The Box Man Solitude

In The Box Man, written and narrated by Barbara Lazear Ascher, she uses the style of diction to compare and contrast the difference between the solitary and loneliness lifestyles. The reveals that “The Box Man” has chosen a solitary life style and lives in solitude, she also gives two more examples such as the lady down the hall, or the lady in the shop. She creates and clear image that the man overcame loneliness and lives a life of solitude become his own friend.
In the first few paragraphs she writes in a first person tone, observing the box man, she uses words such as, “silent fervor”, “dogged by luck”, and that he sits with “slow care” and opens newspapers “with ease”, which would be opposite of what most people would think of a “lonely” person, but actually he’s living a life of solitude. She then uses words such as “bland stares”, “strangers”, “exile” to describe the lonely people, the lady down the hall and the lady in the shop.
She provides the two examples of the lady in the shop, having a lonely lifestyle and assumes that she is all alone, she has kids but don’t want to see her, and she also talks about the lady down the hall that spends her time watching tv all day, which would seem normal to us, this provides her with credibility or ethos.
She then demonstrates pathos, when she consistently questions herself “may she not know what the box man knows” or what the lady does after eating at the shop past 6pm, or the lady who sits at home watching tv all day. Later on she starts to understand the box man, where as he can choose to listen to people or not, he lives in a free caring life that he chose to be alone and friends with himself rather than the women who did not choose but fell into loneliness.
She finally comes to the conclusion that the box man conquers over loneliness by choosing to live in a life of solitude and become a friend of his own, to understand himself completely, compared to the women who don’t know what to do anymore or seem very lonely, but instead he is very happy with his own carefree life and able to be happy, and in the last sentence she says “One could do worse than be a collector of boxes”, telling us that there’s worse life styles than being in solitude.