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1、 O.Henrys Writing StyleAbstracts:The O.henry-style ending is unexpctedly surprising .We may show bitter smiles after knowing how things end up ,like tragic and sad things which reflect the cruel social reality are described in a comic way.Key words:Writing style writing technique Surprising Endings
2、Wry Humor1:Introduction: O.Henry, one of the three most famous short-story writers in the world, enjoys equal status with Chekhov and Maupassant. He played an important role in short stories development especially in America and was called “the founder of American stories.” The social life of that t
3、ime in America was mirrored in O.Henrys unique writing style. O.Henrys short stories gained their popularity in China and some of his famous works were even selected into students textbook. The study of O.Henrys writing style can help us to get a better undstanding of American life in that time, lea
4、rn the writing technics of short stories, and appreciate the art of short stories.2. A brief introduction to O.Henry and his main worksO. Henry, originally named William Sydney Porter, was born on September 11, 1862, in North Carolina in a docotors family. In his lengendary life , Porter took a numb
5、er of different jobs ,first as pharmacist then as a draftsman, bank teller and journalist. He also began writing as a sideline. When he worked as a bank teller, he was accused by the bank of embezzlement and fled to Honduras to avoid interrogation. He returned in February 1897 to see his dying wife
6、and was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison. While in prison, Porter, as a licensed pharmacist, worked in the prison hospital as the night druggist and had fourteen stories published under various pseudonyms during that time. Porter was released for good behavior after serving three years
7、. Later he moved to New York City and specialized in writing.In his prolific writing life , O. Henry wrote more than 300 short stories and among those are some world famous pieces: A Service of Love，The Cop And The Anthem，The Gift of The Magi，The Last Leaf，The Road We Take ，After Twenty Years, The F
8、urnished Room, The Man Higher Up，The Ransom of Red Chief，The Romance of A Busy Broker，An Unfinished Story. 3 Investigation of O.Henrys writing technique 3.1Careful Plotting and Ironic CoincidenceO.Henrys success lies in his theme choice from real life and careful plotting. The changeable plots keep
9、the readers in suspence and the ironic coincidence surprises the reader but at the same time makes them feel it should happened in that way.In His most famous story, The Gift of The Magi he spins the story of a young couple who are short of money but desperately want to buy each other Christmas gift
10、s. The husband sells his only favorite watch to buy a set of combs for his wife, while she uses the money from selling her beautiful hair to buy him a pocket chain. The author arranges the entire plot just to make readers anticipate the excitement of the outcome. From the beginning, the readers keep
11、 guessing what the couple will buy for each other, and the irony of their gifts is the greatest suspense the author puts into this story. However, after deading, the readers will agree to the title The Gift of the Magi because there will be no gift in the world more valuable than love. 3.2 Surprisin
12、g Endings3.2.1Ironic endingAt the end of The Cop And The Anthem, O.Henry gave us a great surprise - when Soapy was planning to be somebody in the world, he was announced to be arrested. It was difficult to say it was a tragedy or a comedy to Soapy, yet the reality is opposite to Soapys mind again.Th
13、is ending is out of readers imagination, and the sudden stop makes it difficult for readers to understand the story immediately. This is the O .Henrys working - the unexpected ending that beyond the peoples normal expectation. The ending was both ironic and unexpected in the stories. Between dream a
14、nd truth, there is a distance. While just this kind of ending attracts more and more readers of worldwide to O.Henrys novels. His extraordinary ending raises the story to a higher level, thus he owns everyones admiration. 3.2.2 Implication endingSome of O. Henrys short stories didnt explain a clear
15、end but for some hints, so that the readers understands tacitly. Unfinished Story just possesses this kind of ending. It tells about a poor beautiful girl Darcie rejected the wealthy, bad Piggys invitation to dinner by faith. Yet if Piggy asks Darcie again to dine with him, the poor girl could not a
16、ssure that she would be able to reject it. The author has not explained. But readers will be conscious of beautiful and poverty of Darcies fate will be moremiserable,they will certainlylike thehateof theweekandonly give five or six dollar a week.3.2.3 Solution endingDefinition:Using readers curious
17、mental, he often set some mysteries and dose not give the answer until the end of the novel so that he can make the readers suddenly enlightened, in this way readers can have a deeper understanding about the mysteries in the novel.For example: In The Song And The Sergeant a warmly welcomed comedy wa
18、s messed up by the comedy troupe. The actor and actress were blaming each other, they played it again in the police station, and when the actor sang”will you marry me” emotionally, the actress suddenly realized his love and cried. Until then, everyone (including the readers) knew where the problems
19、are and gave them their best wishes. 3.2.4 Coincidence endingDefinition: At the end of the stories, it often appears some unexpected coincidence (also include untimeliness).The coincidence and untimeliness in the ending not only increase drama and interest of the work but also provoke thought. These
20、 coincidences can be divided into two parts: one is purely by chance; it lets readers think more deeply about the necessity of the story throughout occasionality. In The Cop And The Anthem, Soapy, who prepared for the coming winter-trying his best to be arrested into the prison, was finally moved by
21、 the anthem of the church. And he decided to make a man of him again and just at that moment he was arrested by a police. There are a series of coincidences, but also exist necessities: he wanted to be arrested just because of the cold winter, his nature was not bad. He could be good. But the social
22、 system was so unreasonable, the judicatures were so corrupt and incompetent. This coincidence reflects that the social reality of the United States at that time was serious unreasonable. 3.2.5 Revealing ending In O. Henrys short stories, in order to reveal the true fact of problems, he often uses s
23、ome ending techniques, so that readers can understand the profound meaning of the short story. The story, The whirligig of Life, mainly depicts three characters of a famer couple, and a little local justice .Because of complains and quarrels, the couple were to divorce at the justice office. However
24、, the justice wanted to get a five-dollar bill, the whole possession of the couple, as the commission charge of divorce. And in fact, the wife didnt want to divorce, therefore she required that his husband give her five dollars as alimony. At last they composited.The author describes at the ending,
25、“Once again he lovingly fingered the five dollar bill stuffed into his coat pocket ” which reveals the inability, greedy, and selfishness of the justice. 3.2.6 Repeating ending O. Henry sometimes repeats the classic plots at the end of the story, which deepen the readers impressions and understandin
26、g to the work. In the story, The Roads We Take, the author says,“The expression on Dodsons face changed in an instant to one of cold ferocity mingled with inexorable cupidity. The soul of the man showed itself for a moment like an evil face in the window of a reputable house”And at the ending O. Hen
27、ry repeats the description of the robbers image when he was killing a man, which not only shocked the readers, but also made people deeply be impressed by the essence of the capitalism. 3.3. Wry HumorHumor is one of the American literary traditions. Starts from Washington Irving, many writers are go
28、od at writing those lovely, funny stories. O.Henry had inherited this tradition. The contemporary writers influence and his rough experience make his unique humor out of the ordinary, which is full of bitter laughter. His wry humor is mainly reflected in three aspects: works themselves, the characte
29、rs and the literary language.3.3.1 humor of works The Cop And The Anthem ,for example , is about a New York City hobo named Soapy, who sets out to get arrested so he can avoid sleeping in the cold winter as a guest of the city jail. Despite efforts at petty theft, vandalism, disorderly conduct, and
30、mashing with a young prostitute, Soapy fails to draw the attention of the police. Disconsolate, he pauses in front of a church, where an organ anthem inspires him to clean up his life and it is ironically that at that moment he was charged for loitering and sentenced to three months in prison withou
31、t reason at all. How humor the story is!3.3.2 humor of the charactersThe Gift of The Magi, for example, is about a young couple who is short of money but desperately wanted to buy each other Christmas gifts. Unbeknownst to Jim, Della sells her most valuable possession, her beautiful hair, in order t
32、o buy a platinum fob chain for Jims watch; while unbeknownst to Della, Jim sells his own most valuable possession, his watch, to buy jeweled combs for Dellas hair. They were a little silly to some extent, but the real love shows incisively and vividly in the two humorous characters.3.3.3 humor of th
33、e literary languageIn O.Henrys short stories, the use of rhetoric is the most important features, which makes the story full of humorous and wit. The Cop and the Anthem, for example, contains kinds of rhetoric. Fist, simile. “No cop for youse，said the waiter, with a voice like butter cakes and an ey
34、e like the cherry in a Manhattan cocktail.” This sentence makes the waiters anger and witty image lifelike. Then, metaphor. “A dead leaf fell in Soapys lap. That was Jack Frosts card.”A common leaf suddenly became a gatekeeper of the approaching winter. Last, euphemism. “The time had come for him to
35、 resolve himself into a singular Committee of Ways and Means to provide against the coming rigor.” Here the single Finance Committee” actually refers to the Soviet himself. The euphemism used to make the language more humorous.4.conclusionO.henrys humor lies in the plots ,language and description of
36、 the main figures in his works.These detailed things make the story dramatic but convincing to readers.The O.henry-style ending is unexpctedly surprising .We may show bitter smiles after knowing how things end up ,like tragic and sad things which reflect the cruel social reality are described in a c
37、omic way.Short stories of O.Henrys are relaxing but thought-provoking. The plots are put in a plain way which is reader-friendly and eligible.This kind of profound philosophy put in a easy way is pretty impressive to readers.Through studying short stories of O.Henrys we experience the darkness of th
38、e social background he lived in. And the soft way of criticizing it makes us feel more strongly how helpless people were under such a poor situation. We fully appreciate his style of putting things up and we will follow some in our own later writing. 参考文献：欧亨利作品在中国的译介与影响，中州学刊，常润芳，2010-04，第58页欧亨利小说中的现
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40、 Writing the Essay Class_1_ Group _1_ Members _黄雪容 _谭孟林 陈自礼 毛睿原_乔佳佳 尹航_ Problems Possible solutionsSolved (+) or not (-)Translation。Searched translation engines on the Internet 。Looked new words up in the dictionary +Tense。Discussion +It is difficult for usto understand the original works。Found Chinese translation on webs。Discussion 。Read chinese version +Material selection。Discussion +
