Analysis Of An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge

• What are the ways in which each major character experiences conflict (either with self, with other characters, or with the social and/or physical environment)?

Ambrose Bierce’s short story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” is a story about a man’s final moments on earth before he is hanged and how he got there. There is a struggle within the character Farquhar of who he is and who he thinks he is. This causes different views throughout the story between reality and a fantasized reality. This plays a big role in the story because in part three of the story he thinks he is far superior and had outwitted his captures and escaped without a scratch after the rope broke and fell into the water. In reality he had been hanged and his body was swaying back and forth. This story had more meaning then just the top layer of being just about a guy who is being hanged. The meaning of this story is how fluid time moves, by this I mean how time seems to flow like a river it can move fast to slow and even seem to stand still. It has a secondary meaning of how we can fantasize another reality that can cause troubles for us. By this I mean you can envision your self into another world when you are still in the actual world, this can cause you to get yourself into a lot of trouble.

In the passage “Two Ways of Seeing a River,” author Mark Twain attempts to share the feelings of loss he experienced after he was disillusioned to the beauty of the Mississippi River. Twain was a famous Nineteenth century author who had previously worked as a steamboat captain and who grew up along the river. The organization of the paragraphs in relation to each other is linear, and the content of each paragraph is dominated by a different rhetorical device.

The temporal setting “oppress the character with the shape of a pendulum” (3) He fears its deadly velocity which represents his final hours of life. He feels terror of the doom that will “cut” his time on earth. As everyone knows, this symbolizes that death is inevitable.

is exiled from his mind during his deployment in the war, then his family once he gets home, and

He was running at my side, out of breath, at the end of his strength, at wit's end. I had no right to let myself die. What would he do without me? I was his only support." (64).

Ambrose Bierce’s short story, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” illustrates a theme of illusion versus reality distorted by the human mind. In the story, a man named Peyton Farquhar is about to be hanged on a railroad bridge towards the end of the American Civil War. Farquhar, a Confederate citizen eager to help the Confederate States of America’s cause, ventures out towards Owl Creek Bridge at the advice of a Union scout in disguise. Unbeknownst to Farquhar, Union troops captured the bridge and surrounding territory, and upon capturing Farquhar, elect to hang him on charges of being a Confederate spy and sympathizer. As he is being hanged, however, Farquhar is able to escape his fate by falling into the river below. He manages to return back to his home, only to find out the entire experience of escape was an illusion created by his own imagination. The story concludes with the revelation that he actually died on the railroad bridge. Farquhar’s mind was able to create a whole new reality for himself. This reality was vivid, and it seems real to the reader until the very end of the story. The hallucination also spanned hours, yet in reality time passed for only a few seconds. Ambrose Bierce’s story demonstrates the impeccable powers of the human mind and its ability to distort time and reality for itself.

betrayal, and violence. His father abandoned him seeking to find a life less confrontational to a

Bierce plays a mind game with the reader that explores an impossible reality. Although it is not conceivable to be inside someone's head to experience his or her thoughts, Bierce's narrator does a commendable job of creating a fictional, yet believable example of this impossibility. Bierce's method allows the reader to become deeply intimate with the details of the profound occurrence of Farquhar's death. He creates a

The author, Ambrose Bierce, writes with a devotion to realism that is made apparent in not only "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" but also one of his most noteworthy short stories; "Chickamauga." The story tells of a small boy who becomes lost in the woods while entertaining himself and becomes lost. The boy is then forced to spend the night in the forest and upon waking, he lays his eyes on what appears to be animals wading across a river. "They crept upon their hands and knees. They had their hands only, dragging their legs. They used their knees only, their arms hanging idle at their sides" (Bierce, "Chickamauga) The author gives an extremely detailed depiction on how the soldiers looked climbing out of the brook, however so vaguely described using the actions of

“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” is a short film based off a story by Ambrose Bierce. The director of this film is Robert Enrico. This film took place in Alabama of 1961. This film is one of the most popular films ever made in the 1900s. “The work was a winner at the Cannes Film Festival and also at the Academy Awards (Best Short Film, 1963)” (Petrie & Boggs 245). This quote tells the audience how enjoyable and famous this film was in the time of its release. Even now a days, this film continues to be very delighting and interesting in my personal opinion. I was surprised of my thought about this film, because I do not usually enjoy silent films. This film illustrates several different types of themes throughout the duration of the film.

The writer of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Ambrose Bierce, uses various literary devices and drives the plot forward in a fashion that builds suspense. Bierce paints a clear picture of the pain and feelings that Farquhar goes through in regards to the constriction of the noose and the heat of the bullets. While Farquhar is swimming, he is being berated with bullets and he somehow dodges them all. While this is happening, Bierce uses imagery and inner dialog to build suspense and make the reader anticipate whether Farquhar will be shot or not. This suspense is relieved when Farquhar makes it to the river’s edge.

A man, who wanted to join the Confederate army but wasn’t able to, set fire to Owl Creek Bridge which was a bridge the Union army was building. The punishment for this is to be hanged. This is a story of a man’s last thoughts while being hanged for committing a crime. This is the analysis of An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.

The great love of the man’s life was his red mountain bike. He rode it on groomed trails, over rutted terrain, on the highway, uptown, downtown, to the grocery store, and everywhere around the mountain town where he lived. Along the way were numerous stops to chat with a friend or neighbour. He loved people. Because he was accident-prone, some of these visits had a comic twist as unplanned adventures presented themselves. The man’s experiences were classic folklore in his family and in the community. Many times, he returned from an outing rumpled from some sort of rutted road experience, still laughing. He found excitement wherever he went—or better said, excitement found him.

Both of the authors in the short stories “After Twenty Years” by O. Henry & “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Biercce put their characters face to face in frightening situations. “Silky” Bob and Peyton Farquhar express their feelings to their situation in a different way as well as a same way. Let’s look at the differences in “Silky” Bob’s and Farquhar circumtances. First we have the differences in their behavior and feelings leading up to their different fates. Bob, in “After Twenty Years”, seems to be very unaware of his surrounding and very boastful of his success in the west. The author states, “The man from the West, his egotism enlarged by success, was beginning to outline the history of his career.” (From “After Twenty