Summary Of A Summer Life By Gary Soto

Soto’s use of imagery serves as an aid to the reader to better understand the author’s perspective, which is that of a six-year-old boy. Prior to stealing the pie, the author uses imagery to describe his temptation to steal. “My sweet tooth gleaming and the juice of guilt wetting my underarms” (Soto 1). The imagery here illustrates both the irresistibility of the temptation to steal and the immaturity of the young boy as he can’t take his mind off of anything but what is in front of him. After stealing the pie, Soto

He “knew enough about hell to stop [him] from stealing” and was “holy in almost every bone”. Soto’s diction makes it clear that his younger self was well behaved because he was scared of the consequences of sin, but not necessarily because he wanted to be good. It also implies that even fear could not stop the most mischievous parts of him. Regardless of his willingness to behave, the young Soto truly believed in a God, and often saw “shadows of angels” and heard “faraway messages in the plumbing”. These symbols appear throughout the passage in order to show how sin changed Soto’s interpretation of them. The narrative continues, and the young boy stands in a German Market, staring at pies. As he ponders which type to steal, the “juice of guilt” wets his armpits and he “nearly [weeps] trying to decide”. This imagery of wetness is associated with his sin, and strongly contrasts the dryness of “the flowery dust priests give off”. The opposing wet and dry imagery show that the boy is sometimes bored with the dryness of religion, but the possibility of stealing a pie both terrifies and excites him. Once again, he is reminded of “the proximity of God howling in the plumbing”

In his autobiographical narrative A Summer Life, Gary Soto vividly recreates the guilt felt by a six- year-old boy who steals an apple pie. Through Soto’s reminiscent he has taken us on a journey of his guilt, paranoia, and redemption through the usage of tone, allusions, and imagery.

Throughout the autobiographical narrative written by Gary Soto, many different literary elements are used to recreate the experience of his guilty six-year old self. Different elements such as contrast, repetition, pacing, diction, and imagery. Soto narrates this story as a young boy at a time when he seems to be young and foolish, Soto foolmaking mistakes, but at the same time hoping to learn from them. Soto uses each of these devices to convey different occurrences in the narrative.

Initially, Rios illustrates a young boy perplexed by a new-found maturity. As the maturation from childhood to adolescence begins, he is facing unfamiliar feelings about the opposite sex. An example of this is

Gary Soto’s body language sets the stage for symbolism on his aim on stealing pie from the grocer’s store. “...the juice of guilt wetting my underarms” (Soto 13). The juice of guilt symbolizes his religious knowledge, since he is acknowledged

Henriquez uses her word choice to create a sense of imagery. When discussing the volume around the lunch table, Henriquez writes, “like puffs of smoke.” Comparing noise rising to puffs of smoke allows the audience to visualize the puffs of noise moving towards the ceiling effortlessly gliding to eventually become nothing. Additionally, when describing Panama's unique landscape, the author wrote, “with twisted pink columns like candy and a wavy red clay roof like the ruffled edge of lasagna.” Again, adding these comparisons creates a sense of realism, almost as if the reader was standing across from Henriquez parents house examining every spare detail. Furthermore, the author utilizes personifications to further enhance ideas. In order to emphasize the idea that dinner had been something no one cared about anymore, Henriquez wrote, “By the time dinner rolled around, no one sat together at the table.” Adding the idea that dinner is rolling around emphasizes the long amount of time it took and the irrelevance of the meal to the family, again relating back to the common theme that lunch was the important and significant meal for the author’s family. Comprehensively, the author uses diction to create a sense of imagery that further draws in her audience and adds dimension to her

“Soto is the poet of the Chicano experience, but his view of that people is not hopeful. He shows their condition to be one of hard work with few rewards.” (Sullivan). Most Mexican Americans had laborious jobs. Soto’s father and grandfather both worked blue collar jobs and he thought he would be doomed to the same life. “In one of his essays, Gary Soto writes that as a child, he had imagined he would ‘marry Mexican poor, work Mexican hours, and in the end die a Mexican death, broke and in despair.’" (Lee). Here he describes Mexican life as an undesirable one. The despair he came to know as a child shows up a lot in his work as seen in his short story “Sorry, Wrong Family”. The main character, Carolina finds the world an unpleasant place to live. “The world, she realized, was a sad place when from a few feet away trash could fool someone who walked in beauty.” (Soto 41). This line from the story describes the moment where after asking for help she receives a small amount of hope, but puts herself back down rather quickly. Soto’s view of these people comes from his own experiences. “Recently, Soto attended his junior high school reunion, and he was disheartened to learn how many of his childhood friends had ended up in prison or been killed.” (Lee). The world he grew up in painted the Chicano life as a lesser one.

Soto’s writings in this passage construct a tone which gives a feeling of concern, due to his family and also his friend Scott to disapprove of a relationship only because of social class and race. The tone portrayed can be perceived when he has discussions with his family about who is the right woman to marry

Soto talks about sacrifice, and we all go through that. What we do to please other people. The boy had to give up his orange because he didn't have enough money. He told his girlfriend that she can chose any kind of candy found in the isle, and she chose a chocolate bar that cost a dime, now the boy only had a nickel and a pair of oranges in his pocket. Instead of feeling embarrassed and cheep in front of his new girl, the boy decided to put up the nickel and an orange on the counter for the saleslady.

One major trademark of Gary Soto’s works is his use of the importance of family in his stories. Readers can feel and understand his passion and appreciation for family. Often, Gary uses family to tell stories about his upbringing and as a sense of pride in his stories. In A Summer Life, he says, “My brother showed me his palm, where a sliver had gone in quick as a stitch on a sewing machine when he climbed the rabbit hutch at the Molinas’ house” (Soto 14). This quote is an example of his close relationship to his family and his adventurous upbringing in Fresno, California. Later in A Summer Life, Soto says, “My face was hot, my hair sweaty, but nothing scary seemed to happen” (Soto 20). This quote once again shows that Soto had a very adventurous upbringing, and he enjoyed being able to go out and explore for himself at a young age. Soto’s family life has always been important to him, but his family life has also suffered heartbreak and adversity. According

In the poem “Behind Grandma’s House”, Gary Soto writes about an experience he had as a young boy. He speaks of himself as being a nerdy Spanish boy who wants attention. He screams out for attention by acting out in negative ways. Most know, to bring attention to one’s self, one can acquire it by acting negatively or positively, but negative attention brings punishment. Soto obtains his grandmothers attention at the end of the poem, but he may have regretted it. Gary Soto’s “Behind Grandma’s House” is a 1952 free verse poem that uses imagery to suggest the speaker’s perspective of the story.

even see, could not see that the justice’s face was kindly nor discern…” (1) This quote lets us know that the tone of the story

The poem begins explaining to the reader the story of a Mexican American as he worked in an industrial factory at some point in his life. “In the factory I worked, in the fleck of rubber, under a press of an oven yellow with flame.” (Lines 1-3) Soto uses visual imagery to describe the color of

Collectively, these literary images go to describe a young ethnic man, probably of Latin descent, who lives with his mother in a poverty stricken area. The careful recitation of instruction given to the younger man seems to demonstrate an intricate knowledge the narrators has accrued from both predecessors and experience. Singularly, this part of the story is very powerful in that it shows a young man having to hide who he is and where he comes from in an effort to seem appealing to women, and speaks volumes about the deception that both genders go through all in name of the chase.