post 4

• Find an example of an archetype in a short story. Explain what the archetype is and the effect that it has on the story.

  In the story “Thank you Ma’am” by Langston Hughes a archetype is the theme of the story.

The theme of the story is that even though you do bad things to someone they may have gone through it as well. Like the boy thought the old woman was going to take him to the cops or tell him what he did was wrong. But instead she explained to him that she knows people do bad things and that she had once did bad things like steal old womens purses before so she told him her story to show him that even though people do bad things they can grow from their mistakes and become a better person. Also this is one of the archetypes in the story their are many in this story that are common to backbones of other stories we’ve read over time. This archetype sets the story and helps show that the old woman was trying to help the boy by telling him “I have done things too, which I would not tell you, son”. This expresses her emotion towards the boy which also helps create the theme. Another thing about this archetype is that it is one that you’d see but not often because how many people do you know will tell someone about their experience and then help them understand what they did was wrong and then give the person money for what they originally were going to steal the money from you for in the first place.

Post 4

• Find an example of an archetype in a short story. Explain what the archetype is and the effect that it has on the story.

In the story "Thank you ma'am" there's two major archetypes. The first being the rotten kid who does wrong and is taught a lesson and the older person who has been there and done that and has changed for the better. In the post I'll be going the archetype for the kid who gets in trouble but is taught right. So in the story we see that a young boy is trying to take a ladies purse. She, however, is not a normal person (to a certain extent). Unfortunately for the boy (we later find out his name is Roger) the purse weighs too much for him and makes him fall over.  The lady, having been at a point in her life like that once, begins to bring the boy to her house. He then can choose if he wants to run out of the house and try to take the purse again. Beginning to change, he makes the decision to just stay and eat and not take the purse. The lady then explains to him that oonce she had done as he, and how it was a mistake and dumb to do. He did everything she told him an she rewarded him enough money to buy the pair of shoes he wanted. I believe that without this archetype that the story wouldn't make sense. If the boy was nice, how would he be taught to do no wrong? It simply just makes sense to have this archetype in this story.

Post 4

• Find an example of an archetype in a short story. Explain what the archetype is and the effect that it has on the story.

In the story “Thank You, M’am” by Langston Hughes there are two plot and character archetype. It is the boy and Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones. The reason I say that the boy is a character archetype is because there is always a antagonist and he fits in it (basically the bad guy). He tries to steal her pocketbook and fails to do so. And the same thing goes for Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones, well not the antagonist thing, she fits in the protagonist section; she’s the good guy basically. Both the boy and Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones go through changes. Like when Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones was younger, she use to be a thief like the boy was when the story first started. But then Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones changed as she grew up. And the boy changed when Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones took him in, in a way adopted him for a day. She treated him like she was his mother and he did not want to lose that little trust she had him. She didn’t ask him about his life or anything; she treated him like he had not done anything to her before she took him to her house. And she gave him money so he could buy the blue suede shoes he wanted. When he left, he wanted to say something else than just thank you, but when he tried he couldn't get it out of his mouth. In conclusion, both characters are a type of plot and character archetype since the beginning to the end of the story.

post 4

• Find an example of an archetype in a short story. Explain what the archetype is and the effect that it has on the story.

The archetype is how the character changes throughout the story, and how many other stories have had particularly the same actions that happened before. In this short story "Thank you ma'am" an archetype character was the little boy Roger. He is an archetype character because at first his intentions were to steal her purse from her while she was walking down the street, but as soon as she caught him and got him by the shirt and told him not to do it again, then she took him to her house and told him to clean up and she fed him dinner and then gave him ten dollars to get him something for himself, his intentions changed because whenever he was sitting before dinner and she got up from the table and left her purse sitting there, he could have took it and ran but instead he sat at the other end of the room, away from the purse and had no intentions on stealing her purse and running. A movie that was an archetype comparison to this short story is "The fosters". The reason this is related in the same way is because Calli was being fostered by these women, Lena and Stef, and in one of the episodes Calli was in juvie and no one wanted her but even though she wasn't such a good kid, Lena decided to take her in but told Callie some rules, and Callie was trying to find a way out and run away, but once she figured out their intentions were just to give her the thing she needed most, a home, she decided to stay there and accept it without making another bad decision. 

post 3

• How does the author develop the theme of the short story?

 In the story “The Scarlet Ibis” by James Hurst he starts to develop the theme by explaining to us what was wrong with the main character Doodle when he was born and also by explaining his family's worries for him when he was born. The author precedes to tell in detail about how Doodles parents were worried about him not being able to live. His parents were so sure he’d die because of what the doctors said that they even had a small child sized coffin made for him. Then the story takes a turn when Doodle’s older brother gets frustrated that his brother can not walk so he takes it upon himself to teach him how to walk even tho Doodle was hesitant to the idea he became comfortable with it and soon wanted to know and worked hard with his older brother to accomplish walking even just for small periods of time. Soon the author tells us how the brothers finally accomplish and show the family doodle walking. This makeing the theme start to grow into a more hopeful and inspirational background. Even though the author shares with us doodles accomplishments on walking and such throughout the story later on he shares with us the tragic ending of how doodle and his brother were working on doodles abilities to do other things like swim and row a boat so when he went to school he could do things with the other children. This event made the author's theme change around once again. Through this story the author helps create a amazing theme little by little with sharing accomplishments and sharing sad moments of lost much like most people's lives today.

Post #3

How does the author’s diction create the tone and mood of the short story? In your explanation, include how the connotative meanings of words chosen by the author affect the mood.
In the book "the Scarlet Ibis" the author uses many good connotative and denotative words to convey the theme and mood of the story. In the beginning of the story, the author started by talking about things that made you question what the story was going to be about; such as if it was going to be sad or upsetting (which you find out later on it is). In the book to create a more upsetting mood, the narrator called William Armstrong (Doodle) a disappointment. Disappointment has a very negative connotation, compared to the word different or unique. Then the story becomes happier and more uplifting when Doodle smiles at the narrator and he becomes so excited. When Doodle smiled and his brother found out he was "all there" as they put it, the mood became happier. Progressively Doodle learned to crawl, but his older brother was ashamed that he couldn't walk yet. So, wanting a normal brother, he started teaching him how to walk and he never gave up which made the story have a happier feeling. Unfortunately Doodle can only do so much and it's more or less of a disappointment for his brother. The narrator then begins teaching Doodle more things that'll help when he starts school. Then things take a turn for the worst while they were out. A storm began and the two boys had to run home. Doodle, being small and not able to run as well, was tracking behind. When his brother finally went back to look for him there was a bad feeling you got. Then he found Doodle dead and that's when the theme is revealed and the mood changed from happy to sad.

Post 3

• How does the author’s diction create the tone and mood of the short story? In your explanation, include how the connotative meanings of words chosen by the author affect the mood.

In the story “The Scarlet Ibis” the author has a great choice of words to create the tone and mood of the story. When he started the story he was talking about a bleeding tree. To me that created a sense of sadness and fear. Once Doddle got into the story we would end up understanding what he meant. The narrator said that his brother was crazy (the good kind) and that when he was born he was a disappointment. This makes the readers feel and know that that Doodle wasn't normal like other kids. Then he starts explaining why people had thought that and that he wanted a brother to hang out with but then his mom told him “even if William Armstrong lived”... “he might not, she sobbed, even be ‘all there’”. But one day he watched him look straight at him and grin. He was so happy he ran to his mom saying “Mama, he smiled. He’s all there! He’s all there!”. That made us feel like there was a chance for him. And there was, he then started to learn how to crawl and talk. When Doodle was five his older brother said that he was ashamed that he had a brother that couldn't walk to he made it his goal to teach Doodle how. Once he learned how to walk we felt happy and proud; the whole atmosphere was positive. Well, not until the ending started to approach; the whole ending was depressing. The narrator had been pushing his brother the whole day so they could reach the goal they had set for the first day of school (the day after). The sky was getting cloudy and they decided to go home when it started raining. The narrator started running and doodle tried to keep up because he didn't want to be left alone. But his brother kept running and Doodle got left behind. One the narrator got tired he waited for Doodle to catch up and he didn't appear so he went back to find him. One he found him Doodle was dead and he started to cry. The overall mood was sad and depressing for me.