Have you ever read a story and wondered what would happen next? In the short story Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket, Jack Finney uses the character Tom to display how a paper flies out of a window and the main character has to go and rescue the paper, leaving any reader to wonder how this will end. The author creates a feeling of suspense and tension in the story by using effects like foreshadowing, uncertainty, and imagery. This essay will explain how the author Jack Finney uses these effects to create that feeling in the story Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket. The title Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket is an example of how the author Jack Finney uses foreshadowing to create tension in his short story. The title gives us a perspective of …show more content…
After Tom sees how high the ledge is to the street the author says “he began to tremble violently, panic flaring through his mind and muscles, and he felt the blood rush from the surface of his skin. (Finney, page 6)” This example gives the reader a feeling of uncertainty because they do not know and are questioning what will happen next. Will he fall off due to his uncontrollable shaking or will he be able to calm himself? The effects of uncertainty creates a feeling of suspense due to not knowing what will happen next. The author also uses imagery to further create tension in Contents of a Dead Man’s …show more content…
Imagery is when a writer uses strong descriptive words to create a mental image or idea in a story. The author says “staring down through the autumn night at Lexington Avenue, eleven stories below. (Finney, page 1)”, which is a description of the setting. Another example of imagery in the short story is “Above the muffled sound of the street traffic far below, he could hear the dry scrape of its movement, like a leaf on the pavement. (Finney, page 3)”. In this example, Finney uses strong descriptive words like “muffled sound” and “dry scrape” to describe that the paper was louder than the cars below and how it moved along, which also shows the importance of the paper. Descriptive imagery creates tension in a story because when a reader is able to imagine what's going on in the story, they are able to feel the tension by how bad a situation may be, like this paper flying out of a window at 11 stories
Before Tim Piazza’s night begins, he reaches in a closet that “his mother will soon visit to select the clothes he will wear in his coffin.” After the night of “torture”, Tim’s family will be reunited one last time with “the redheaded boy they have loved so well” so he does not “die alone”. These pieces of wording are prime examples of the instrumentality of emotionally involving the audience in any piece of writing. When simple statistics and bland facts don’t seem to push Flanagan’s stance quite far enough, she turns to powerful, almost agonizing wording to complete the task. The language may be exaggerated at times, but it’s undoubtedly effective.
his neck was open to the spinal cord and the blood there was thick and shiny” (O’Brien 118). O’Brien uses the visual imagery to show his horrified response to his actions, as well as gain a response from the reader. O’Brien describes the dead man in so much detail that the readers are able to visualize him and feel the pain that O’Brien felt, which invokes an emotional response and helps prove the novel as very admirable. Finally, O’Brien utilizes conflict in
Throughout the story of “Contents of a Dead Man’s Pockets,” the author uses three main ways to introduce what the Protagonist is experiencing to his readers. Being able to use diction, (what words are being used), details, (the usage of words), and imagery (the image of something, someone, or a moment in time), really helps the readers understand the Protagonist. With readers understanding the Protagonist and what is going on, makes the story more relatable to the readers. The author really gives his readers a good understanding of what the Protagonists is experiencing through the usage of imagery.
Imagery is a visually descriptive or figurative language,especially in a literary work. Imagery is a picture that develops in your head from a word or words that describe something. If you say the dog is black with white spots. The words that are gonna get that picture in your head from the previous sentence is black and white spots. Description words is what makes up most of books and stories without them everything you read would be plain.
An example of sensory details and imagery in my story was, “the corners were stained and squished.” I was describing to the reader how the man’s sign looked. Adding that allowed the reader to picture in their mind what the sign looked like rather than saying, “the sign was messy.” The reader would feel like they were present while the story was taking place because the image in their mind would be more detailed and
Literary devices used in “Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket” The art of suspense and tension is one few writers master. Jack Finney is one of those few authors who have practiced the study and put it to use. His work on “Contents of a Dead Man’s Pocket” is a shining example of how to make your readers feel anxious or worried for a character’s well-being. Throughout the story, you are left wondering how Tom Beneke will conquer his fear of the ledge he put himself on.
Murder becomes a touchy subject to the college students; the author mixes together a suspenseful atmosphere throughout the community college the protagonist attends as the short story progresses. It almost feels like one is on the edge of their seat when reading it. William Faulkner’s short story, “A Rose for Emily,” displays suspense and tones of slight insanity, but it cannot compare to the undertones that lay beneath Stephen King’s work. The narrator’s foreshadowing of uncovering the truth through his own detailed point of view creates a well written short story dubbed “Strawberry Spring.” Skimming through the literary work, foreshadowing is an obvious detail that appears in the work several times.
Jack Finney uses Tom Benecke’s epiphany to illustrate that it is not the materialistic things in life that matter, but rather the relationships that are formed, that account for life’s greatest moments in the short story “Contents of the Dead Man’s Pockets”. An epiphany is a sudden realization that occurs in literature. In the story, Tom’s epiphany occurs to him during a near death experience in his attempt to retrieve an important piece of paper from a ledge. Short Stories for Students depicts that “Tom's epiphany occurs when he realizes that he has nothing in his pockets except for the yellow piece of paper filled with his incomprehensible notes. . . . This, in turn, leads him to the larger truth: he has been living a wasted life" (“‘Contents’”
Imagery is used throughout, in order to engage the reader and assist them in understanding things from Saul’s perspective. For example, the sense of sight was touched on when it describes the string of light bulbs, the shadows of the ice and the rocks and spindly trees. It creates a mental image with the use of sophisticated adjectives such as humped, spindly and eerie. Also, the description of the smell is very detailed by saying that it was a “potent mix” of various unpleasing scents. This proves that imagery is a device that is essential in helping the audience imagine the setting, make connections and hold interest.
Imagery allows a reader to imagine the events of a story within their mind through mental images. Imagery can describe how something looks, a sound, a feeling, a taste, or a smell. Imagery is especially important when the author is describing a character or a setting. The short story The Man In The Black Suit by Stephen King has several excellent examples of imagery.
Imagery is a literary device that uses descriptive wording to put a vivid image of a scenario in your mind. Dickens uses imagery to describe the scenery and the change in Scrooge’s physical appearance throughout the course of the story. “eezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self- contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice.
Imagery is a way of writing that the author gives you visual descriptive writing or figurative language. One quote that stood out to me was “There would be other Sheila Mant’s in life, other fish, and though I came close once or twice, it was these secrets, hidden tuggings in the night that claimed me, and I never made that mistake again. ”(41) This quote has a lot of meaning in this story
With the use of foreshadowing, Lee establishes the history of the Oke family, while simultaneously warning the reader of the deadly nature of obsession which the narrator lacks due to his own growing infatuation blinding himself from what is happening around him. Contrast this with the present, established through the use of imagery, overall shows just how in-depth the grave Alice has dug for herself really is. The use of imagery establishes the obsessive nature of the past, how even a naive want to look like an ancestor can devolve into something much darker and far more sinister, which highlights the future endpoint of the cycle of history as fate fulfills its ultimate destiny. The short story begs the question as to whether or not history is ever able to serve as just that, history; or if history rather serves as to foreshadow the deadly consequences of obsession without change to ultimately change one's course in
Can life’s events cause us to change our priorities? According to Merriam Webster, priority is defined as something that is more important than other things and that needs to be done or dealt with first. Life’s events definitely can change the priorities of people. People prioritize based on what is important to him/her, and life’s events can cause a person’s view of importance to change.
“A Short Guide to Imagery, Symbolism, and Figurative Language Imagery” describes imagery as “a writer or speaker’s use of words or figures of speech to create a vivid mental picture or physical sensation”(Clark). In the short story, “The Story of an Hour,” Kate Chopin uses nature imagery to portray the journey of emotions that Mrs. Mallard experiences