Page 167 - DENG202_ELECTIVE_ENGLISH_III

Elective English—III

Notes “Go on the stage?” guessed Lulu, breathlessly.
“Nit; he’s too cheap a guy for that! He wanted me to marry him and go down to Coney Island to
see Luna Park and Dreamland for a wedding tour!”

12.6 Complete Stylistic Analysis of ‘A Lickpenny Lover’

The extract under consideration comes from a collection of the short stories “The Voice of the
City” written by a prominent American writer O Henry (William Sydney Porter). The book was
firstly adopted in 1908 and contain many other stories - “A Comedy in Rubber”, “One Thousand
Dollars”, “The Shocks of Doom”, “Roses, Ruses and Romance”, etc.
All pieces of literature created by this famous writer reveal his extraordinary style of writing.
O Henry’s short stories are known for their wit, wordplay, warm characterization and clever
twist endings. In his day he was called the American answer to Guy de Maupassant. Both authors
wrote plot win unexpected endings, but stories by O Henry were much more playful. Besides,
his stories are also known for witty narration.

This prominent writer wrote primarily about his own time - the early 20th century. Most stories
were set in New York and the characters were ordinary people. His brilliant writing style and
his optimistic and often playful tone make O Henry’s stories a delight to read.
From the point of view of presentation the story I have chosen is an extraordinary mixture of the
1st, 2nd and 3rd person narration:
“That is the shop girl smile, and I enjoin you to shun it unless you are well fortified with
callosity of the heart, caramels and a congeniality for the capers of Cupid.”

“She stood behind her counter in the Biggest Store; and as you closed your band over the tape -
line for your glove measure you thought of Hebe; and as you looked again you wondered how
she had come by Minerva’s eyes”.

“His words penetrated the heart whose very lightness was its armour. She looked up at him
with eyes that saw. And a warm glow visited her cool cheeks...”
It is not clearly known who is the narrator of the story, but seems like it is the author by himself.
As an observer of the events, O Henry gives a detailed description of the main characters, their
feelings and actions both directly and indirectly:
“There were 3,000 girls in the Biggest Store. Masie was one of them. She was eighteen and a
saleslady in the gent’s gloves.”

“Will you please pardon me”, he says, “if I seem too bold, but I earnestly hope you will allow
me the pleasure of seeing you again.”
“As Carter glided away from the Biggest Store with his mother in his electric runabout, he bit
his lip with a dull pain at his heart. He knew that love come to him for the first time in all the
29 years of his life.”
The basic theme of the story is the connection between being wealthy and being in love.
An authoritative respectable 29 year - old man named Irving Carter by chance happens to drop
into the Biggest Store and from the first sight falls in love in a beautiful young saleslady Masie,
who is only 18. They seem to be people of quite different circles of society, with different ideas,
interests and plans for the future. Still, the author represents a detailed description of both main
characters and emphasizes on some features of their personalities with the help of a great
number of stylistic devices.

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