The realization of what is reality and what isn’t can easily become blurred in literature specifically in the story An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce, in which a gentleman named Peyton Farquhar is to be hung for a crime against the Confederacy of which he was tricked into committing. The audience is led to believe he escaped the hanging until the final paragraph where that image is smashed to pieces, it is explained to be a figment of his imagination. Ambrose Bierce manipulates the reader into believing the unbelievable through word choice with an appeal to pathos and the shifting point of view throughout his story. The control over the audience demonstrated by Bierce is an extremely difficult skills to employ and he does
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Farquhar was just hung Bierce takes the audience back to before the occurrence in part two and explains more about the character himself. The reader finds Peyton to be “A well to do planter, of an old and highly respectable Alabama family.... No service was to humble for him to perform in the aid of the South, no adventure too perilous for him to undertake”(Bierce paragraph 2 chapter 2). Through this description the reader gains a level of respect and admiration for his character, even if he is fighting for the south.The point of view is still directed from a third person perspective but this time explaining how the hanging came to be. Mr. Farquhar is as Bierce says a man humble and respectable man so the question still remains why is he being hung? What did he do that was bad enough to get him killed. A small amount of foreshadowing is used because the adventure he takes this time is too perilous; when a Federal scout unknown to Peyton manipulates him into thinking it is in the interest of the South to burn down the Owl Creek bridge. When Farquhar went to burn the bridge he was met by Southern troops, the irony was that the cause he was fighting for would end up killing him. The main polio in this part is to redirect the audience into thinking Farquhar is still alive, when in fact he is really in another …show more content…
It is like his hands are operating outside his body, they are pulling at the noose trying to get it off and he is watching. Knowing the ending a reader may see this as a usual description and may be alluding to something. All though reading it the first time one may just consider it an artistic way to describe the scene. Farquhar defies the odds escaping the soldiers and running to the woods. The reader already has a connection to the character and in a way, wanting to see him find his home and be with his family once again. This was established by learning about the characters background and how he came to be hung. Bierce describes Farquhar to be “fatigued, footsore, famished.... His tongue was swollen with thirst; he relieved its fever by thrusting it forward from between his teeth into the cold air”(Bierce chapter 3 paragraph 17). This scene uses descriptors that have an emotional effect on the audience one wants this man to be out of his pain and to find his family. The reader is caught up in Farquhar’s suffering travels they don’t
Farquhar was just hung Bierce takes the audience back to before the occurrence in part two and explains more about the character himself. The reader finds Peyton to be “A well to do planter, of an old and highly respectable Alabama family.... No service was to humble for him to perform in the aid of the South, no adventure too perilous for him to undertake”(Bierce paragraph 2 chapter 2). Through this description the reader gains a level of respect and admiration for his character, even if he is fighting for the south.The point of view is still directed from a third person perspective but this time explaining how the hanging came to be. Mr. Farquhar is as Bierce says a man humble and respectable man so the question still remains why is he being hung? What did he do that was bad enough to get him killed. A small amount of foreshadowing is used because the adventure he takes this time is too perilous; when a Federal scout unknown to Peyton manipulates him into thinking it is in the interest of the South to burn down the Owl Creek bridge. When Farquhar went to burn the bridge he was met by Southern troops, the irony was that the cause he was fighting for would end up killing him. The main polio in this part is to redirect the audience into thinking Farquhar is still alive, when in fact he is really in another …show more content…
It is like his hands are operating outside his body, they are pulling at the noose trying to get it off and he is watching. Knowing the ending a reader may see this as a usual description and may be alluding to something. All though reading it the first time one may just consider it an artistic way to describe the scene. Farquhar defies the odds escaping the soldiers and running to the woods. The reader already has a connection to the character and in a way, wanting to see him find his home and be with his family once again. This was established by learning about the characters background and how he came to be hung. Bierce describes Farquhar to be “fatigued, footsore, famished.... His tongue was swollen with thirst; he relieved its fever by thrusting it forward from between his teeth into the cold air”(Bierce chapter 3 paragraph 17). This scene uses descriptors that have an emotional effect on the audience one wants this man to be out of his pain and to find his family. The reader is caught up in Farquhar’s suffering travels they don’t