Best-selling writer and humorous David Sedaris, in his personal essay, "Santaland Diaries" recounts his stint working as an elf named "Crumpet" at a Macy's department store. He adopts a dry somewhat witty tone in order to depict the hustle and bustle of Christmas!
Sedaris begins by establishing a setting, he describes his "perky" elf costume he momentarily called a work uniform. This technique creates a personal and informal tone, making this a really fun and easy read.
As the writer goes on his use of sarcastic diction allows you to fully understand his point of view. While showing a side of the holidays that many don't see. He pokes fun at the parents who torture their children with long lines, and threats of coal in their stocking.
Finally, in the end their is a sense of irony, in that really the holidays aren't for the children but the "parents' idea of a world they cannot make work for them."
1 comment:
You do something important here that we haven't much discussed yet -- introduce the author. I think you might mean "humorist" though.
Good observation about setting - but why/how does the setting particularly inform the argument/main claim he's making (and is that claim about consumerism? hypocrisy? workplace conditions/environment for low-level jobs? etc.)
The beginning paragraph would work well as a introductory paragraph but needs a thesis that communicate's the author's central claim (implicit here; he never explicitly states it).
Post a Comment