That adult male begins deceasing on the minute the first breath is taken at birth is a fact of life and is possibly one of its greatest sarcasms. How good life is lived is a witting determination everyone has to do throughout the journey from its beginning to life ‘s inevitable terminal. In Happy Endings, Margaret Atwood ( 1983 ) tells a narrative about love and gender in a satirical mode where the characters are portrayed as stereotypes of the male and female genders. In contrast, a verse form by Michael Ondaatje ( 1982 ) called “ The Cinnamon Peeler ” which takes a more empyreal reading on the affair and the verse form ‘s attractively written prose emits a feeling of heat that makes one privation to cuddle in forepart of a hearth with a loved 1. This essay intends to carry on an interpretational and critical analysis on Atwood ‘s short narrative and Ondaatje ‘s verse form by concentrating on the issues of love and gender and that of life and decease embedded in these literary pieces. The diverging positions of the writers on these issues without a uncertainty will do interesting comparing and analysis.
Happy Endings takes a different attack to storytelling by leting the reader to do a pick on the events and fortunes of the narrative such that if a happy stoping is preferred so scenario A should be chosen. Scenario A though is implied as drilling and inconsequential by the writer and even the characters are bland and forgettable. As the reader reads on the other scenarios so that is where the secret plan thickens and the deadening characters John and Mary take on more form and deepness. In scenario B, Atwood presents the first stereotype on love and gender between the genders: unanswered love. The tone besides changes with the scenario and the writer ‘s pick of words is evocative of her angst against the male self-importance and its insensibilities to adult females. John is portrayed as a character who takes advantage of Mary to satiate his sexual impulses and nil else underneath the physiological satisfaction. Mary though is in love with John and tries her best to be meriting of John ‘s love. Her attempts to win John ‘s love prove to be futile as the narrative returns and the reader will happen another act that is typical of love personal businesss: treachery. John betrays Mary who could hold seen this coming when John complained of her cookery. Mistake determination is a cosmopolitan mark when a relationship is headed south and is typical of both genders to make so. As the narrative continues the reader will happen Mary, a true romantic possibly, perpetrating self-destruction and trusting John will come to her deliverance at the really terminal. Mary ‘s hopes we unfounded though and the narrative ends tragically. The stoping though is non tragic, it is really expected and as pointed out by the writer in a caution towards the terminal of the narrative, the stoping is similar: John and Mary will decease. In scenario C, the narrative takes and interesting turn and John reemerges as a more developed character. Here, he is depicted and as an older adult male married to Madge and is holding an illicit matter with Mary which is once more stereotyped of relationships. The scenario besides introduces a new character, James, a free spirited bike siting immature adult male who has a fabulous record aggregation and Mary is in love with him. One twenty-four hours, they both got stoned jumped to bed and John found them in an sturdy state of affairs so he gets his gun, hit them and so he turns the gun to himself. The fortunes were different in this scenario but ends merely as tragically however.
The narrative continues with other possibilities in Madge ‘s life like run intoing a suited adult male after her period of mourning named Fred. They get along good, married finally and ended up like scenario A merely with different names. The writer makes a point sing the exchangeability of characters connoting that this could go on to anyone and the stoping remains the same. This is besides highlighted in the succeeding scenarios where Fred and Madge ‘s house was brought down by a tidal moving ridge but the twosome survived the catastrophe and the one where Fred has a bad bosom and the narrative ends necessarily the same. Atwood besides suggested that the reader may go every bit adventuresome as possible and portray John as a revolutionary and Mary a undercover agent and yet the terminal will be merely the same.
Happy Endings tells the reader that what is of import in a narrative merely every bit much as in life is neither the beginning nor the stoping but what is in the center that matters most. It is the span of clip in between the minute adult male takes his first and last breath that affairs. Atwood though shared that beginnings are fun but true cognoscentes, those who has a passion for life favour what is in between because this is the portion where it is difficult to make anything with because of its capriciousness and invariably alterations with every determination that people makes. Atwood ‘s Happy Ending may hold a instead misanthropic attack on the topic of love and gender and of life and decease but it seems to work instead good in conveying the message of the narrative to its readers. The straightforward mode on how the narrative was told and the informal tone and usage of words reiterates the message that in order to populate life good, adult male should turn over with the clouts and larn to take hazards and non play safe like a happy stoping would. Finally, Atwood reiterates that its non merely the what, what, what that affairs ; adult male must besides seek the how and the why. If and so, who knows? Life will stop merely the same anyhow.
Michael Ondaatje ‘s “ The Cinnamon Peeler ” takes on love and gender through symbolism and sexual overtones throughout the verse form. The inspiration is rather obvious, cinnamon comes from Sri Lanka and the writer is of Sri Lankan descent. Cinnamon at one clip in history is said to be a trade good every bit valuable as gold. It is non the same in the present though but the aroma of cinnamon is as distinctive at it is now and a century ago. This is what the verse form is all approximately, a drama of the senses and sensualness. Unlike the short narrative tackled earlier, the verse form delves non much into life or decease but love of the genitive sort. It provides an penetration to the writers psyche as to the clip when the verse form was written co-occuring with his separation from his married woman.
The first stanza of the verse form pertains to sexuality evidenced as evidenced by the words such as ‘ride your bed ‘ and populating a grade on the pillows every bit good as on the adult female ‘s organic structure who would smack of his aroma and even if the she bathes it would still be recognizable. These lines reiterate the writer ‘s message of conveying genitive love to one ‘s object of desire. The 3rd stanza is besides full of gender and explores the female anatomy from the poet ‘s description of the upper thigh and the line ‘neighbor to your hair ‘ which pertains to the adult female ‘s pubic country. Likewise, this overpowering physical attractive force is symbolized in the 4th stanza where the aroma was masked with ‘saffron and smoking pitch ‘ else the adult female ‘s female parent and brothers will take notice of the desire. The following few stanzas take mention to a yesteryear from the cinnamon stripper ‘s memory. This can be interpreted as the writer go throughing through memory lane on some experiences shared with his married woman. This is symbolized in the verse form on the lines ‘left with no hint, as if non spoken to in an act of love, as if wounded without the pleasance of cicatrix ‘ . The verse form ends with the lines ‘I am the cinnamon stripper ‘s married woman. Smell me ‘ . A gesture that could merely every bit good intend that the adult female will everlastingly be left with the aroma and will everlastingly be his.
The short narrative ‘Happy Endings ‘ and the verse form ‘The Cinnamon Peeler ‘s Wife ‘ wages tribute to our humanity and our preference for love and our gender. Man by nature is born with these emotional and physiological desires and it is his nature to be seeking both. What is more profound though is that adult male is cognizant of the possible reverberations and chooses to be merely the same. Is it because adult male knows that being is limited and the inevitable is merely a affair of clip?
