The Story of an Hour
By: Kate Chopin

I honestly was so confused after I read this story.  At the beginning, I felt so bad for Mrs. Mallard.  The way that she found out about her husband's death was very sad.  "It was her sister Josephine who had told her, in broken sentences, veiled hints that revealed in half concealing" (Chopin).  I felt so bad for Mrs. Mallard and cannot imagine how difficult this would be.  "She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms" (Chopin).  Mrs. Mallard cried immediately upon learning of her husband's death.  However, she quickly recovered from this.  She soon begins to feel a sense of joy and freedom.  This made me wonder if she was in an unhealthy marriage.  Why would anyone feel free after the loss of his/her spouse?  Maybe she felt that she could not be her own, individual person as a married woman.  Either way, I was very confused as to why Mrs. Mallard suddenly experienced joy.  In addition, I was even more confused when she died of a heart disease at the end.  "She had died of a heart disease-of joy that kills" (Chopin).  Is this to be taken literally?  Did Mrs. Mallard really die as a result of her joy?

Popular Mechanics
By: Raymond Carver

In this short story, a couple is in a major argument.  It is such a bad fight that the man is packing a suitcase to leave.  The couple has a baby together, and they are fighting over who gets to have the baby.  Because of this, I assume that the baby is the only thing that was keeping them together.  They are arguing so much that they are tugging at the baby from each other.  They got so caught up in their fight that they didn't pay attention to the fact that they were hurting the baby.  The baby was screaming and crying, but the couple continued to fight.  This leads to a surprising ending, and it can be classified as dramatic irony.  The man and woman are fighting over who gets to have the baby.  However, it turns out that neither gets the baby.  They tug so hard at the baby that they rip it in half.  "He felt the baby slipping out of his hands and he pulled back very hard.  In this manner, the issue was decided" (Carver).  This shows that the argument ended up leading to neither one getting what they wanted.

You're Ugly, Too
By: Lorrie Moore

Moore does a great job of using characterization throughout this short story.  With the use of this literary device, readers are able to figure out about Zoe Hendricks' personality.  Zoe is a very sarcastic person.  She uses sarcasm and humor throughout the entire story; I think she uses this as a way to act like she is okay with her life.  However, it isn't hard for readers to realize that Zoe is pretty lonely.  Besides her sister Evan, she really doesn't have anyone.  She describes a few past relationships that all failed.  In addition, she doesn't seem to have a good relationship with her students.  The story features many different excerpts of student reviews about Zoe.  For example, one student said "Professor Hendricks has said critical things about Fawn Hall, the Catholic religion, and the whole state of Illinois.  It is unbelievable" (355).  This shows that Zoe is always willing to state her opinion about everything, and she doesn't care whom she says it to.  However, her opinions are very offensive to others.  I would assume that she has no filter.  Another way to characterize Zoe can be seen in her Halloween costume.  She dresses as a bone.  I think that this illustrates her hard attitude towards love.  She basically just doesn't believe in love.  Also, she isn't even happy for Evan when she and Charlie get engaged.  Overall, Moore's use of characterization allows readers to understand the personality of Zoe Hendricks.  This is possible through her dry humor and lack of emotion towards love.

Getting Out
By: Cleopatra Mathis

This poem is about a young couple and their life together.  It describes their struggles together as a married couple and how they are no longer together.  The story is told in first person point of view.  The poem uses the pronouns of "we" and "us" at the beginning.  However, the end of the poem shifts to using "I" and "you."  This shows how they are no longer together.  Their lives are separate now.  Also, the pronouns help readers understand that they are not placing the blame on one person over the other.  Every time the speaker brings up something that "you" (the man) did, she brings up something that she did, too.  When the poem mentions "our matching eyes and hair" (896), it implies that maybe the man and woman were too much alike.  Also, maybe they were too young for marriage.  For example, the final lines of the poem describes how they held hands instead of hugging or kissing.  Their love developed at too young of an age.

Eveline
By: James Joyce

Eveline Hill is a young girl that is lonely.  Her mother passed away, and one of her brothers has also died.  Her father is an abusive man, and it seems like Eveline desperately wants to escape her family life.  The only person that she truly seems to care about is a sailor named Frank.  Eveline is in love with Frank.  Her father does not approve of Frank, though.  Regardless of this, Eveline plans to escape with Frank to go off and marry him.  "She was to go away with him by the night-boat to be his wife and to live with him in Buenos Aires where he had a home waiting for her" (220).  This life with Frank is a promise of happiness in Eveline's eyes.  However, she remembers the promises she made with her mother.  She promised to keep her family's household alive.  She also committed to keeping her family together.  Eveline realizes that she will break these promises by escaping with Frank.  As the boat starts to move away, Eveline pulls away from Frank and lets him leave without her.  This showed that Eveline decided to stay true to her family.

How I Met My Husband
By: Alice Munro

This story is told in first person by Edie, a young girl that dropped out of high school and now works as a farmer.  Edie becomes a maid for Dr. Peebles, a veterinarian.  One day, Edie is at the old fairgrounds near Dr. Peebles' house.  Here, she meets a pilot named Chris Watters.  Chris is engaged to Alice (or at least Alice claims this).  Edie and Chris kiss, and the young girl is convinced that she is in love with Mr. Watters.  There is situational irony in Edie's story.  I thought that Chris was going to marry Edie.  However, Chris is not a man that can settle and commit to one certain person (or even one place).  He promised Edie that he would write her a letter, and she waits at the mailbox everyday with hopes of him fulfilling this promise.  Edie meets the young mail carrier, and he is the man whom she ends up marrying!  This seemed so random to me; I did not expect this ending at all.  However, her husband definitely was a better choice than the sketchy Chris Watters.  Edie explains that her husband thinks that she had a crush on him and that he is why she was always waiting by the mailbox.  This wasn't the case though, and I was surprised that she never told him the truth.  "He always tells the children the story of how I went after him by sitting by the mailbox every day, and naturally I laugh and let him, because I like for people to think what pleases them and makes them happy" (146).  I'm glad that Edie ended up finding a quality husband and enjoyable life with him, but it left me with one last question.  Did Edie ever tell her husband about her infatuation and past with Chris Watters?

Delight in Disorder
By: Robert Herrick

This brief poem describes a girl that is apparently attractive in the narrator's opinion.  The girl wears dresses, lace, ribbons, etc.  She tries to dress very girly.  However, she doesn't do a good job of keeping her appearance looking orderly.  For example, her appearance is a "sweet disorder in the dress" (979).  Also, the narrator observes that the girl's ribbons "flow confusedly" (979).  Regardless of the unkempt look of the girl, the narrator still finds her to be attractive and a beauty.  Herrick uses oxymorons to describe the girl.  "Sweet disorder" is an example of this.  We wouldn't normally associate these two words together because a disorder isn't sweet- it's more of a negative term.  Another oxymoron is "wildly civility."  These two words are pretty much complete opposites.  When we think of civility, we often think of order and structure.  Putting "wildly" with this word suggests that the girl has a wild side to her.  The use of this literary technique further enforces the fact that this girl is disorderly in her appearance.  However, the narrator sees past this and still finds her to be a very beautiful girl.

Lonely Hearts
By: Wendy Cope

In this poem, readers get to read multiple ads from a newspaper.  Apparently, the newspaper offers a section of ads where some of the locals in North London write descriptions about themselves in hopes of finding love.  For example, one of the writers describes himself as a male biker that wants a fun female companion.  Another writer explains that she is an attractive Jewish woman with a son; she is looking for a man as her soul mate.  Another claims to be a "gay vegetarian whose friends are few" (973).  This proves that these writers are all lonely.  This fits into the poem's title "Lonely Hearts."  Each writer repeats at least one of these two rhetorical questions: "can someone make my simple wish come true?" or "Do you live in North London?  Is it you? (973)."  These rhetorical questions reinforce the loneliness of the writers and how desperate they are to find love.  (If they are resorting to a newspaper ad to find love, I'd say they are pretty desperate.)  I think the purpose that Cope was trying to convey in this poem is that some people are so empty without love in their lives that they would be willing to appear desperate to fill this emptiness.