John Updike's A & P Essay

In "Outage" and "A&P," John Updike attempts to explore different facets of suburban life through ordinary and common events. In "A&P," Updike explores how innocent ignorance influences a young cashier named Sammy and his views of suburbia. On the other hand, "Outage" explores the seething underbelly of suburbia and the events that occur when no one is looking, or in this case, when the lights go out. Through each work, Updike counters innocence with knowledge and rebellion against submission.

Sammy begins the story by describing the three girls in bathing suits who have walked into the A & P grocery store. The girl who catches his attention is a chunky girl in a plaid green two-piece swimsuit. As Sammy continues to observe the girls, his interest seems to focus only on the girl who leads the other two into the store. Sammy refers to the girl he likes as "Queenie",someone showing poise and leadership, while the other girls

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.

Transition -- In fact, Supporting point 2 -- when he contemplates what Queenie might be thinking Quote -- he wonders if her head is empty or “a little buzz like a bee in a glass jar” (824). Explain/relate quote to point -- In his mind she and the other girls are objects, not human beings. Transition -- Even the nicknames he makes up show the sexist attitude of an immature teenage boy. Supporting point 3/Quote -- Referring to the one he likes as “Queenie,” to her tall friend as “Big Tall Goony Goony” or other female shoppers as “houselaves” indicates that women in his view have no place or identity beyond themselves(825). Explain/relate quote to point -- indicates that women in his view have no place or identity beyond themselves Transition – further Supporting Point 4 -- His false-chivalric gesture at the end reveals his immaturity. Quote -- He assumes that the girls need an “unsuspected hero” to save them Explain/relate to point --, that they cannot take care of themselves or handle a little embarrassment (827). Concluding sentence -- Clearly, Sammy has much to learn about heroism, chivalry, and

A&P is in first person perspective and is portrayed by Sammy the nineteen-year-old cashier. You can easily tell that the point of view is based on a nineteen-year-old due to the first sentence. It reads “In walks these three girls in nothing but bathing suits. I'm in the third check-out slot, with my back to the door, so I don't see them until they're over by the bread.” (Updike) The way that Sammy is talking is childish and someone that is in their thirties or older would not talk like that. John Updike made sure to make Sammy of a mind of a nineteen-year-old. Another proof of that is “I look around for my girls, but they're gone, of course. There wasn't anybody but some young married screaming with her children about some candy they didn't get by the door of a powder-blue Falcon station wagon.”

“Sammy, you don’t want to do this to your Mom and Dad,” he tells me. It’s true, I don’t. But it seems to me that once you begin a gesture it’s fatal not to go through with it (323). This statement made by Sammy after quitting his job, was made towards the end of John Updike’s story “A&P”. Sammy had quit his job, a job that his parents helped him to get. Sammy opened up a whole new world; a world that I don’t think Sammy was ready for. He made a quick and irrational decision, rather if it affected his life or not we would never know.

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

Their wealth allows them to most likely live within a large city where the world moves much faster than in the rural regions and even in the suburbs. Whereas cities are always advancing in all aspects, the small communities, much like the one Sammy lives in, tend to hold onto tradition and more conservative values. The normal behavior for beach-goers in this small town is, as Updike so blatantly puts it, “the women generally put on a shirt or shorts or something before they get out of the car into the street.” (Lawn 401) The three girls are part of a new generation, one that is changing styles of fashion and lifestyle faster than ever before.

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”.

Status is the social or professional standing of a person, and it is often a unifying factor which John Updike uses to show comparisons of several different characters. Through Sammy’s point of view, several comparisons are shown between the employees of the A&P, even though their ages are different. Firstly, Lengel and Sammy assume the girls are ignorant and incompetent. Sammy’s demeaning view is viewed when he says, “Poor kids, I began to feel sorry for them, they couldn't help it.” In Sammy’s mind he saw the girls as helpless prey that had walked into a trap he needed to save them from. The manager saw the way they were dressed and proceeded to scold them the way a principal in a school scolds disruptive students. Another parallel between the two men is they both objectify the girls. Lengel is shown to look the girls up and down before he passes his judgement. Sammy’s defense of the girls, while it seems honorable, has ulterior motives. His hope is the girls hear him quit his job so that he can impress them; this action further objectifies the girls making them passive objects of passion. In the A&P there is another comparison between some of the repressed customers; the group of women he calls houseslaves and the trio of girls. Houseslaves are women whose only job was to cook, clean, and care for children. When the trio passed by these women there is a moment of shock from the girl’s appearance, but they look a second time possibly out of envy for the freedom they lack. The women in this story seem to all lack a voice and in the 1960s that was not uncommon; men in this time were still seen as the ultimate providers for the households. Queenie, like

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 short story A&P by John Updike, the story is told in a first person narrative of a teenage boy working as a cashier in an A&P grocery store on a hot summer day. The story begins with the teenage boy named Sammy becoming preoccupied by a group of three teenage girls that walk into the grocery store wearing bathing suits. Sammy admires the girl's beauty as most nineteen year old adolescent boys would, in a slightly lewd and immature nature. His grammar is flawed and he is clearly not of an upper-class family, his