The People

Angela Franklin Professor Ginfrida ENC1101 22 April 2013 Neat Vs. Sloppy In Suzanne Britt's "Neat People Vs. Sloppy People" and Dave Barry's " Batting Clean Up and Striking Out" both author's examine just complicated human relationships can be considering how many types of personalities are out there. They both share certain literary elements, but differ immensely in the realms of tone, thesis and organization methods. Barry and Britt share many similarities in their literary elements. Literary elements are symbols and allusions. An allusion is usually used to refer to a person, place or thing that is common knowledge, it may point to a famous event, a familiar saying or a well-known story or song (734). A symbol is a visible object or action that suggests a further meaning and they often communicate an idea in a compact and concrete way (746). They both use these literary elements to create humor in their essays. Barry for example takes the use of Pompeii saying that "men generally don't notice dirt until it forms clumps, large enough that can lead to a tragedy like the city of Pompeii (261). Another allusion Barry uses is the reference to Edgar Allen Poe when he goes on to say that "they could feel the world series television and radio broadcast rays zinging through the air penetrating right through their bodies, causing our dental fillings to vibrate, and all the while the women were behaving as though nothing were wrong" (262). This enhances his story with suspense. Likewise Britt refers to The NewYorker by saying that "someday the sloppy people will sit down and read all the back issues of the magazine" because they are intelligent. A neat person she goes on to say: "would hurry up and get the whole thing over with so they can sit down and watch some