Lust Susan Minot

The short story, “Lust”, written by Susan Minot uses style, tone, and imagery to explore the universal idea of helplessness. She uses a style of writing in which there are short paragraphs that tell multiple stories of experiences she has had in her life; it is much like an itemized list. This allows the narrator’s voice to be strengthened and begins to address the issue of helplessness. Minot wrote, “it was different for a girl.” This one sentence, she composed as a paragraph, has a meaning much deeper than the six words. With this one line the reader can understand that boys and girls are different, and the way society judges them based on their sex life is also different. This one sentence also shows how people can be helpless when put in certain situations. The tone in “Lust” is very straightforward and revealing. By coming out and telling things how they are, she can get her point across well. “For a long time, I had Philip on the brain. The less they noticed you, the more you got them on the brain.” In this instance, the narrator has a boy on their mind instead of focusing on whatever task at hand whether it be schoolwork or sports, furthermore, showing a sign of weakness and a helpless situation. Another example is when Minot tells the reader, “some things I was good at, like math or painting or even sports, but the second a boy put his arm …show more content…
It is very clear to visualize every scenario she describes. “Roger was fast,” was all the reader needed to know to understand the way he treated her. When Minot is honest about how things were, the reader can connect and recognize the sexual freedom this woman had, yet the burdens she bore from society. Towards the end of the story Minot writes, “After sex, you curl up like a shrimp, something deep inside you ruined…” At this point in the story, the narrator has begun to recognize she is being used, but it is too late. She is so powerless she can do nothing about