English 1302.02H
Lee Williams, abjunct professor
July 22, 2010
A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings
1. I believe that the angel was a success at doing his job as an angel. When he got there he cured the sick child of Pelayo and Elisenda. And he helped them out financially in the process. The couple charged people five cents admission to see the angel. The curious came from far away. For less than a week they had crammed their rooms with money. The angel was the only one who took no part in his own act. He spent his time trying to get comfortable in his borrowed nest, befuddled by the hellish heat of the oil lamps and sacramental candles that had been placed along the wire.
2. The angel might be interpreted as a protector of the earthlings. I think that the angel represented the ability to heal because he saved the couple and their child.
3. I believe the angel was exactly what he was: an angel. He never once complained about the way that the greedy couple or the childish and immature townspeople treated him.
4. The story is a myth
5. The story is not a legend
6. The story is a fable
7. The story is an allegory
8. The story is magical realism
9. The angel is disguise is Raphael, the Archangel because Raphael is concerned with our suffering and with every affliction of the sons of men.
10. Raphael is charged with the sacred duty to heal the earth and to heal mankind of its maladies.
11. The girl who turned into a spider.
12. The blind man who did not recover his sight but grew three new teeth.
13. The paralytic who did not get to walk but almost won the lottery.
14. The leper whose sores sprouted sunflowers.
15. A Portuguese man who could not sleep because the noise of the stars disturbed him.
16. No, the story is not a ‘fairy tale’ because it is missing the most important part of the story which is the happy ending. Pretty much all ‘fairy tales’ end in a happy ending, and this story did not end this way. But then again it could have