The group carries on with their friendly conversation. The visitor acknowledges that he is young and has no accomplishments of note, but hopes he will have "achieved my destiny" before he dies and then "I shall have built my monument!" The father expresses the wish for a more humble legacy, and the aged grandmother makes a request for her dying day.
Suddenly, they are alarmed by the sound of a much larger avalanche. They scream in fear of "The Slide!" and bolt outside for their safe place. But they are all caught up in the rockslide and killed, while the house is completely undamaged. Their bodies are swept away and never found. The narrator notes that some who see the house later think there is evidence of a visitor that night, but others disagree - the young man has in fact died without leaving any trace of his life.
The basis of the story is the Willey tragedy of Crawford Notch, New Hampshire.
it is about the virtue of tranquility with a family of cozily gathrerily around the hearth
You May Also Find These Documents Helpful
-
A harmonious and peaceful atmosphere is created through the accumulation of positive images: My father’s sits out in the evening/ with his dog, smoking, / watching the stars and the street lights come on’’. Feliks’s self-sufficiency and contentment contrast to Peter’s discontent: ‘’ Happy as I have never been.’’ This is ironic, considering that Feliks’s life has been more difficult. Feliks’s capacity to enjoy a sense of belonging has come through his experience of suffering. His mind has been broadened to understanding what really matters in life.…
- 1085 Words
- 5 Pages
Better Essays -
Point: the poem opens with a positive description of Peter Skrzynecki’s father and his detachment from the consumer competitiveness of his neighbours. His home is the garden…
- 758 Words
- 4 Pages
Good Essays -
In line seventeen, be can seen in words What and world and happiness and harmony. In line thirty eight, there are words tale, terror, their, turbulency and tells. In line forty five, there are words frantic fire. Words desperate desire, in line fourty seven. Words tale, their, terror and tells, can be found again in line fifty two. In line fifty four, words clang and clash. Words melancholy menace, in line seventy five. Word” muffled monotone”, in line eighty three. Words “human heart”, in line eighty five. And the last, words “ Runic rhyme”,…
- 154 Words
- 1 Page
Satisfactory Essays -
The poem follows the narrator’s internal monologue as he revisits a place of nostalgia that ignited his love of nature. His fears that the picturesque scene of his childhood has been idealized are quieted as he sees the place for the first time in five years, falling in love with the environment all over again. He even credits nature as “The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,/The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul/Of all my moral being” (Wordsworth LL. 109-111). His ecological thinking recharges his soul and makes him feel joyful about life once again. Nature also connects the narrator to his sister, who he sees himself in because of their love of the countryside. He acknowledges his sister the first time in the poem as his “dear, dear Friend; and in thy voice I catch/The language of my former heart, and read/My former pleasures in the shooting lights/Of thy wild eyes” (Wordsworth LL.…
- 830 Words
- 4 Pages
Good Essays -
Overall this poem is the portrayal of a cohesive family unit, working and living harmoniously together.…
- 840 Words
- 4 Pages
Good Essays -
Once school started again, the three girls tried to catch the ghost. They found a trap door leading to a tunnel that ultimately led to the broom closet in the kitchen. They found out how the food was stolen, but they did not know who did it. The culprit ended up being Tommy, the workman’s son. After this was proven, the girls received a heartfelt apology from Miss Clark; and they went on enjoying their days at Rivercote. They were no longer the same mystifying twins they once were.…
- 399 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
In the afternoon; as I leave for the garden and water the trees and plants which circumvent this house, I abide and forbear the remarks that grow from the neighbouring buildings. Moreover, I ask myself on a moral basis and for repeated times how to ignore their insignificant annoying deeds; nuisances that border the legitimate norms and cause extreme pressure as they move and accumulate.…
- 119 Words
- 1 Page
Good Essays -
The Heath Anthology of American Literature: Volume D: Modern Period 1910-1945 (5th Edition) by Paul Lauter, General Editor. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company, a division of Cengage Learning, 2006.…
- 4176 Words
- 17 Pages
Powerful Essays -
The boy and the man continually search among the debris in the aftermath of the cataclysmic event for morsels of food and warmth. Though they are forced to breathe thick ash in the air and travel in constant cold, they continually trudge forward. It is apparent that the father is slowly losing his faith in humanity and their situation, and parts of him wish it could just all be over. They must find food and clean water, and they must constantly hide. There are marauding groups of cannibals who look upon the man and boy as nothing more than meat. The lone bullet in the man’s gun is saved for the boy, who has been instructed on how to kill himself should something happen to the man. This young…
- 1230 Words
- 5 Pages
Better Essays -
Stretching in pensive quietness between; The vernal woods--rivers that move In majesty, and the complaining brooks That make the meadows green; and pour'd round all, Old ocean's grey and melancholy waste,-- Are but the solemn…
- 819 Words
- 4 Pages
Good Essays -
The story takes place in different parts of Georgia. The beginning of the story is at a family Georgia home where the reader is introduced the main character the Grandmother and supporting characters her son and his family. The…
- 1821 Words
- 8 Pages
Better Essays -
A meditation on good and evil, on desperation and hypocrisy -- tells of a servant who cannot decide whether to steal or starve until he meets an old woman who is pulling the hair out of corpses. Lacking compassion or empathy, he fails to recognize himself in her.…
- 359 Words
- 2 Pages
Satisfactory Essays -
In "The Guest" Albert Camus uses irony to convey the existential theme of making what you believe to be the moral choice regardless of the consequences. This theme reflects Camus ' existential philosophies, stressing free choice and responsibility for one 's actions in addition to the inevitability of death. This philosophy plays a major role in the theme and structure of this story, and stresses the individual 's unique position as a self determining agent responsible for the authenticity of his or her choices. In the short story, Daru has several choices to make. He can either deliver the Arab to prison, obeying the government 's orders but angering and isolating himself from his community, or he has the choice to set the Arab free, pleasing his community but going against the orders of his government. Both of these choices will most likely result in Daru feeling guilt and angst. However, not making a choice is also an option for Daru. He could allow the Arab to make the choice for himself resulting in, theoretically, no angst and no conflict. The irony within the story lies within these choices and the choice Daru ultimately makes.…
- 971 Words
- 3 Pages
Good Essays -
The narrative structure adopted in this poem is third person limited. In the wife’s point of view, this is effective as a wife wants a family more than husband and belonging to a place is closely tied to belonging in a family.…
- 347 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
When the narrator and his wife enter their cellar, the cats tripped him. He was very angry, and want to use the axe to kill the cat, however his wife stopped him. Because of her interruption, he hits her head with the axe, killing her instantly. When realized that he cannot remove the body from the house, he considers ways to conceal it, including cutting it up and burning it, digging a grave in the cellar, throwing the corpse into the well, and packing it up in a box and having it carried out of the house under the guise of merchandise. Meanwhile, he decides to wall it up with plaster in the cellar behind a false fireplace, nobody would know it. The narrator tries to find the cat in order to kill it, but he could not find the cat, and he sleeps well that night, free of…
- 419 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays