Things: A Story of the Sixties Literary Elements

Fiction

The first part of the novel is set in France where Jerome and Sylvie worked as market researchers whereas the second part is set in Tunisia where they worked as teachers.

The narrator is in the third person and is critical of the deluded life of Sylvie and Jerome where they constantly imagined themselves living a glamorous life yet they did not work hard to achieve it.

The tone of the novel is resigned for the narrator is critical and resigned about the life and fate of Sylvie and Jerome. The mood of the novel is melancholy for it described the desperation of the characters for failing to achieve their dreams of getting wealthy.

There are no protagonists or antagonists in the novel.

The major conflict in the novel is the delusion that Jerome and Sylvie have that they will soon have a glamorous life yet they did not have the desire to work towards achieving that. They constantly imagined themselves living in mansions when they were living in a small two-roomed apartment.

The climax is reached while Jerome and Sylvie are in Tunisia and they realize that they would never achieve the status of wealth that they constantly obsessed over.

The narrator said that the lives of Jerome and Sylvie were treading water. This happened when it dawned on them that they would not be as wealthy as they imagined that they would get and they were tired of their melancholy life in Tunisia.

The statement, ‘Their lives were dripping away.’ This is an understatement of their current status of life because they were devastated when they realized that they would not achieve their dreams.

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The study is described as, ‘Slightly to the left of the window and at a shallow angle would be a long country table covered with a large red blotter. Wooden boxes, flat pen-holders and pots of all kinds would hold pencils, paper-clips, staples large and small. A glass tile would serve as an ashtray. A circular black leather box decorated with gold-leaf arabesques would be filled with cigarettes. Light would come from an old desk-lamp, adjustable only with difficulty, fitted with a green opaline lampshade shaped like a visor. On each side of the table, virtually facing each other, would be two high-backed wood and leather armchairs. Still further to the left, along the wall, would be a narrow table overflowing with books. A wing-chair in bottle-green leather would lead to grey metal filing cabinets and light wooden card-index boxes.’

The narrator said in regards to Jerome and Sylvie’s attitude to their work, ‘They did not like their work; could they have liked it? But they did not dislike it a great deal either.’ The statement is paradoxical because they could not both like and dislike their work at the same time.

The narrator draws a parallel between the life that Jerome and Sylvie lived in France to the one they lived in Tunisia. In France, they had many friends and a vibrant social life while in Tunisia they did not have many friends and were often lonely.

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The narrator says that, ‘Tables set themselves fully of the laden...’ This is a personification of the tables because they have been given the ability to set themselves.