Setting Analysis of John Updike's Term Paper

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1) The fact that the girls are in bathing suits in a supermarket highlights their sexuality. Perhaps the most compelling definition of setting is provided, not by any literary theorist who might opine on the subject, but by Updike through the mouth of Sammy, "it's one thing to have a girl in a bathing suit down on the beach, where what with the glare nobody can look at each other much anyway, and another thing in the cool of the A&P, under the fluorescent lights, against all those stacked packages," which flouts all conventional norms of expected attire and behavior. (Updike, p.206)

This is what makes the girls, however unconscious their sexuality; seem so radical in their stance as they transgress the norms of conventional behavior and attire in the store. "If character is the foreground of fiction, setting is the background," says Burroway. (p.173) But Sammy's character is both commensurate with his setting -- he is of the same station and community year 'round as his supervisors at the supermarket, but he also sees himself, within, as above these other individuals, above his fellow cashiers and the shoppers he serves, even his parents because of his self-perception of himself as more intelligent and more cognizant of the fine things of life, as embodied by the girls who stalk the A&P that afternoon.

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In contrast to his immediate setting, Sammy sees himself as more sophisticated and intelligent, and allies himself with the beauty and defiance he reads into the action of the girls, even if the girls themselves cannot 'read' him as such. "Whether there is conflict between character and setting or the conflict takes place entirely in the foreground, within, between, or among the characters, the setting is important to our understanding of character type and of what to expect, as well as to the emotional value that arises from the conflict." (Burroway, 174) The conflict between Sammy and his setting of class and economy as well as of environment is brought to such an immediate foreground by the actions of the girls.

The A&P creates a rough and immediate democracy between the summer people like Queenie, and the locals like Sammy, but also elevates the adolescent protagonist. "When the girls come to his checkout slot instead of Stokesie's, he feels chosen by Fate to see his queen face-to-face. Even her purchase is exquisite," to Sammy's eyes. (Saldivar, p.13) Thus, through the democratic environment of cash transactions, Sammy symbolically and physically touches his queen, accesses a different kind of life and ultimately leaves his immediate workplace setting to find himself.

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