Analysis the Secret Life of Walter Mitty Essay Example
Analysis: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Tara Jackson
ENG 125 Introduction to Literature
Instructor Alfaro
April 18, 2011
The short story that I will do an analysis on is the Secret Life of Walter Mitty, written by James Thurber in March of 1939. This story centers around the hilarious and amusing daydreams of Walter Mitty an ordinary man, who resides in Waterbury, Connecticut, with his overbearing, nagging wife Mrs. Mitty. Throughout this short story Mitty is characterized as being a pathetic, timid man, who daydreams to deal with situations, and conflicts that arise in his life with his wife and others he encounters on a daily basis.
The genre of this short story would be comedy, Thurber’s writing style is quiet creative and imaginative, with themes of adventure, escapism. Symbols and images are the car, Mitty is unable to correctly park, the overshoes that he insists he doesn’t need, the gloves, and the tire chains he can’t correctly remove from the vehicle (Clugston, 2010). Characters in this short story are of course, Walter Mitty, Mrs. Mitty, the policeman, and the parking attendant. This story is the settings of Waterbury, Connecticut, on a cold afternoon, point of view told in the third person. First daydream occurs when Mitty and his wife are driving into Waterbury, Connecticut, Mitty thinks he is a commander at war in a hydroplane (Clugston, 2010). After experiencing this first daydream Mrs. Mitty reminds her husband as they are approaching the city to shop for overshoes for himself, which he insists that he doesn’t need, but as he leaves the car with a parking attendant , “he kicked at the slush on the sidewalk”(Clugston, 2010) which in fact he realizes that he does need overshoes, also before his wife went along to her appointment, she questioned Mitty as to why he wasn’t wearing his gloves because it was cold Mitty hastily put is gloves on, but as soon as she exited the car into the building for her appointment Mitty removed his
Tara Jackson
ENG 125 Introduction to Literature
Instructor Alfaro
April 18, 2011
The short story that I will do an analysis on is the Secret Life of Walter Mitty, written by James Thurber in March of 1939. This story centers around the hilarious and amusing daydreams of Walter Mitty an ordinary man, who resides in Waterbury, Connecticut, with his overbearing, nagging wife Mrs. Mitty. Throughout this short story Mitty is characterized as being a pathetic, timid man, who daydreams to deal with situations, and conflicts that arise in his life with his wife and others he encounters on a daily basis.
The genre of this short story would be comedy, Thurber’s writing style is quiet creative and imaginative, with themes of adventure, escapism. Symbols and images are the car, Mitty is unable to correctly park, the overshoes that he insists he doesn’t need, the gloves, and the tire chains he can’t correctly remove from the vehicle (Clugston, 2010). Characters in this short story are of course, Walter Mitty, Mrs. Mitty, the policeman, and the parking attendant. This story is the settings of Waterbury, Connecticut, on a cold afternoon, point of view told in the third person. First daydream occurs when Mitty and his wife are driving into Waterbury, Connecticut, Mitty thinks he is a commander at war in a hydroplane (Clugston, 2010). After experiencing this first daydream Mrs. Mitty reminds her husband as they are approaching the city to shop for overshoes for himself, which he insists that he doesn’t need, but as he leaves the car with a parking attendant , “he kicked at the slush on the sidewalk”(Clugston, 2010) which in fact he realizes that he does need overshoes, also before his wife went along to her appointment, she questioned Mitty as to why he wasn’t wearing his gloves because it was cold Mitty hastily put is gloves on, but as soon as she exited the car into the building for her appointment Mitty removed his