27 pages • 54 minutes read
So What Are You, Anyway?
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Literary Devices
Foreshadowing
Hill’s imagery foreshadows coming events and conflicts in the short story. At the start of the narrative, Carole is lost in her own private concerns. She is “only a child,” so she is unaware of the more complex political conundrums she will face over the course of her flight (Paragraph 37). In spite of her lack of awareness, the author portends these tensions through images of her belongings and descriptions of her appearance. On the surface, these elements contribute to the story’s descriptive opening scene, which effectively sets the narrative stage. However, as the narrative unfolds, these same images recur with more fraught undertones and implications.
Each image in the opening scene foreshadows the hostility with which the Nortons will treat Carole because she is biracial. When Carole looks at herself in her mirror, she has no inclination that Henry and Betty will discriminate against her because of her appearance, her parentage, and her cultural background. When Henry holds Carole’s doll upside-down, the author foreshadows the ill treatment Carole will receive because she is a child, but it also foreshadows how her childhood innocence will be turned upside-down as she is involuntarily thrust into the reality of adulthood. Hill has placed these images at the forefront of the novel to prepare the reader for Carole’s upcoming, albeit unpleasant, experiences.
Dialogue
Instead of following a traditional narrative plot line, Hill has shaped “So What Are You, Anyway?” around Carole’s verbal interactions with Henry and Betty Norton. By telling the story primarily in the form of the three characters’ oral exchanges, the author is enacting the claustrophobic, inescapable atmosphere that Henry and Betty create for Carole over the course of her flight.
Although the short story is written from the third person point of view, the narrator rarely comments upon the characters’ dialogue. The infrequent narrative intrusions on the page leave Carole alone to navigate her interactions with Henry and Betty. Hill has allowed the characters’ extended dialogue to consume the majority of the narrative so as to formally capture its relentless tone. Because Carole is blocked into the window seat, she is powerless to dismiss herself from the conversation with the Nortons. She therefore must listen to and answer their questions despite the perpetual “hollowness in her stomach” that she feels (Paragraph 15). The narrative’s reliance on dialogue immerses the reader in Carole’s experience.
Ambiguity
Due to the third person narrator infrequently intruding upon the three primary characters’ conversation, the short story is defined by its ambiguous atmosphere. While the narrator is present throughout the narrative, they do not always remark upon or explain what the characters are thinking or feeling, or even how they are physically orienting their bodies. For example, after Henry “turns [Carole’s] doll right side up” and exclaims, “A black doll! I never saw such a thing,” Carole’s lines of dialogue follow and the narrator makes no commentary upon the incident (Paragraph 4). A few paragraphs below, the narrator does note that “Carole tucks the doll close to the window,” but they do not detail what is passing through Carole’s mind as a result of Henry’s actions (Paragraph 7).
The narrator’s elusiveness throughout the short story therefore compels the reader to engage more thoughtfully with the events occurring on the page. Hill is thus asking his reader to interpret the narrative events and exchanges without authorial or narrative guidance. This is why the short story closes with the ambiguous image of Betty scoffing at Carole’s sensitivity instead of with Carole settled safely into her new seat; Hill is granting Betty the proverbial last word, and thus the power over Carole. However, neither Hill nor the narrator draw this conclusion on behalf of the reader.
Point of View
The short story is written from the third person limited point of view and thus centralizes the experiences of the main character. Throughout the short story, the third person narrator inhabits Carole’s consciousness. The narrator’s perception and rendering of the narrative world on the page are thus dictated by Carole’s character. The way Carole sees, perceives, and interprets her experiences is how the narrator presents these experiences. When Carole sees her reflection in the mirror, for example, she simply thinks of her father deeming her “clear complexion […] ‘milk milk milk milk chocolate’” (Paragraph 1). Carole has no concept of her appearance and identity being potentially problematic, and the narrator does not regard or describe her in this manner.
The third person limited point of view enacts Carole’s developing sense of self. As a child, Carole does not have a defined sense of who she is and why. She takes pride in her appearance and attempts to prove herself “a young lady,” but she has yet to craft an identity (Paragraph 38). The third person limited perspective thus captures the degree of separation Carole still has from own psyche; she is not confused about her identity, but it has yet to take shape inside her. The narrative vantage point grants the reader access to Carole’s interiority. However, Carole is not narrating her account in her own words and is thus unready to claim ownership of her voice.
Unlock all 27 pages of this Study GuidePlus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
