Greasy Lake
The Darkness of "Greasy Lake"
It is almost clear that the story of "Greasy Lake" takes place in the 1960’s, with the style of clothing, the preference of music and the careless attitudes of the characters that spend the night in the darkness of "Greasy Lake". This was a time when smoking pot, drinking beer, and hanging out was the cool thing to do. The story of "Greasy Lake" being in the 60’s, with the random music of rock n roll, reggae and misfit attitudes clearly attributes to Boyles statement of
“when it was good to be bad” (Boyle 529). The setting of “Greasy Lake” brings everything out that Boyle is trying to portray in this bad boy story.
When we think of “bad” boys hanging around with toothpicks hanging out of their mouths, wearing leather jackets, drinking, smoking and loafing their days away we have that feel of the 60’s in mind, maybe even the 40’s but in this story the boys are listening to a reggae band called Toots and the Maytals, which is a band that was big in the 60’s. That’s how these boys are described right away in this story. The setting of the story doesn’t start you in the actual weeds of "Greasy Lake" but the narrator draws you to this dark, wet marshy place by taking you in the car with the boys at 2: am where they are cruising through town where there are strip malls, street lights and obviously other teenagers hanging out looking for something to do; or in this case possibly looking for trouble. We know they are mostly teenagers because the narrator
points out that this is the “3rd night of summer vacation” (Boyle 530).
The feel then takes you through a long dark road with the trees crowding each side that is described as “a black unbroken wall” (Boyle 529). It seems as though you are leaving the crowded neighborhood and entering into a closed, quite dark area. The feel in the car is a pure feeling of freedom as the characters are rolling a joint, listening to music, the smell of chicken and hamburgers, with the
It is almost clear that the story of "Greasy Lake" takes place in the 1960’s, with the style of clothing, the preference of music and the careless attitudes of the characters that spend the night in the darkness of "Greasy Lake". This was a time when smoking pot, drinking beer, and hanging out was the cool thing to do. The story of "Greasy Lake" being in the 60’s, with the random music of rock n roll, reggae and misfit attitudes clearly attributes to Boyles statement of
“when it was good to be bad” (Boyle 529). The setting of “Greasy Lake” brings everything out that Boyle is trying to portray in this bad boy story.
When we think of “bad” boys hanging around with toothpicks hanging out of their mouths, wearing leather jackets, drinking, smoking and loafing their days away we have that feel of the 60’s in mind, maybe even the 40’s but in this story the boys are listening to a reggae band called Toots and the Maytals, which is a band that was big in the 60’s. That’s how these boys are described right away in this story. The setting of the story doesn’t start you in the actual weeds of "Greasy Lake" but the narrator draws you to this dark, wet marshy place by taking you in the car with the boys at 2: am where they are cruising through town where there are strip malls, street lights and obviously other teenagers hanging out looking for something to do; or in this case possibly looking for trouble. We know they are mostly teenagers because the narrator
points out that this is the “3rd night of summer vacation” (Boyle 530).
The feel then takes you through a long dark road with the trees crowding each side that is described as “a black unbroken wall” (Boyle 529). It seems as though you are leaving the crowded neighborhood and entering into a closed, quite dark area. The feel in the car is a pure feeling of freedom as the characters are rolling a joint, listening to music, the smell of chicken and hamburgers, with the