A Pocket Anthology Literary Analysis

A Pocket Anthology is a book containing various short stories that all have a common theme. The five stories I had chosen were “Sweat,” “Reunion,” “A Rose for Emily,” “The Story of an Hour,” and “The Yellow Wallpaper." All five of these stories had, at least, two characters and one was deceiving the other. Although, only one character, in the end, was able to deceive the other. All stories show various amounts of themes, but the most common were deceitfulness. In “Sweat”, Delia is portrayed as the hard working wife who was always abused by her husband, Sykes. One day, he brings home a snake thinking that Delia would leave since she is scared of snakes. Sykes displays that he is a snake expert and tries to loosen up the snake cage. The snake was expected to attack Delia but attacked him instead. Sykes constantly called Delia’s name for help thinking she would help since …show more content…
One day, she goes out to a drug dealer to buy arsenic and doesn’t explain why she needs the drug. When she died at age 74, the townspeople pry open an upstairs room to find her future husband, Homer Barron, laying out on the bed decaying. Everyone was deceived that Emily was just a suicidal lady who went through hardships, but she was actually insane. The “Story of an Hour” portrays a similar theme by showing how looks are deceiving. Mrs. Mallard is informed that her husband had died in a train accident to which she responds with tears. She decides to lock herself in her room and wants to cry, but she can’t because she thinks of her new found freedom. Mrs. Mallard had been abused by her husband and rejoices on how she no longer feels imprisoned. Everyone outside of her room feels sorry for her since losing a husband is heartbreaking. Once she leaves her room, her husband walks through the front door to which she is so heartbroken that she dies due to heart