AT THE END OF THE ROAD
Mr. Clayton Hamilton says in “A Manual of the Art of Fiction” (page 187), “—although the novel may be either realistic or romantic in general method, the short-story is almost of necessity obliged to be romantic. In the brief space allotted to him, it is practically impossible for the writer of short-stories to induce a general truth from particular, imagined facts imitated from actuality: it is far simpler to deduce the imagined details of the story from a central thesis, held securely in the author’s mind and suggested to the reader at the outset. It is a quicker process to think from the truth to facts than to think from facts to the truth.” And in illustration of his statement, he adds that Daudet and de Maupassant, who worked realistically in their novels, worked romantically in their contes, also that the great short-story writers of our own language have been, nearly all of them, romanticists—from Poe to Kipling.
With this interesting tenet in mind, look over all the realistic stories in the four volumes we are studying, and try to apply to each the same methods by which the romantic stories are studied. Does the application break down? How far can you follow it? Try, for example, to analyze the plot of “At the End of the Road” according to the type used again and again in this book.
Why is this story told in the first person? Try telling it in the third person, beginning that is, “The latter part of the summer found him tramping,” etc., and see what is lost.
Recall stories which have for setting a picnic ground, a fair ground, or other community gathering. Read Thomas Hardy’s “On the Western Circuit.” (In “Life’s Little Ironies.”) Why is such a setting good for many types of story—whether realistic, romantic, comic, tragic?
Who is the central figure in Mr. Muilenburg’s Iowa story? Would his story gain importance if detached from the subjectivity of the narrator—if the musings, observations and feelings were cut? What would happen to the whole narrative if such a change were made? Sum up the gist of the “story” in a few words.
What is the struggle? Wherein lies the human appeal?
What is the end of the action? How do you know?
The drunkard is an age-old figure, whether humorous or tragic. What is the essential difference between the tragic and the humorous portrayal? Why, for instance, does one laugh at an actor who plays the part of Cassio, in the drinking-scene from “Othello”? Why does one “feel sorry for” Bill as here conceived?
What theme is lightly touched and where?
What has this example of Mr. Muilenburg’s work in common with the preceding story by him?
What color comes to mind instantly on thinking of his chromatic effects? Is it in harmony with the other story-elements? Are there notes of contrast?