Marxist Reading Of A & P By John Updike

This story could make one wonder, how far would you go to get the person of your dreams. Three young ladies walk into the A&P store wearing nothing but bathing suits. The girls catch the attention of Sammy who is the cashier. Sammy watches the girls walk around the store while making mental notes about each one of the girls. When Mr. Lengel the store manager sees the girls, he lets them know that the store policy is to have your shoulders covered and to dress appropriately when you enter the store. This conversation upsets Sammy, so in the moment Sammy spontaneously quits his job in hopes of being the girl’s hero. After Sammy takes off his apron and walks out the door he looks around, but the girls have already gone. Within John Updike’s short story “A&P” the author uses foreshadowing, a dynamic character, and symbolism to show us how life can be unpredictable at times.

The short story “A&P” written by John Updike, is about three girls who change Sammy’s life. The three girls came from the beach and are not dressed properly to enter a grocery store called A&P. Sammy, the main character, is a check out clerk, and observes every detail about the girls. Sam even gives each of the girls a name. His favorite is “Queenie.” Sammy is obviously the type of guy who doesn’t get a lot of girls. Sam has a conflict of person vs. society. Because of his dead end job, obsession with Queenie, and his noble act to save the girls from embarrassment, Sammy has a conflict between himself and society.

In John Updike’s coming of age story “A&P,” the protagonist Sammy sees what he believes to be an unfair act to three teenage girls in bikini in the grocery store. He makes an immature decision and quits in front of his manager that decided to address the girls about their clothing choice in front of the entire grocery store, instead of talking to them in private. Unfortunately, the teenage girls do not notice Sammy’s heroic act, and he is left alone in the parking lot to face the repercussions of his childish actions. John Updike chooses to write in first-person, so the reader gets to know the narrator’s real character. In his short story “A&P,” John Updike demonstrates that Sammy is an immature character immaturity from his disrespectful personality, judgmental attitude, and misogynist beliefs.

The story happens in 1961. This is the post war period when the market is prospering at the time. New ideas, such as dressing freely comes up as the economy grows. A&P is in a small town located in northern Boston, far away from the big cities. People there are not ready for the changes in the way people dress openly and in mindsets. People’s values in Sammy’s community are conformed. As Sammy points out that: “we’re right in the middle of town, and the women generally put on a shirt or shorts or something before they get out of the car in to the street.” Women in this town should not wear revealing costumes to public places. This is not only people’s values, but their policy. When three girls dressing in bathing suits show up in A&P, they get condemned by the manager Lengel. Lengle, the lower class in society, is the representation for conservative in the town. As a manager, he supposes to put customers’ need in the first place. However, he puts his personal value above business’s principle. He reprimands Queenie that: “We want you decently dressed when you come in here” (749). “It’s our policy” (749). It is obvious that people are under strict supervision in this town. They are not allowed to dress what they want, but should follow the town’s dressing standard. Therefore, Updike creates a conserved setting that helps to reinforce the theme of conformity versus personal

John Updike presents significant items to represent certain points in the story like the girls bathing suits, the herring snacks, and the sheep. When the girls walk into the A&P, they caused a disruption mainly because of what they were wearing, bathing suits. During that time, women were expected to be fully clothed when entering a store or else they drew attention to their sexuality, which Sammy noticed quickly. As everyone reacted to their bathing suits it later represented a kind of freedom to Sammy. After Lengal body shames them saying, “Girls, I don't want to argue with you. After this come in here with your shoulders covered. It's our policy” (Updike 20), it crushed Sammy’s freedom feeling, so he reacted. Sammy also feels the contrast between the girls and the sheep as they try to purchase

John Updike, one of the most forward-thinking and socially provocative writers of the 50s and 60s, is known for his “incisive presentation of the quandaries of contemporary personal and social life.” (Lawn 529) Updike graduated from Harvard University and wrote for one of the more cutting edge publications like The New Yorker- both are notoriously ahead of their time and harbor controversial ideas. In his short story “A&P”, Updike reveals a young man named Sammy in a society on the brink of a social revolution- one in which a group of girls and an innocent cashier will unknowingly lead. Updike, through symbolism and syntax, shows how the girls are leading the revolution, how Sammy is feeling the wrath of this revolution, and

Love between two genders is one of the most common themes in writing. In literature, love is often praised, appreciated and cherished. Another common theme in writing is the looming specter of inequality between men and women, which has been strongly depicted throughout history and is still worryingly present in the world today. It is extremely interesting to realize that though love is treasured and valued, in most cases, it takes both genders to create love, and those genders are often separated by inequality. Both these themes coincide well together; the clash of love and gender inequality is interestingly captivating. In John Updikes A&P and Ernest Hemingway’s Hills Like White Elephants, both stories send a conclusive message to the reader that equality between both sexes in love and attraction is almost impossible; one gender will always be more powerful than the other.

As people age, maturity and wisdom is gained through every experiences. From the time a child turns eighteen and becomes an adult, they are required to deal with the realities of the real world and learn how to handle its responsibilities. In John Updike's short story, "A&P", the narrator Sammy, a young boy of nineteen, makes a major change to his life fueled by nothing more than his immaturity and desire to do what he wants and because of that, he has do deal with the consequences.

The short story “A & P” by John Updike is about a young man’s decision to stand up for others or, in the other characters’ opinions, make a foolish decision by abandoning his responsibility. At first he believes his decision is the right thing, quitting his job for how the girls were being treated. Then when he gets outside of the store, he realizes the world he just left behind, regrets his decision, and begins to question his actions. He starts to overthink what the world has to offer him, making his worldview change from underrating to overrating. His “unsure of the world’s dangers” worldview in the beginning changes to overrating the dangers of the future ahead at the end of the story causing Sammy to change throughout “A & P”.

John Updike’s ‘A&P’, is about a young man’s struggle with morality, authority, and freedom. Through a series of events Sammy witnessed injustice in his workplace leading him to quit his job. When Sammy quit his job he was taking a stand against authority because he longed for freedom from the A&P and his manager. Sammy made the leap from an adolescent, knowing little about life, into a man facing the consequences from his actions. John Updike’s use of language and actions reveal the internal struggles and relationships of a young man growing into adulthood.

“A&P” and “Girl” both symbolized the protagonists’ oppression by an older, more experienced generation. However, Kincaid’s “Girl” was artistic with an undercurrent of selfless love and hope while Updike’s “A&P” was uninspiring with selfishness and lust. The protagonist of “Girl” discouraged her daughter’s dreams out of love. The protagonist of “A & P” encouraged the antagonists’ out of a selfish desire for self-promotion.

Bentley, Greg W.. "Sammy's Erotic Experience: Subjectivity and Sexual Difference in John Updike's 'A & P'." Journal of the Short Story In English 43 (2004): 121-141. Gale Group. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.

In the story “A&P” by John Updike he tries to portray the conventional lifestyle and tendency of his community. The story “A&P” proves how feminism was a large part of the conservative lifestyle and is still present today. A&P helps you visualize how sexism could be happening right under our noses. The story is told through the main character Sammy, who is an ordinary teenager in the small town. Sammy makes a courageous effort to fight feminism and introduces ideas of liberalism but sadly loses his job in the process. The story A&P, based in the 1950’s, directly correlates to how women were treated in that time period. From the story A&P we can learn the distinct and harsh gender

Sexuality and personal growth has and always will be a topic of conversation in real life and even in fiction short stories. The idea of sexuality has just recently not only became an open idea to discuss but one to also write and publish about. Both Alice Munro and John Updike both illustrate the idea of sexuality and personal growth in very different ways. “The Found Boat” by Alice Munro, deals with sexuality in an aggressive manner while “A&P” by John Updike, deals more with the idea of sexuality rather than sexuality itself. They also have very similar elements of fiction that include (but is not limited to) characters, theme and conflict. The characters relate in both

This imagery shows the kind of scandalous clothing that they were wearing giving them the power to bring attention and desire to Sammy and his coworkers. They stood no chance to these appealing looks that the girls had with the help of the bathing suits and the environment that they were in as Sammy describes “You know, it’s one thing in to have a girl in a bathing suit down on the beach, where what with the glare nobody can look at each other much anyway, and another thing in the cool of the A & P, under the fluorescent lights, against all those stacked packages, with her feet paddling along naked over our checker-board green-and-cream rubber-tile floor.” (Updike 165). This also shows that Sammy can not control himself once he unleashes his descriptive imagination when thinking about Queenie and her friends walking through the store.