Quitting In John Updike's A & P

In life there will be times where some people may feel that quitting is the best thing to do for themselves or possibly for others. “A&P”, a short story written by John Updike, is based on a nineteen year old boy, Sammy, who works as a cashier at the A&P supermarket. Updike portrays Sammy as a young man who lacks enthusiasm towards his job and wants to figure out what the real purpose is working at A&P with his miserable manager Mr. Lengel and dealing with “sheep’s”. John Updike strongly describes every detail of this story with analogy, plot, and point of view by this young man setting foot into adulthood and accepting responsibility. John Updike included a lot of specific analogies and it helped readers understand and imagine many details of his story.“She didn’t look around, not this queen, she just walked straight on slowly, on …show more content…
“Girl’s this is not the beach”(151). The manager of the supermarket- Mr. Lengel didn’t find the three girls attire quite appropriate for the store’s customer policy. Queenie replied, “My mother asked me to pick up a jar of herring snacks”. Of course, Mr. Lengel didn’t care much about what Queenie had to say because he had the power and continued on ranting. Sammie didn’t appreciate Mr. Lengel disrespecting and causing a scene in the supermarket. Sammy was fuming with anger from the embarrassment Mr. Lengel caused the young females, that it actually led him to quit as a cashier at A&P supermarket. Sammy felt that he if he quit it would prove to the young females that he’s their hero and it would probably be stress free for him having to deal with a foolish manager. By the time Sammy said “I quit” to his miserable manager Mr. Lengel, the girls were already out the door and they didn’t even recognize what he did for them. Probably just shows how much they really cared. As you can see, Updike put an intense scene in his story to have a stronger