Painted Door

1. After seven years of ever-lurking silence Ann does something she soon regrets. At the end of the story Ann says, “If you knew him though- John would try” (p. 7). So did Ann really know John? I think Ann did know John and she knew that he would come home like he always did. But I think she let herself believe what Steven continued to say which was no one would risk coming home in such a bad storm. Ann always had feelings for Steven, but they were all for the wrong reasons. So I think her act with Steven was her defiance of seven years of ‘ever-lurking silence’ with John. Ann always felt alone with John and I think she thought Steven could give her more than what John had given her, but soon after her act with Steven she realized she was wrong. Ann realized John was a man and there was nothing Steven could give her that John wouldn’t, but by the time Ann realized this it was too late.

2. John was a victim of his wife’s betrayal. He was able to fight his way through the storm only because of his love and devotion for Ann. But little did John know that Ann had surrendered to the storm while he was trying to fight the storm only to come home, to see what was happening while he was gone. Before John left for his fathers, he said to Ann, “Twice a week before we were married I never missed and there were bad blizzards that winter” (p. 1). John truly loved Ann but she betrayed him which led to his death the night of the terrible storm. It was Ann’s disappointing love and actions that made John think that he was a bad husband. Which led to John going back out into the storm, he thought that with him out of the picture Ann and Steven could be happy together. Due to Ann’s and Steven’s actions John died. John was a victim- not of the snow, but of his wife’s betrayal.

3. The story is told in a third-person omniscience point of view, and at the beginning of the story there is a shared omniscience where both Ann’s and John’s perspectives are given. But when John leaves,