Cat In The Rain Analysis

Longing for something, whether it be love, family etc. consumes a person’s mind and actions over time. To convey such emotion in prose or poetry, the arrangement of words means everything, for emotional arouse upon the reader. Thus, even poetry and prose by the same author, can end up using different language and means to generate the feeling of longing. This paper will focus on “Cat in the Rain”(Ernest Hemingway) which tells the story of a woman’s strong desire for a cat; and “Killed Paive”(Ernest Hemingway) which narrates lost feelings between the narrator and the addressed person. This paper will examine the different ways longing for someone is expressed, through the word choices of the narrator in the two texts. The method used will be

As the narrator tells the addressed person, "Now in the night you come unsmiling/To lie with me..." (line 6-7), thus the usage of apostrophe, in addition to each word bespoken induces a stronger sensory impact towards the reader. This is seen with in the following line, "A dull, cold, rigid bayonet…" (l 8). The usage of adjectives, enables the narrator to phrase his inner thoughts in a manner of conveying the emotional pain of longing. Therefore, the adjectives used become key factors in this case. If they were to be left out, the interpretation of what the narrator tries to describe fails generating emotional affects, due to lack of imagery, hence disconnection between the addresser and recipient. Furthermore, the narrator 's usage of expressive adjectives, generates imagery, thus clearer connection between the conveyed inner thought and the emotional affect of longing. Therefore, the usage of soul functions in two ways, due to the phrasing by the narrator, “On my hot-swollen, throbbing soul.” (l 9). The first function is the soul acts as a metonymy, as a result of the physical imagery it takes on by the