Analysis of Robert Graves’ Story the Shout
Robert Graves’ story The Shout represents as a part of the book Collected Short Stories, which was written in 1924. This is the story in which reality and unreality are closely interwoven. Even though, this story gives a reader the creeps, it makes to think about very important things as love, soul and fear of death.
The Shout is the story within frames of the story. That is, the narrator retells a story he heard from Crossley in the Asylum at a cricket match. We do not know who is the narrator; therefore, we percept the narrator as the author’s “second self”. Thus we should believe the narrator and see the story about Crossley from his point of view.
From the narrator we get know that his interlocutor, Crossley, is insane and claims that his soul is split in pieces. In the beginning of his story Crossley points out that his “story is true, every word of it”; however, every time when he tells this story, he tells it in a new way. Crossely’s story tells us about the destructive impact of Charles – a man with magic power – on the relationship between Richard and Rachel – a happily married couple. After one night when Richard and Rachel have similar dreams, their life changes abruptly. Richard had a dream in which he had a conversation walking in the sand hills with a strange person about the whereabouts of the soul. Similarly, Rachel tells about her dream in which she saw Richard with the man walking in the sand hills. However, Rachel was afraid of the man and ran from them both. Discussing their dreams Richard says, “We not only live together and talk together and sleep together, but it seems we now even dream together”. As a result, very soon their dreams start to come true. First of all, Richard meets a man called Charles. During the conversation with him Richard recognizes in his interlocutor a person from the dream. Moreover, in the sand hills Richard has a sense of “déjà vu”. Likewise in the dream, Richard has a talk with Charles about whether “the soul is
The Shout is the story within frames of the story. That is, the narrator retells a story he heard from Crossley in the Asylum at a cricket match. We do not know who is the narrator; therefore, we percept the narrator as the author’s “second self”. Thus we should believe the narrator and see the story about Crossley from his point of view.
From the narrator we get know that his interlocutor, Crossley, is insane and claims that his soul is split in pieces. In the beginning of his story Crossley points out that his “story is true, every word of it”; however, every time when he tells this story, he tells it in a new way. Crossely’s story tells us about the destructive impact of Charles – a man with magic power – on the relationship between Richard and Rachel – a happily married couple. After one night when Richard and Rachel have similar dreams, their life changes abruptly. Richard had a dream in which he had a conversation walking in the sand hills with a strange person about the whereabouts of the soul. Similarly, Rachel tells about her dream in which she saw Richard with the man walking in the sand hills. However, Rachel was afraid of the man and ran from them both. Discussing their dreams Richard says, “We not only live together and talk together and sleep together, but it seems we now even dream together”. As a result, very soon their dreams start to come true. First of all, Richard meets a man called Charles. During the conversation with him Richard recognizes in his interlocutor a person from the dream. Moreover, in the sand hills Richard has a sense of “déjà vu”. Likewise in the dream, Richard has a talk with Charles about whether “the soul is