Peter Orner's The Raft: Narrator, Characterization, Time, Symbols and Setting
The Raft
”His face is so perfectly round that his smile looks like a gash in a basketball.” In this essay I’m going to focus on narrator, characterization, time aspect, symbols and the setting. The short story is written by Peter Orner in 2000. The short story is about a conversation between a 12, soon 13 years old boy, and his grandfather, Seymour, who commands a destroyer. It is about war and what a war can do to each individual soldier after killing another human being.
“The Raft” takes place around the 60’s or the 70’s because the grandfather, Seymour, has lost his short-term memory while he was in duty during the first Eisenhower administration, which takes place approximately between 1953-1957. Another clue that it might be in the 70’s is that there is white shag in the grandfather’s study, which point to it is in the 70’s, because it was well-used back then. His grandfather and grandmother are at the middle class, because the grandfather has his own study with his own desk and the grandmother is sitting by her beauty table, and we know she is a lady. She is more relaxed and wants the best out of spending time with the boy, besides the grandfather. He wants respect. Like if someone is talking to him he has to see him in his eyes, say ‘sir’ and have a straight face, not smiling because he smiles. Like I said before the grandfather was a captain at a destroyer in World War 2, and he was the one which had to make important decisions. Even though he lost his short-term memory, he still remembers a lot from the war, but every time he tells the story to the grandson, it is different stories. He is taking it very seriously when telling it to his grandson, which he treats like a soldier (sailor) from the World War. The grandson, who is 13 in two weeks, knows the story the grandfather is telling, because he has heard it several times before.
“Oh, Seymour, my God…” (P. 124 L. 32) – the grandmother disturbs by saying that, after he tells the beginning of
”His face is so perfectly round that his smile looks like a gash in a basketball.” In this essay I’m going to focus on narrator, characterization, time aspect, symbols and the setting. The short story is written by Peter Orner in 2000. The short story is about a conversation between a 12, soon 13 years old boy, and his grandfather, Seymour, who commands a destroyer. It is about war and what a war can do to each individual soldier after killing another human being.
“The Raft” takes place around the 60’s or the 70’s because the grandfather, Seymour, has lost his short-term memory while he was in duty during the first Eisenhower administration, which takes place approximately between 1953-1957. Another clue that it might be in the 70’s is that there is white shag in the grandfather’s study, which point to it is in the 70’s, because it was well-used back then. His grandfather and grandmother are at the middle class, because the grandfather has his own study with his own desk and the grandmother is sitting by her beauty table, and we know she is a lady. She is more relaxed and wants the best out of spending time with the boy, besides the grandfather. He wants respect. Like if someone is talking to him he has to see him in his eyes, say ‘sir’ and have a straight face, not smiling because he smiles. Like I said before the grandfather was a captain at a destroyer in World War 2, and he was the one which had to make important decisions. Even though he lost his short-term memory, he still remembers a lot from the war, but every time he tells the story to the grandson, it is different stories. He is taking it very seriously when telling it to his grandson, which he treats like a soldier (sailor) from the World War. The grandson, who is 13 in two weeks, knows the story the grandfather is telling, because he has heard it several times before.
“Oh, Seymour, my God…” (P. 124 L. 32) – the grandmother disturbs by saying that, after he tells the beginning of