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Similes
Chapter 4: Cast Away
Explanation and Analysis:
Proulx's style is unique in several ways. First, it ignores common grammatical features, writing sentences without pronouns that then turn into poetic fragments, like in this passage from Chapter 4 that briefly takes the aunt's perspective:
Wondered which had changed the most, place or self? It was a strong place. She shuddered. It would be better now. Leaned on the rail, looking into the dark Atlantic that snuffled at the slope of the past.
"Wondered" and "leaned" are without subjects, as Proulx does not always feel compelled to repeatedly indicate who is doing what, instead allowing the reader to intuit those connections.
Proulx's style is also highly poetic—rich in figurative language, especially simile and metaphor. Details acquire specificity and texture through their relation to other images. Take this passage from Chapter 11:
On the way they passed the aunt's amusement garden, a boulder topped with silly moss like hair above a face. Scattered throughout the moss a stone with a bull's eye, a shell, bits of coral, white stone like the silhouette of an animal's head.
Here, Proulx uses two similes that bring together different elements of nature: the nonliving and the living, the inanimate and the animate. Often, the images recall other images from the book. Both the "white stone" and the "animal's head" recall the white dog that scares Bunny. "Hair above a face" might make the reader think of Petal, Wavey, or Quoyle's daughters, all of whom Quoyle looks at lovingly. People and their surroundings profoundly reflect each other.
These sentence fragments also allow her to pay homage to Quoyle's journalistic type of writing. Frequently, Proulx includes what one might call "headline sentences" that sensationalize the events of Quoyle's daily life. One such sentence ends Chapter 9:
Stupid Man Does Wrong Thing Once More.
With sentences like this, Proulx pokes fun at the inflation of mundane events by turning the life of her protagonist (himself a reporter) into a kind of news story. In other words, she takes on the stylistic traits of Quoyle's medium.
Chapter 9: The Mooring Hitch
Explanation and Analysis:
Proulx's style is unique in several ways. First, it ignores common grammatical features, writing sentences without pronouns that then turn into poetic fragments, like in this passage from Chapter 4 that briefly takes the aunt's perspective:
Wondered which had changed the most, place or self? It was a strong place. She shuddered. It would be better now. Leaned on the rail, looking into the dark Atlantic that snuffled at the slope of the past.
"Wondered" and "leaned" are without subjects, as Proulx does not always feel compelled to repeatedly indicate who is doing what, instead allowing the reader to intuit those connections.
Proulx's style is also highly poetic—rich in figurative language, especially simile and metaphor. Details acquire specificity and texture through their relation to other images. Take this passage from Chapter 11:
On the way they passed the aunt's amusement garden, a boulder topped with silly moss like hair above a face. Scattered throughout the moss a stone with a bull's eye, a shell, bits of coral, white stone like the silhouette of an animal's head.
Here, Proulx uses two similes that bring together different elements of nature: the nonliving and the living, the inanimate and the animate. Often, the images recall other images from the book. Both the "white stone" and the "animal's head" recall the white dog that scares Bunny. "Hair above a face" might make the reader think of Petal, Wavey, or Quoyle's daughters, all of whom Quoyle looks at lovingly. People and their surroundings profoundly reflect each other.
These sentence fragments also allow her to pay homage to Quoyle's journalistic type of writing. Frequently, Proulx includes what one might call "headline sentences" that sensationalize the events of Quoyle's daily life. One such sentence ends Chapter 9:
Stupid Man Does Wrong Thing Once More.
With sentences like this, Proulx pokes fun at the inflation of mundane events by turning the life of her protagonist (himself a reporter) into a kind of news story. In other words, she takes on the stylistic traits of Quoyle's medium.
Chapter 11: A Breastpin of Human Hair
Explanation and Analysis:
Proulx's style is unique in several ways. First, it ignores common grammatical features, writing sentences without pronouns that then turn into poetic fragments, like in this passage from Chapter 4 that briefly takes the aunt's perspective:
Wondered which had changed the most, place or self? It was a strong place. She shuddered. It would be better now. Leaned on the rail, looking into the dark Atlantic that snuffled at the slope of the past.
"Wondered" and "leaned" are without subjects, as Proulx does not always feel compelled to repeatedly indicate who is doing what, instead allowing the reader to intuit those connections.
Proulx's style is also highly poetic—rich in figurative language, especially simile and metaphor. Details acquire specificity and texture through their relation to other images. Take this passage from Chapter 11:
On the way they passed the aunt's amusement garden, a boulder topped with silly moss like hair above a face. Scattered throughout the moss a stone with a bull's eye, a shell, bits of coral, white stone like the silhouette of an animal's head.
Here, Proulx uses two similes that bring together different elements of nature: the nonliving and the living, the inanimate and the animate. Often, the images recall other images from the book. Both the "white stone" and the "animal's head" recall the white dog that scares Bunny. "Hair above a face" might make the reader think of Petal, Wavey, or Quoyle's daughters, all of whom Quoyle looks at lovingly. People and their surroundings profoundly reflect each other.
These sentence fragments also allow her to pay homage to Quoyle's journalistic type of writing. Frequently, Proulx includes what one might call "headline sentences" that sensationalize the events of Quoyle's daily life. One such sentence ends Chapter 9:
Stupid Man Does Wrong Thing Once More.
With sentences like this, Proulx pokes fun at the inflation of mundane events by turning the life of her protagonist (himself a reporter) into a kind of news story. In other words, she takes on the stylistic traits of Quoyle's medium.
