Truth about Sammy in John Updikes A&P Essay -- A&P Essays

The Truth about Sammy in A & P At first glance, Sammy, the first-person narrator of John Updikes A & P, would seem to put in us with a simple and glib explanation as to wherefore he quits his job at the grocery store mentioned in the title he is standing up for the girls that his boss, Lengel, has insulted. He even tries to shell out us on this explanation by mentioning how the girls embarrassment at the pass on of the manager makes him feel scrunchy inside and by referring to himself as their unsuspected adept after he goes through with his gesture. Upon closer examination, though, it does not seem plausible that Sammy would have quit in defense of girls whom he quite evidently despises, despite the lustful desires they invoke, and that more analogously explanations of his action lie in his boredom with his menial job and his desire to rebel against his parents. While its authentic that Sammy finds the triplet scantily-clad girls who enter the supermarket attractive, as would any normal nineteen-year-old male, what is most worthy about his descriptions of the girls, and particularly of the leader of the group, is that Sammy holds them in contempt. Once we get beyond the descriptions of their bodies, we see nothing but derogatory comments directed at them, including the disrespectful nicknames that Sammy assigns to them. Nowhere is this more evident than in Sammys description of the leader, Queenie. The nickname delegate to her by Sammy points out the stereotypical snap judgment that Sammy makes about her constitution and social status initially, and to which Sammy rigidly adheres despite no real try of its accuracy. From the description of her prima donna legs, to his imagining of ... ...gels suggestion that he relent and keep his job, Sammy is in creation saying no to his parents and their attempt to put him on the road to lower-middle-class respectability. In the final analysis, it would seem that the most obvious explanation for why Sammy quits his job--the one that he implies--is actually the least plausible. While Sammy would like to portray himself as the fearless defender of the delicate sensibilities of innocent girls, the reality is that Sammys motives in quitting have far more to do with his own sensibilities than with those of the three girls. Work Cited Updike, John. A & P. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 2nd Edition. Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston St. Martins Press, 1990. 407-411. Wells, Walter. John Updikes A & P Studies in Short Fiction, vol. 30, (1993) Spring, pp. 127(7).