JGB's ENG 104

Throughout this story, the narrator, Shaila, struggles with her version of grief. She is numb and calm, though she feels the despair rip through her heart. Her brain, trying to cope, places visions of her family around her. She hears their voices at night, some part of her still tightly holding on because “it is […]

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“Girls clung to my stand, like the shipwrecked to their raft, and I could do no wrong.” In the “The Lifeguard,” by Mary Morris, the story’s theme is about ego and pride. In the beginning of the story we meet the main character and narrator Josh Micheals, who appears to be rather full of himself. […]

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That was when I saw Ric Spencer, running across the burning sand, waving his arms in an awkward way. He ran forward, then back, then  forward again, like a dog wanting to play catch. He kept waving, shouting, then rushing back again. Then, Mr. Potter, whose own failing heart kept him pacing the shore, came puffing to me. “A child,” […]

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In Mary Morris’s “The Lifeguard,” the main character Josh Michaels grew up without his father, but he doesn’t idolize him the way Les did in  Richard Ford’s “Communist”. In the story, Josh’s father is not mentioned much and Josh does not seem to be phased by the fact his father is dead. The only instance […]

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The story “The Lifeguard” shows perfectly just how a single instant can change someone’s whole life. From the start when Billy drowned because his father needed to take a phone call to Josh when ruined his date with Peggy by asking about said drowning, every event in the story takes place in a single moment […]

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I watched them curiously, these people whose life had been irrevocably altered with the sweep of a wave. (427) Morris’ “The Lifeguard” is a coming of age story that expresses how true character is developed through hands-on experience. This story also represents how quickly one’s life can be altered at any given moment. One must always see […]

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I’ve seen monsters rise from the belly of the deep when it’s only a big fish leaping into the air. (p. 427) Mary Morris’ short story “The Lifeguard” addresses the theme of death through the protagonist’s job of a lifeguard. The lifeguard, who is prepared for disasters that can occur within the ocean, even takes […]

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It was the first time I felt what it was supposed to feel like to be in the arms of a woman, not the girls whose breath steamed my car on Saturday nights. But it was not her body I felt, though I liked the feel of it, it was not her sex, though I […]

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In the story “The Lifeguard,” is told in first-person retrospective. The lifeguard is telling the story of his last summer before college. The lifeguard is self-centered at the beginning of the story. “I was eighteen then. I wore zinc oxide on my nose, a whistle around my neck. No. 4 Coppertone covered my body. I […]

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In “The Lifeguard,” Morris suggests that one’s true age is a reflection of their knowledge and their own life. The narrator says, “I loved my body that summer. I loved its firmness and its bronzed skin. But mostly I loved the way it was admired.” (427) By all accounts, he is physically mature, as most boys […]

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I felt myself longing for something I could never have, and I wanted her to take me back, fold me inside of herself as she’d folded Becky that afternoon. But then she let me go. I grabbed at her trying to hold on, as if her arms could save me from what came next. (Morris, […]

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The saying ignorance is bliss is something society has come to accept as true. However, Mary Morris’ “Lifeguard,” uses this saying ironically, as ignorance becomes horror. The following is the anticlimax that ignorance has brought about. Sally Spencer, who’d once dug her nails into my arm during horror movies of my youth, now did so again. “you’re […]

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Then Mrs. Lovenheim turned to me where I stood, first-aid kit dangling in my hand like a lunch box. I felt as if she were about to say or do something, but instead, without a word, she moved past me back to her umbrella, collected her things, and left” (430). These two sentences really summed […]

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“In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried” by Amy Hampel, has many Allusions, but one stands out the most and that is the sign language chimp. It stands out not because its mentioned multiple time, but because it has a deeper connection with what is going on. It becomes a symbol within the story, […]

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She wants every minute, I thought.  She wants my life. In the short story by Amy Hempel the reader encounters two young women who remain unamed. One woman is clearly sick in the hospital, and the other woman is meant to be a “supportive” friend. I did notice that there is a tone of resentment […]

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“Tell me things I won’t mind forgetting,” she said. “Make it useless stuff or skip it.” I began. I told her insects fly through rain, missing every drop, never getting wet. I told her no one in America owned a tape recorder before Bing Crosby did. I told her the shape of the moon is like a banana — you […]

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Amy Hempel’s “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried” begins in medias res. Beginning the story in the middle of the action introduces the reader to the reoccurring concept of the story– fear of the inevitable. The narrator, a loyal companion to her sick and dying friend (also referred to as Best Friend), tells her friend strange and […]

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But the beach is standing still today. Everyone on it is tranquilized, numb, or asleep…They pose” (4). This passage shows that the main character can sense the hollow feeling of the people on the beach. They almost identify with going through the motions just to get through the moment. The teenage girls put on suntan […]

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If one had to choose a singular mood that encompasses the entirety of this story, I would choose denial. It keeps the Best Friend from spiraling into depression at her situation and keeps the narrator from doing it for her. The trivial bits of information we receive as we read are one of the coping […]

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Amy Hempel’s “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried” starts in medias res and is narrated in first person through the main character: a young unnamed woman, occasionally referred to as “the Best Friend.” The narrator struggles with her friend’s illness and impeding death, and often uses sarcasm to evade the subject when it comes up, […]

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Throughout Amy Hempel’s story, “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried” there is a conversation that is revisited that compares the life of Al Jolson to that of a lab test chimp. “Did you know that when they taught the first chimp to talk, it lied? That when they asked her who did it […]

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Did you know that when they taught the first chimp to talk, it lied? That when they asked her who did it on the desk, she signed back the name of the janitor. (1) Amy Hempel’s story “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson is Buried” follows a symbol of a chimp, which was first introduced […]

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I wanted her to be afraid with me. But she said, “I don’t know. I’m just not.” She was afraid of nothing, not even of flying. This story by Amy Hempel is very different from other short stories. She doesn’t give the readers any names for the characters except “The Best Friend,” “The Good Doctor,” […]

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In the story,”In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried,” the narrator is afriaid of death and refuses to accept that her friend will die. Even when her friend does die, the narrator refuses to visit the grave or attend the funeral. The narrator fears death and dying alone. On the the morning she was […]

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In the story “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried,” Amy Hempel suggests that losing a close friend can feel like losing a limb. At the start of the story, the reader is not given any context, setting, or background for the characters. The narrator tells the story as it happens and as she […]

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