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Avoiding Reality

The introduction in the passage of The Secret History by Donna Tart, sets the tone for the rest of the novel. In the introduction, the author immediately characterizes the narrator’s attitude toward Bunny’s death. The narrator’s heartless, shameful, inhumane, and hostile attitude is shown by the authors use of literary techniques. Furthermore, the disinterest and uncaring attitude is demonstrated with the use of simile, symbolism, and irony.

The use of simile throughout the passage demonstrates the narrator’s heartless attitude. When the narrator describes Bunny’s murder, he compares each event with a less important and almost irrelevant analogy. The narrator describes, “…remember piling gratefully into the car and starting down the road like a family vacation…with Henry driving clench-jawed through the potholes and the rest of us leaning over the sears and talking like children” (54-60). Here, two continuous simile descriptions are purposely embedded in the passage to show the narrator’s heartless attitude toward the murder. After having left Bunny in the wilderness, he describes his trip back “like a family vacation” and the group of criminals “talking like children.” The narrator compares his actions and the group’s actions with happy events after having killed Bunny. Overall, the narrator’s attitude is seen when he uses the similes because he shows disinterest and a spirit of heartlessness.

The symbol of the ravine describes the narrator’s mental struggle and shameful attitude toward Bunny’s murder. There are two instances where the ravine appears in the passage and it seems as though it symbolizes struggles and Bunny himself. The narrator mentions, “…and though once I thought I had left that ravine forever on April afternoon long ago, now I am not sure..” (35-36). In this sentence, the word ravine could be easily replaced by the word struggle or murder. The ravine does not just mean a bird, but it symbolizes and demonstrates the narrator’s personal struggle with Bunny’s murder. The fact that he cannot name his struggle or talk about what he has committed shows that he has a battle with himself. In other words, he is ashamed and shows a spirit of remorse because the novel mentions, “I thought I had left the ravine forever…now I am not sure.” Here, he is almost questioning and complaining to his past by saying, why should the memories of his past come back if he had left them forever? All in all, the ravine is used to portray the narrator as someone who is ashamed of his past and is therefore, unwilling to face the reality.

Finally, the narrator’s hostile attitude reveals itself when he uses irony by mentioning the color white and introducing Bunny’s murder. The narrator automatically begins the passage with a pleasant and beautiful description of snow. Snow and the the color white appears many time in the passage. For example, the narrator mentions in the beginning of the introduction, “The snow in the mountains…” (1-2). The fact that the narrator clearly uses the color white in the introduction shows the narrator’s attitude and hostile intentions. Also, he uses the same irony when he says, “…though I remember the walk back and first lonely flakes of snow” (54-55). The narrator uses the color white to mock and minimize the extremity of the situation he is in. Right after he has killed Bunny he purposely describes the scenery and includes the “flakes of snow.” Within these sentences there is irony because during a horrid situation he uses the snow flakes and the color white, which ironically mean something pleasant and positive. To finalize, irony is used to show that the narrator is hostile and gruesome because he purposely goes around in circles when he explains the murder to distract the reader from reality.

In the novel, the use of simile, symbolism, and irony are used to portray the kind of attitude the narrator has in the introduction. These literary techniques allows the author to portray the narrator as someone gruesome, hostile, shameful, heartless, and inhumane. In conclusion, all these examples and techniques allow the tone to establish for the rest of the appalling novel.