My Short Story Essay Blog

My Short Story Essay Blog

The most interesting short story to me, which you can probably tell from the last blog, is “Hairball” by Margaret Atwood. I chose to write my essay on this one because I felt a strong connection to the main character Kat. I noticed that Margaret Atwood uses a series of symbols to foreshadow the loss of one’s identity. As we read in detail Kat's influence on other characters we learn more about her as a person.  I believe her hubris leads to her own downfall. To me although this character is supposed to appear as a strong Feminist, she does not actually have that strong of a character, “she isn’t in good shape. She can hardly stand…Pompous asshole. She looks at his neck. She longs for him, hates herself for it, and is powerless” (Atwood 116). To me this is a slap in the face. The fact that the first thing she feels after being fired is anger and she suppresses her true emotions just puts Kat in a submissive state. I believe Atwood uses unique diction of two contradictory elements such as him being a pompous asshole and her being attracted to it to shed a light on how emotionally and physically sick Kat is. I think she wants to express emotions, but feels as though society would not accept her if she did. She lacks the fundamentals that she sees in modern day life as tries to emulate them. Most feminists are married with children while she lacks a husband and/ or children, “Hairball, she says, I wish you could talk. I could have a more intelligent conversation with you than most losers in this turkey farm Hairballs baby teeth glint in the light; it looks as if it’s about to speak” (Atwood 115). This shows that in Hairball symbolizes the physical manifestation of the child she always wanted. Kat says that she’d have more intelligent conversations this means that she’d have someone to open up to and finally be herself. The story never says she’s unfertilized  so it is simply her inner ideals keeping her from tapping into to other avenues besides her career. As soon as she loses her job she loses her identity. The one aspiration of being on top is usurped from the monster that she created. When Kat changes Gerald’s name to Ger he becomes a selfish, ambitious, and overall conniving man. His name change similar to her symbolizes a loss of identity, “the stable, unfashionable, previous, tight-assed Gerald. Not Ger, not the one she’s made in her own image. The other one before he got ruined” (Atwood 116). Becoming hip and “knowledgeable” along with this new nick name gave him the courage to want to make something of his life. Selfishly he weasels Kat out of the picture. The fact that’s he’s now “ruined” is a warning to the reader. It’s similar to the poem “A Dream Deferred” by Langston Hughes. If you allow the world to deter you dreams then you become dried up and useless like a raisin in the sun. In other words their ideas will overpower you and your true emotions and character traits will succumb to the will of society. Preserve your identity like a treasure and always strive to be who you are is what I took from the short story Hairball. My essay of course will go deeper in depth, but I hope this blog helps you understand why I chose the story I did.