ENGLISH PROGRAMME

FACULTY OF ADAB AND HUMANITIES

UIN SUNAN GUNUNG DJATI BANDUNG

Final Exam
The Short Story
Semester II Class E
Lecturer: Dian Nurrachman, S.S., M.Pd.

NAME : Salwa Diva Az Zahra

ID : 1205030204
CLASS : 2E

Narrative Excerpt:
“Fahrquhar dived—dived as deeply as he could. The water roared in his ears like the voice of
Niagara, yet he heard the dulled thunder of the volley and, rising again toward the surface, met
shining bits of metal, singularly flattened, oscillating slowly downward. Some of them touched
him on the face and hands, then fell away, continuing their descent. One lodged between his
collar and neck; it was uncomfortably warm and he snatched it out.”

--Ambrose Bierce, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”

Question:
Is that Fahrquhar activity really happened in the story or not? Why?

Direction:
Write a short analytical essay in English at least 1000 words reflecting your own answers for the
above question based on the above narrative excerpt from Ambrose Bierce’s “An Occurrence at
Owl Creek Bridge”. Your comments do not need any references at all, yet, those who make a
copy paste analysis from other sources will be disqualified from this exam. Submit the result
before the date and time.

Answer :

Maybe as a lay reader, when you first read Ambrose Bierce's short story, “An Occurrence
at Owl Creek Bridge”, you will think that the activity that Fahrquhar did was something that
happened, and he did it at that very moment. Maybe some readers hope that this was done and
happened to Fahrquhar so that he could survive the death sentence he was about to face and
return to his family. But, if we move forward on the next narratives that happened in the story,
then we will found out that actually, what the author mentioned or the activities described
Fahrquhar were only illusions and imaginations that Fahrquhar created himself.
Starting from here, I will detail some opinions on why I conclude that the quote above is
fantasy. Bierce does an excellent job as a writer. He can combine elements of literature and good
diction to describe the form of escape into the imagination that Fahrquhar did when he almost
accepted his death. In the narration quoted above, Farquhar tries to escape from shackles and his
death by swimming in the river while dodging the bullets that fired at him
This fantasy was created by the author, to express the imagination that humans can have
when facing death. The narrative quote above makes it seem as if what Farquhar did is a real
activity because it can be seen from how Bierce as a writer can combine the real and imagination
with the dictions and elements that support the narrative. The author can combine fact and
fantasy by describing the activities that Fahrquhar does, starting from how he escaped from
hanging, to how he can dive into the water to escape. For me, how the author combines fantasy
and reality is also a form of the depiction of the thin line between reality and our imagination in
reality, and this is told by how Fahrquhar's dream and reality journey is experienced.
Detailed descriptions of his escape, how he dived and felt the bullets fired at him, and
forward a few paragraphs after how he returned to land, and the journey back to his plantation
where he met his wife, all happened in a short time and a matter of seconds. But, this fantasy is
drawn in a longer period by Bierce through a detailed description, using literary dictions and
reinforcing the reality of how a Farquhar can escape and avoid that moment as the narrative
quote above. Bierce even explained in exaggerated how Farquhar dived into the water and tried
to dodge the bullet. How is it possible Farquhar was able to do this, given how the neck is bound
by what rope when the rope was finally pulled, and of course, the rope will grow stronger on
Farquhar's neck, as already known. The quotations from the above narrative also create an
imaginative atmosphere of how Farquhar felt the bullets that hit him. So, it's natural to me that
the readers initially thought that what Farquhar was doing was part of the story of how he would
survive.
The story is about how Fahrquhar drowned and tried to run, how he felt the bullets that
would bring him into a situation of thinking about the actions that would occur at their climax
Fahrquhar would survive out of the air to the front and meet his family. The feeling of tension
also the hope of how he dives and feels the bullets fired is a big hope that Fahrquhar must
survive whatever he goes through. The same few paragraphs as the quote above also present an
even more peaking offer. But, apart from how Bierce makes the reader form the imagination that
Fahrquhar can save himself, it is also possible that readers can already guess and anticipate with
narrations that describe how Fahrquhar can escape. As I mentioned above about the impossibility
of Fahrquhar's survival because the rope that tied his neck would get tighter, maybe some visitors
had their thoughts that could deny how Fahrquhar could not possibly save himself with the
conditions he was.
The author plays with the plot to form the reader's imagination that what Fahrquhar is
doing is something real, even though when he has Knowing the end that will happen we can
understand that the things Fahrquhar did or like the activities in the narrative quote above we can
realize that all the activities that Fahrquhar does are just imagination. So far what we have
witnessed in Fahrquhar's long journey to escape is only the last mortal thought of a man who will
soon meet his end. Besides that, this is also the main irony in this story where there is situational
irony. when some kind of discrepancy was revealed between what was expected to happen and
what happened. In other words, what happened was not what the audience expected. The reader's
hope when reading the narrative quoted above is that Fahrquhar can save himself even though he
has to dive and try to escape first.
The depiction of Fahrquhar's imagination depicted by how he is in the water and has to
dive supports the idea that Fahrquhar cannot escape his destiny. Farquhar created his fantasy
world because he was desperate, he knew he would die, and imagined his escape was a way to
regain control of the facts of his current state. His mind supplies the successful flights and
escapes his own body cannot achieve. This short story also creates a metaphor for the story itself.
Similar to what Farquhar experienced, the reader is also brought by the author to follow the
imagination and fantasy experienced by Fahrquhar even though involved in something that is not
real for a while, in the end, both Fahrquhar and the reader will return to reality at the end of the
story.
Furthermore, if we advance to a few more paragraphs and come to the end of the story.
Then, it will be proven and it will be seen that actually, the few narrative quoted above are a
description of the fantasy experienced by Fahrquhar so that is not reality. Everything Fahrquhar
did in his attempt to escape, avoid bullets, and capture by the soldiers was just an imagination
that shaped in such a way as to attract the interest of the reader. The narrative quote above can be
regarded as one of several pieces of the puzzle to create a surprise that some readers might not
expect. Bierce is indeed a reliable writer who can build an amazing imagination and plot. At the
end of the story, it is finally revealed that Farquhar never escaped at all; he imagined the entire
third part of the story during the time between falling through the bridge and the noose breaking
his neck.