told that he tried to comfort himself but he could not. The
narrator think that the death approaching him, has stalked with his black shadow before him,
and envelop the victim. Though, the narrator could not describe details about him. So, it can
be said that the point of view in this story is limited omniscient. In paragraph 9, it can be seen
that the narrator is limited. It shown that the narrator sees the door is open but he can not see
about the old man’s face. Other evidence can be found in quotation:
The officers were satisfied. …they sat, and while I answered cheerily, they
chatted familiar things. (paragraph 16, line 1-2)

Quotation above conveys that the narrator knows about the officers. He tells the
officers are satisfied because of his welcome and treatment when they came in his house to
observe because the neighbors heard a shriek during the night, and they chatted familiar
things. The narrator also knows about the room.
His room was as black as pitch with the thick darkness (for the shutters were
closed fastened, through fear of robbers), and so I know he could not see the
opening of the door, and I kept pushing it on steadily, steadily. (Paragraph 4,
line 7-10).

In the quotation, the narrator describes about the old man’s room. When he tried to
kill the old man, the room is dark and the windows close fastened so that it made the old man
got fears. The narrator tells about room but not details. He can not tell the description of the
room, what things inside the room are.

In short, from those evidences, it can be considered that the point of view in ‘The
Tell-Tale Heart’ story is Limited Omniscient.