Homework Clinic
Social Science Clinic => English => Topic started by: daltonest1984 on Jul 20, 2018
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What statements does the narrator make that seem unreliable?
What will be an ideal response?
Question 2
Can we equate the narrators voice with Weltys? What clues does theauthor give that Sisters opinions are not her own?
What will be an ideal response?
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Answer to Question 1
- Consider, to take one instance, Uncle Rondo, who had seemingly turned against Stella-Rondo at one time because she did something horrible to himbroke a chain letter from Flanders Field, causing him to take back the radio he had given her and let Sister have it. He is on an annual Fourth of July drunken binge during much of the story. He is wearing a kimono from Stella-Rondos trousseau, leading to a conversation between the sisters. Stella-Rondo reportedly states that Uncle Rondo looks like a fool in it, thats all. Sister defends him: Well, he looks as good as he can I says. Its good as anyone in reason could. Yet this is a half-hearted defense at best, and when Stella-Rondo later tells Uncle Rondo that Sister says, Uncle Rondo certainly does look like a fool in that kimono we are left to question which version of the conversation is the more reliable. Regardless, Uncle Rondo believes StellaRondo, leading him to ignite a package of firecrackers in Sisters bedroom early the next morning, the event that finally precipitates her packing of her thingsmany, like the four-oclocks growing in the yard, of dubious ownership at bestand moving into the P.O.
To take another example, Sisters suggestion that she is being maligned and misrepresented by Stella-Rondo may be called into question by the dissatisfaction she registers toward her grandfather and the job he used his influence to get as China Groves postmistress: Oh, Papa-Daddy, I says, I didnt say any such of a thing. I never dreamed your beard was a birds nest, I have always been grateful though this is the next to smallest P.O. in the state of Mississippi, and I do not enjoy being referred to as a hussy by my own grandfather (par. 21). Here, Sister narrates two versions of a conversation, and her protests do not prevent Papa-Daddy from believing Stella-Rondos versionfor Sister, evidence that Stella-Rondo turns everyone against her; for the reader, evidence both of her paranoia and her unreliability as a narrator.
Answer to Question 2
- As indicated above, the narrators voice is certainly not to be confused with that of the author. Sisters function as an unreliable narrator is intimately connected to her role as a Southern grotesque whose verbal and psychological exaggerations both mirror and instigate her ultimate isolation from her family that eventually leaves her alone at the P.O. Sisters paranoia and jealousy lead her to question the veracity of her family members, particularly Stella-Rondo. They also lead her to engage in conversations with her family that lead to her final, comic alienation from themusually because, as she perceives it, one family member falsely reports her comments to another.