Analysis of "This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona" by Sherman Alexie

In “This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona” written by Sherman Alexie, the story starts off with Victor losing his job at the BIA and losing his father from a heart attack. Victor isn’t the richest person so he goes ask the Tribal Council if they can give him money to go to Phoenix, Arizona to go get his father’s ashes. The only thing the Tribal Council can give him is a hundred dollars. Although Victor needed more than just hundred dollars he still took the money. While Victor was in line to cash the check he seen Thomas Builds-the-Fire, one of his old friends, and then Thomas seen Victor so Thomas walks over to Victor. Thomas told Victor that he’s sorry about his father’s death and Victor asked how he knew and Thomas told him that

Victor thought that Thomas might be able to help him because “Victor felt a sudden need for tradition” (78). This quote means that after Victor’s fathers died he wanted to feel like he belongs to the tribal community and traditions. Thomas offers to lend Victor the money on the condition that he accompany Victor to Phoenix, Arizona.

In the story “This Is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona” there was a man named Victor. In the beginning of the story Victor had lost his job and he also found out that he lost his father due to a heart attack in Phoenix, Arizona. Victor and his father hadn’t spoke to his father for a few years but he still felt the pain of his death because that was his father. Victor had very little money with no car and his family was poor also. Victor father had a savings account waiting to be claimed and he needed a way to get to Phoenix. Victor then went to the Tribal Council and asked for some money they could only afford to give him hundred dollars and so he took it. While Victor stood in line he seen Thomas Builds-the-Fire talking to himself Thomas

When Victor is informed of this treachery, he goes into tremors and exhibits manic behavior. At the sight of his body "I gasped for breath; and, throwing myself onto the body... The human frame could no longer support the agonies that I endured, and I was carried out of the room in strong convulsions"

Most of the time Victor would reply shut up Thomas but at the end of the film Victor has a different answer. Thomas asked Victor ”Hey Victor, do you know why your dad really left?” and instead of lashing out at his Victor replied “Yeah. He didn't mean to Thomas.” When Victor confesses to Thomas that he knows what his father did is the most significant moment in the film and where Victor accepts the fact that he is angry and is transformed to a pillar of ash.

Upon returning home he finds out that another child that his parents had adopted is accused of the murder of his brother. She is tried and found guilty then executed for the crime. 5. After losing two loved ones Victor leaves for a vacation hoping to be able to relieve some of the grief he is dealing with. One day of this vacation he is approached by the creature, who then tells Victor that he is the one that killed his brother, but did it in order to try to hurt Victor for abandoning him.

According to Robert Ebert a movie review critic emphasizes that “[Victor] never much liked the skinny, talkative Thomas. But he has no choice [to get help from Thomas]” (Ebert). This illustrates that he doesn’t like Thomas because he won’t stop telling stories. Furthermore, Victor won’t have another choice, but to tolerate Thomas throughout his trip to Phoenix, Arizona. Because Thomas knows so many of stories Victor “accuses him of having learned most of what he knows about Indians by watching ‘Dances with Wolves’”

Thomas’s prophetic stories began in childhood. When Victor and Thomas were children, Thomas told a story about Victor’s father. The story expressed how Victor’s father felt toward his own family. He said, “Your father’s heart is weak. He is afraid of is own family. He is afraid of you. Late at night, he sits in the dark. Watches television until there is nothing but white noise. Sometimes he feels like he wants to buy a motorcycle and ride away. He wants to run and hide. He doesn’t want to be found” (Alexie 181). The story Thomas told was highly important because it was true. Thomas knew that Victor’s father would leave the reservation before anyone else. Furthermore, every story that came out of his mouth, he always closed his eyes. As if he is connected to something

Since he was a kid, Victor hated his dad’s drinking habit. Victor always blamed himself that his mother and father got separated and that his father left them. This feeling of guilt was killing Victor, until he decides to go to Phoenix and collect his father’s ashes. After arriving Victor thinks it's too difficult to forgive his father, but during the trip he learned more about his father from Suzy, Victor came to learn how his father had fought with himself to stop drinking and also

Throughout the story, Victor has shown that he feels guilty for what happened, even going so far as to try to turn Thomas’s help down by saying “I can’t take your money. I mean, I haven’t hardly talked to you in years.

Proves Victor came to his senses about not judging someone based on what they do. At the end of the story, everything comes together. Victor thanks Thomas by giving him half of his dad’s ashes. Although Victor knew he couldn’t be Thomas’s friend because, it was “cruel”.

Remembering his past helps the main character to understand it and once he will be able to understand it, he will be able to become an adult. Indeed, in Indian tradition, you have to reunite past, present and future in order to become an adult. The journey has an appeasing effect on Victor, he comes to peace with himself and gets closure in his relationship with his father. He is beginning to make amends (he apologizes to Thomas), to accept his past and the traditions of his culture by agreeing to stop and listen to Thomas, which means he is on the road to adulthood. It is a kind of a

He often took routes through town by foot when he wasn't in a hurry,preferring exercise then not. It was one of the ways he kept himself in shape. He began to drift off in his own world again, thinking about this life his father had chosen for him. When Victor was a young man, his father Benedict had him trained in various martial arts programs. All to create a family weapon. For Victor was the second born, his brother Aella was the family business's heir. His father who was obsessed with the ancient world actually named his first born son after the King of North Umbria from ancient times. In that same regard he trained Victor to be a loyal "knight" his whole life, whom he pledged his services to another criminal

He knows that he has no other choice and he is trapped in a really bad situation but it is better to communicate with the people than to wait doing nothing. He also learns to survive in a difficult situation. He loses his food coupons, but he explores that he can get a quarter every time he returns the luggage card at the carousel. He also becomes successful in innovatively creating a temporary bedroom in a building that is still under construction and nobody is using the building. Dixon, another character in the movie, becomes surprised and stunned at the friendly nature of Victor and he warns the airport staff about the odd behavior of

During his time at the University of Ingolstadt, Victor’s efforts of creation and reanimation drive himself into complete isolation and avoidance of any contact with the outside world for an immense amount of time. Victor’s demented quest of reanimation solely corroborates with his fully developed mad mentality, and his desire to be remembered. His horrific extremities drive him into illness, both mental and physical. Alongside his severe health status, Victor becomes detached from his entire family in Geneva, realizing how much time has passed only when his dear friend Henry Clerval arrives in Ingolstadt almost two years prior to the beginning of his experiment. It is brought to light that Victor’s extensive search for greatness cost him over