This Fella I Knew Essay

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This Fella I Knew In this essay I will be analyzing the short story, “This Fella I Knew” by the Irish author Bernard MacLaverty. Not only will I explore the use of language and how the story was told; I will also dig deeper observing how Irish culture is portrayed, in addition to statements that make the this story effective. This story, unlike most, is told in the persona of a traditional storyteller. As the author chose to write the story in this fashion, naturally it makes it very informal. Throughout the story there were references to us, the reader, with the narrator asking us questions like “ Would you credit?” and the use of words like “us,” “are” and “before our friend” makes us feel involved and our opinions cherished, like we’re sitting right next to the storyteller, in his world. Furthermore Standard English is not used, instead Irish slang is used, for instance: “the best part of £50,” not to mention the well-known Irish saying: “Boyo.” Mockery is also a main element of the storyteller persona. A recurring feature in this story is how the narrator mocks the main character and his career path. One way in which the narrator mocked the packaging industry was when he said, “no matter if it was a bar of soft shite- it became a best-seller.” Moreover the narrator ridicules Universities, saying that although the main character “did a degree in all kinds of things” he ended up folding shirts “across the water,” basically stating that achieving higher education is not worth it. With both an informal tone and forms of humor the storyteller changes are view to that of a villager living in the country, allowing us to relate to the story a little better than we would usually. Based on the story I believe that the storyteller is of a working class, I think this as he uses colloquial and informal language, in addition there were many intentional grammatical
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