Araby And How I Met My Husband By Alice Munro

The short stories “Araby” by James Joyce and “How I Met My Husband” by Alice Munro have strikingly different tones established by the two authors. The stories both consist of a narrator with a love interest, however the authors’ use of diction, imagery, and setting create a difference in tone of the two stories. In “Araby,” Joyce begins the story in a setting with a very dark, gloomy tone. Joyce accomplishes this by mentioning how the priest, the former tenant of the house, had died in the back drawing-room (2). With the story starting on a depressing note, the narrator, a young boy, begins gushing over his love interest, Mangan’s sister. Each time the narrator mentions his love, Joyce makes it clear to the reader that she represents a sense …show more content…
The narrator, a fifteen-year-old girl named Edie, has two love interests, although the first one did not go so well. Munro introduces Edie’s first love interest, Chris Watters, when he lands his plane across the Peebles’ house at the fairgrounds and asks Edie if he “could use that pump” to get water (34). He notices Edie as she gets all dolled up for nothing wearing Mrs. Peebles’ dress and makeup. Both Chris and Edie took this first encounter nonchalantly, therefore contributing to a light, quaint tone. When Chris plans to leave the fairgrounds after having kissed Edie, he promises he would write her a letter (145). Edie waits everyday by the mailbox for her letter from her romantic interest to finally arrive, but in doing so, she also encounters the sociable mailman. He has romantic feelings toward Edie, and when Edie realizes that “[n]o letter was ever going to come” from Chris, she courted the kindly mailman (197). The mailman, “a local man, ordinary but reliable” and Edie actually ended up happily married (Sutton 2). Although Edie’s husband has the idea that she had gone after him by waiting every day at the mailbox, she lightheartedly lets him believe whatever he wants, which also greatly contributes to a carefree …show more content…
The pilot, Chris, exhibited a heroic deed of valor to win the lady’s heart when promised Edie that he would write to her because he was leaving. However, this did not work because he never followed through with his promise. Edie’s husband, the mailman, exhibited declaration of passionate devotion when he complimented her smile, and later when he asked Edie to marry him. This romance between Edie and her mailman husband influences the tone in ways that it creates a traditional and relaxed