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Review Of ' Old Mother Savage '

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Assignment One The Question states: “Write an essay about SKILL in the story ‘Old Mother Savage.’ By ‘skill’ I mean both the skill and the intelligence that the woman shows in doing what she does, and planning it, and also the skill and intelligence of the writer, de Maupassant. That is to say, how well, and effectively, the writing works, and how it reaches the heart (if it does) and is real. Write as well and as intelligently as you can, and please quote from the story in order to support the points that you make.” The definition of Skill: “The ability to do something well; expertise. A particular ability.” The word skill encompasses a wide variety of meaning in its definition compared to how few words it contains. In the following, I will describe some of the interesting examples of skill and lack of skill that I found throughout the story, Old Mother Savage. I found these examples of skill in the narrator of the story; in the flashback storyteller, Serval; in the main character, Old Mother Savage; as well as in the writer himself, Guy de Maupassant. The Story Narrator’s Skill. At the very of the beginning of the story, the reader is greeted with a long description of his surroundings and overall feelings about nature. This was coupled with the recollection that the narrator had when walking, where he remembered having met Old Mother Savage, the “…good woman of the house…” (line 31). I believe that this gives the narrator a reason to ask Serval what has happened to the

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