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Storytelling in "Happy Endings" by M. Atwood Essay

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M. Bakhtin once said, "We are to our own lives what the authors are to the books they write (Bakhtin in Gallagher, 40)." It's really hard to disagree with this assertion. The best evidence of this statement can be found in the story "Happy Endings" written by Margaret Atwood. The author develops, in a very interesting and attractive way, the idea of living a life and writes a plot of the story. To find a good understanding of those concepts, it is impossible to skip the process of asking correct questions and, of course, getting answers. Margaret Atwood like no one else does it so skillfully through asking a reader just two simple questions: "what" and "how and why." It is really hard to disagree with the essential inevitability of those …show more content…

There is a rising action ("If you think it is too bourgeois..." etc. (71)), the discriminated occasion ("The only authentic ending is the one provided here..." etc. (71)), and the falling action ("That's about all than can be said for plots... Now try How and Why (71)." The story shows us that life can never be the way we want it to be. The author uses not really kind and simple way to reveal it through John and Mary's story because even life at times gets very rigid and hard.

At the same time a complicated plot can confuse the reader at the first sight. There is no strong and endless plot line, as it was already mentioned. The author shows just A-story, then B-story and so on. Another thing that confuses greatly is that the author finishes all the parts of the story, which are supposed to have a happy ending, referring to paragraph A. In paragraph B it sounds like ."..and everything continues as in A (70)." Then, in paragraph C it is ."..and everything continues as in A, but under different names (70)," in paragraph D one is ."..and continue as in A (70)." It creates an effect of having a couple of different stories which are ending with an A-story, of course. Why is Margaret Atwood doing it? Does she still have a story?

M. Atwood confuses a reader purposely. Sometimes it seems like the author writes two or three, or even more stories in one, but there are two stories presented in her work A-story and the B-C-D-E part is a second story: one

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