Professor Beohm
Feb.28, 2010
The A&P
In this essay Updike narrates the story through the eyes of a teenage store clerk named Sammy. Right from the beginning, all of Sammy’s attention gets diverted to three teenage girls that walk in the A&P in their bathing suits. He was in the middle of checking out an older lady which he described as looking like a witch, at the time of the girls arrival. He got so distracted by the girls that he rang the elderly ladies crackers up twice. He assumed this made her day, because she had been waiting all her life for someone to mess up so she could yell at them for making a mistake. As soon as he gets the old lady out of his way, he gets back to watching the girls intently. Sammy put each girl into a category. He described the first as a typical chunky girl with a round face and nice butt. The second one Sammy described as having “black hair that hadn’t quite frizzed right, and one of these sunburns right across under the eyes, and chin that was too long”.(pg 68) She is the type of girl all the other girls thinks is attractive ,but never makes it and they know this so they keep her around to make them look better. I personally never did this, but I’m sure there are girls that do. The one he likes the best he calls her the queen. She’s not to tall or chunky. He describes the first two girls as wearing bikinis, but doesn’t get into detail about the queen. I never knew that men categorized women in this fashion. It’s also funny how he thinks everyone else is looking at them in the same way. I’m sure all the other men are
The Essay on Three Girl Story Sammy Girls
The short story "A & P" by John Updike is a descriptive short story. Updike writes the story from a viewpoint of a young man, about 19 years old, named Sammy who works as a cashier at a supermarket. The story contains many descriptive phrases about the three young girl's flesh. For example, .".. a chunky kid, with a good tan and a sweet broad soft-looking can with those two crescents of white ...
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looking at the girls and fantasizing about them, but I doubt if it gets any deeper than that. He
starts comparing other ladies to the queen. In his eyes no one can measure up to the queen.
In the end of the story, he lets his feeling get the best of him and he makes a bad decision.
There is another cashier in this story named Stokies. He is married with two kids. Though he is a man in his early twenties, that doesn’t stop him from looking or fantasizing when a half naked girl passes by. He lets his co- worker know how he feels about the girls. So now they’re both staring as the girls gallivant through the store. Maybe guys were more sheltered back in the 1950’s. For the time he spends watching them Stokies seems like he has never seen a girl in a bikini before.
The girls seem like your average teenage girls to me. Most teenage girls are starving for attention, especially from the opposite sex. I doubt if the plan for the day was to go out and cause a buzz at the A&P. .The queen’s mom sent them to the store to get kippers. The girls were probably already in their bathing suits, so they simply entered the store unaware of the commotion they would cause. Also, girls that age, often get an ego rush when guys start to notice them. The chunky girl should not be wearing a bikini in my opinion , but neither should skinny girls. I guess the chunky girl thought she looked good. The girls walk around this small town store long enough to get everyone’s attention. They get to Sammy’s check- out lane and that’s when Lengel arrives in the store and see this spectacle. He reprimands the girls coming in the store and not being properly dressed. The chunky one and the queen defend themselves of being and try to justify their reasons for coming into the store in bathing suits. In my opinion they did this to convince themselves they were properly dressed more than the manager and the others.
The Essay on Sammy Girls Store Story
A & P John Updike's A & P is a short story about a young man named Sammy working in a grocery store. During his shift, three girls walk in, all in bathing suits. Although the town in which the story takes place is near the beach, the A & P is in an area where it is not common for this sort of thing to occur. It is also worth noting that the story takes place in the fifties, thus three ...
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The girls were in a hurry to leave the A&P. Along with them going out the door, the girls confidence walked out before them. Not to mention, the girls showed no appreciation for Sammy who tried defended them. All they were concerned about was their bruised egos. I understand that teenage girls need attention and acceptance from the opposite sex. I don’t understand why they went in the store dressed like that, knowing a store’s service rules. No shirt, No shoes, No service. The girl were also out of bounds by violating the store’s policies. It’s not mentioned if they were unaware of this policy or violated this policy intentionally.
The manager Lengel on the other hand is your typical hypocritical, role model of a small town. Also he teaches Sunday school at the town church. He is said to not m iss a thing. I think this is because his life isn’t going how he would like, so he has to find fault with everyone and criticize everything he can. It wasn’t the fact that he was explaining the store policy to the girls, but how he told them. Lengel comes over and says “Girls, this isn’t the beach”, (pg70) loud enough so everyone heard and repeated it in case someone missed it the first time. He should of pulled them aside and did it privately. By publically chastising the
girls , Lengel demonstrated a need to embaress and humiliate them for his own gratification. .
The setting where the incident takes place is a small beach resort town. Sammy explain “we’re right in the middle of town, and if you stand at our front doors you can see two banks and the Congregational church and the newspaper store and three real estate offices and about twenty-seven old freeloaders tearing up Central Street because the sewer broke again.”(pg70-71) Sammy also states that most of the town’s people haven’t seen the beach in twenty years. This seems strange to me,because beach is only five miles away. It would only take about ten or
The Essay on Girls In Bathing Suit Sammy Story One
Does Sammy undergo essential change? John Updike's fictional account "A & P" is a story of a 19-year-old teenager, Sammy, who impulsively quits his job in a grocery due to three girls in bathing suits. We, as listeners of his plight situation, may want to consider if Sammy learns something fundamental about himself as he justifies his indignant-yet presumptuous-actions that caused him to quit. ...
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fifteen minutes to walk to the beach. Since the towns people are described by Sammy as being so parochial, maybe they just stared because of the novelty of seeing three girls in bathing suits. In a small town everything gets magnified because there isn’t that much to do. So, three teenage girls shopping in their bathing suits at the local A&P was probably talk of the town.
I enjoyed this story. In the beginning there is high sexual tension between all the men as these half naked girls strut around the store. Then you have poor Sammy, who is at that age, where he lets his lower brain do all the thinking. I can’t agree with his decision. He made a big mistake when he quit his job just because Lengel embarrassed the girls. I can’t understand why he thought he would be their hero. It seems just stupid in my eyes. They didn’t even pay him enough attention to even know he quit over them. This story went from excitement to disappointment. That was unexpected. It makes a good story when you can’t predict the ending halfway through.
