Analysis Of The Bass The River And Sheila Mant

The boy knows all about largemouth bass, even their scientific name. He also has all the name brand equipment for fishing such as Pflueger and Rapala. The name brand equipment is important because it must mean he is extremely committed to fishing. The last reason he might choose the bass is because he is extremely dedicated to fishing. As the text states, “I say automatically, because I never went anywhere that summer without a fishing rod” (Wetherell 2). The boy was constantly fishing or practicing his casts. Fishing was not something he had to think about, it was just instinct to grab his rod anytime he went somewhere. Fishing for bass is tremendously automatic for the boy. Secondly, the other decision the boy might make is to pick Sheila. He might select Sheila because he creeps on her constantly. As explained in the story, “I had learned all her moods. If she lay flat on the diving board…Sitting up, arms tucked around her long, suntanned legs, she was approachable” (Wetherell 1). The boy was regularly creeping on Sheila and learning all her poses. He would try to spy on her parties. He might pick

Striped bass are known by avid fisherman as a ‘true bass’ and are not members of the sunfish family. Due to their similarities, the striped bass can often get mistaken for the white bass and vice versa. These beautiful members of the bass family originate from the eastern seaboard of America and are most often found in St Lawrence River going all the way from Canada to Louisiana.

The realization comes later after he has accidentally hooked the biggest fish he has ever hooked. By reeling in the bass, he would be losing Sheila, but cutting it loose would make him lose the catch of his life. When the narrator finally knows a decision must be made between the bass and Sheila, he chooses Sheila believing it is a more mature thing to do. When he “pull[s] a penknife . . . and cut[s] the line,” (7) he makes a conscious decision that Sheila Mant is to be more important than his fishing. When the night is over, and Sheila goes off in a different guy’s Corvette, the narrator comes to the realization that she was not worth giving up the fish. Later in life, after being with other girls and catching other fish, what “haunts [him] still” is losing the bass, not Sheila Mant. Ultimately, the narrator’s maturity came from finding out what he actually loved the most and sticking to that.

Topic Sentence: In the short story “Ponies” by Kij Johnson, it is evident that when the protagonists Sunny and Barbara face an imbalance of power against the antagonists, TheOtherGirls, tragedy occurs.

Finally as a result, Sheila uses people just to get what she wants. Through the story, she uses the narrator just to go see a boy that she likes and leads the boy to think it’s a date. This is shown when Sheila tells the boy she will be going home with another boy. “She would be going home in Eric Caswell’s Corvette” (Wetherell 297). She used the boy to get to the concert and hang out with Eric Caswell.

G. Throughout the short story “Sheila Mant”, the boy must decide between the bass and Sheila

I have read “The Bass, The River, and Sheila Mant” by W.D. Wetherell. The story is about a 14 year old boy who has to pick between a girl and fishing. In this journal, I will be questioning the narrators regretful decision and connecting to my regretful choice.

In fact, he says, “She is prettier than a largemouth bass”. While this may seem like an odd compliment cleary he finds her more attractive than his favorite past time. In the end, the narrator asks Sheila Mant on a date. The narrator is very young, and he would probably not ask out Sheila had she not been attractive. The second reason the narrator should pick the girl is because he stares at her for too much time. He makes an effort to be outside when she is outside and to show off by swimming laps. This is a proven effort of showing off because as previously stated he is very superficial and this physical feat of swimming is an attempt to seem more attractive. He is very obsessed with her to the extreme of knowing all her various emotions. He know her emotions from the way she idles on her dock. This is not the only instance of stalking in the narrator routine, he also partakes in viewing from the bushes. This proves how much he is obsessed with her because bushes are not very comfortable and it is most probably a last resort solution to view her without be seen. Although there are a plethora of reasons to choose Sheila Mant, there is a myriad of reasons to pick the fish instead. The first of which is the massive

The young narrator in the story is overcome by a pull between Sheila Mant, the beautiful girl on vacation, and his love of fishing. While on a boat ride to his first party, the narrator tries to impress Sheila by acting like someone else. During the ride, a huge bass is pulling on the boy’s fishing line, but Sheila thinks that fishing is dumb, so the boy does not want her to know. He is in a tugging war between who he is, and who Sheila thinks he is. At the end of the story the narrator proves to have learned a lesson because he says, “There would be other Shiela Mants in my life, other fish, and though I came close once or twice, it was these secrets, hidden tuggings in the night that claimed me, and I never made that mistake again” (Wetherell 40). By him saying he never made the same mistake again, he means that he never again made the error of acting like a different person to impress someone. The narrator realizes that he neither got the girl nor the fish because he was too busy trying to look cool in Sheila’s eyes. Like Shakespeare implies, never let who you are be placed below someone else’s thought of you. If he had been himself, the young narrator may have been successful in getting either his true love, or the biggest fish of his life. When a person takes his or her mask off, they realize that being who they are will always surpass the criticism of

W.D. Wetherell uses characterization to develop the conflict. One example of this is, "I was on the swim team at school, and to win her attention would do endless laps between my house and the Vermont shore"(3). This relates to the thesis because it is one of the ways the narrator tried to impress Sheila. Wetherell also uses, “"Yeah, bass. They come into the shallows at night to chase frogs and moths and things. Big largemouths. Micropterus salmoides," I added, showing off."(31). in this quote the narrator is trying to show off how much he knows about fish since he's a fisher.

The short story by W. D. Wetherell The Bass, The River, and Sheila Mant was entirely and completely unrealistic. First of all, the only two characters in the story are unrealistic. This kid sounds like he’s done nothing but fish and swim in a muddy disgusting river his whole life. And speaking of his life, it seems to revolve around fishing and some girl he’s never spoken to. Creepy? Yeah. Realistic? Ehhh.. maybe. Let’s face it, most boys his age, especially ones in small Southern towns as it appears he is from, tend to have very few hobbies, two of which being idolizing girls too old for them, and something involving hurting or killing animals (fishing, hunting, etc). So that is realistic. However, the problem arises in his intense passion for those

Throughout the short story “Sheila Mant” the boy must decide between the bass and Sheila. First off, the boy may pick the bass because he brought his fishing pole with on his first date. He would not have brought his fishing pole on his date if he did not want to use it. His fishing pole is like his cellphone, he cannot go anywhere without it because he will be thinking about it the whole time. The fishing pole comforts the boy because he knows that if he sees a bass he has an opportunity to catch it. Another reason he might pick the bass is that he knows more about the bass than Sheila. He knows what the bass eats, where the bass go during the night, and how it sounds. He has gathered this knowledge from all the years he has been fishing, is he willing to give the biggest bass he

In “The Bass, The River. and Sheila Mant” written by W.D. Wetherell, the narrator is faced with external and internal conflict. The narrator asked Sheila Mant, an older girl, out to a party and traveled by canoe because he could not drive at fourteen. While he was rowing the canoe, a large bass showed up and he had to confront the conflict; should he throw away his pride to catch the humongous bass, knowing that Sheila Mant thought fishing was lame? or should he ignore his strong passion for fishing so that he could look ‘cool’ in front of Sheila? He chose to ignore the largemouth bass, hoping that Sheila wouldn’t shun him for his passion of fishing. He ended up regretting it because Sheila Mant went home with some other guy and proceeded

In the story the author portrays the protagonist differently from the other characters because she talks about the physical appearance of other characters and when it comes to the narrator we have no idea what she looks like but she is developed partially through her relationship with other characters, although we the readers do come the find out that the narrator is around the age of 15-17 years old and we can assume that she has a bad relationship with her parents because first of all she talks about them maybe once or twice in the whole story and second of all we know that they sent her to boarding school so that alone proves that her relationship with them is lacking. As readers we also know that she has trouble opening up in the story she say “To open your heart. You open your legs but can’t, or don’t dare anyone, to open your heart” (237). This is a prime example of how author characterizes the protagonist as broken and emotionally damaged. And as the story progress the author becomes more honest with us the readers and herself, she starts the reveal the pain she is in and how lonely she feels. The narrator gives us an example of how she feels after sex by saying “After sex, you curl up like a shrimp, something deep inside you ruined, slammed in a place that sickness at

While Mrs. Mallard remembers Mr. Mallard as a kind and tender man who loved her, she also viewed him as the oppression that marriage put upon women and men. While Mr. Mallard was kind and loving to his wife, he was also controlling and overbearing. Josephine, Mrs. Mallard’s sister and Richards, Mr. Mallard’s friend is there to break the news of Mr. Mallard’s death. Richards has learned of Mr. Mallard’s death at the newspaper office, not wanting to believe the information that was received, Richards waited for the new to be delivered for a second time before enlisting the help of Josephine. They are both there to support Mrs. Mallard and their support shows that they care for Mr. and Mrs. Mallard.