Summary Of James Alan Mcpherson's 'Why I Like Country Music'

James Alan McPherson uses abstract diction by paradoxically combining colors and inanimate objects, describing the skin color of the characters in the story, as well as slang to amplify the connection between the inanimate objects and colors and create a childishly colorful tone in his short story, “Why I Like Country Music.” Throughout the story the main character describes a childhood experience to his wife Gloria about why he likes country music. The author uses slang in sentences, which gives the story an informal or friendly feeling. “ ‘I can see blues, bebop, maybe even a little buckdancing. But not bluegrass,’ Gloria says, ‘Hillbilly stuff is just not my music,’”(McPherson 3). Words like “bebop, buckdancing, and hillbilly are slang
“A peanut-brown boy with curly hair, he seemed to know everything,” (McPherson 9). Comparing the color of a peanut to the skin color of a boy that the main character notes is important in contributing to McPherson’s ongoing connection between lifeless objects and the colors of everyday life. It’s this type of diction that the author uses that develops a childish tone throughout the story. Not only does the author use this connection between two different parts of speech but he also uses adjectives to develop the colorful tone of the story. “These happy children would pull and twist the long arms of billowy crepe paper into wondrous, multicolored plaits,” (McPherson 13). The main character describes his observation of the colors around the Maypole as “wondrous,” which continues to develop the tone of vibrant and youthful colorfulness throughout the story. The adjectives the author uses have a childish ambience to them, including “wondrous,” which creates a visualization of the main character as a young boy staring in awe at the colors of the Maypole. “A deep blue bandanna enclosed her head with the wonder of a summer sky. Black patent leather shoes glistened like half-hidden stars beneath the red and white of her hemline,” (McPherson 18). The author continues to portray the main character as a young man infatuated with the colors around him to amplify and extend the tone of color in the story through a childish