This paper will demonstrate choices, tragedy, respect, individuality, and values in the following stories: The Moose and The Sparrow by Hugh Garner, The Yellow Sweater by Hugh Garner, The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant, The Painted Door by Sinclair Ross, and David by Earle Birney
A choice is something one must make frequently throughout each and every day of ones lifetime. Some choices may be easier to make than others. One must choose to get out of bed each morning, what someone wants to eat or drink, whom one should converse with. Other choices may not quite be as simple to make, or the choices I make throughout my life may be easy choices to me, but to someone else those choices would be very hard to make. For instance, young Cecil had to make many choices in the story “The Moose and The Sparrow”. Cecil chose to stay at the camp even though he was being bullied constantly by Moose Mason. “He said he’d made up his mind to stick it out until his time was up” (page 4, lines 23-24)
As much as Moose was physically harming Cecil, Cecil did stick to his commitment to the lumber camp and continued to earn his money for university. He was a tough young man inside of his sparrow-like shell to put up with all of Moose’s bullying, and Cecil made a justifiable choice to stop Moose by killing him.
In the story “The Yellow Sweater” Marie chose to leave her aunt Bernice’s house as Bernice’s husband was obviously abusing Marie. Marie Chose to pack up her things to move to the city, but she didn’t hitchhike like other people leaving the small town she was living in. Marie simply chose to walk, but when Tom pulled over on the side of the road, Marie chose to get into the car not knowing what kind of person she would be traveling with or if she