Literacy Analysis: “A Telephone Call” By Dorothy Parker

ANALYSIS OF “A TELEPHONE CALL” BY DOROTHY PARKER

The story is written in the first point of view where we can see the deepest thought and feeling of the main character. There, the main character implicitly described as a woman who falls into infatuation for a man. The whole story is written through the woman’s dialogue that reveal what she really thinks about the man whom she waits to call her and her sad feeling while she waits his call. Every word she says are the reflection of her thought that changes very often. She puts herself in an impatience condition. The traits of main character are shown in a various description as she does a lot of mood swings. At first she cannot be patient for the call from the man then starts to calm and becomes impatient again; unstable emotions. She sometimes says something rude as we can see in the eleventh paragraph “I wish I could hurt him like hell” or in the thirteenth paragraph “I wish he were dead. I wish he were dead, dead, dead.” The traits are shown very clearly through her attitude to make up a believable personality of an obsessive woman.

The story itself takes place in a living room, where people at that time put their phone and other religious goods, at 7:10 P.M as what is explained by the main character in the third paragraph “It’s ten minutes past seven.” We can see some clues that lead us to the conclusion that the specific setting of the story is taken in a living room. In the seventh paragraph, the main character explains it by “I’ll put the clock in the other room. Then I can’t look at it. If I do have to look at it again, then I’ll have to walk in the bedroom.” People at that time use an antique clock that is not hanging on the wall. They place it above a table or fireplace. And the place is absolutely not a bedroom, because she wants to go to her bedroom if she looks at the clock again. Then we can conclude that the setting is taken in a living room.

The woman is shown as the stereotype of women; impatient, care too much; always want to be treated nice by men.She shows us her impatient attitude by her non-stop prayers to God and some rude wishes that she throws to the man. She wants to be called by her lover right at 5:00 like what he promised. The man, in other hand, does not call her as what he promised. It is not like a woman who is impatient; man tends to be more patient and does not really care. Man does not take feelings too much. It is written in the fourteenth paragraph that “he doesn’t like to telephone me in front of people”. Maybe her thought about what happens to the man is right. If we look at the stereotype of man and woman, it is the usual attitude of a man towards a woman.

We can see the tone of the main character through the choice of words in the story. Dorothy puts some rude expressions and wishes of the main character to show how obsessive the woman is. We can see it through the thirteenth and fourteenth paragraph. The repetition used in the story is also become the symbol of obsession; the repetition of prayers and wishes about the phone call to God, and the supposition of the man’s reason for not calling her at the time. The casualtone type is also found in the story as the writer writes the story with a very simple choice of words. As the story brings by the thought of the main character, where it looks like the main character talks to herself, the story is written in a simply sentence structure.

The main problem that main character has is shown in the beginning of the story as an introduction. She puts herself in unstable condition where it leads up to some rude thoughts about her boyfriend. The climax of the story shown as she thinks that it would be better if her boyfriend died. We can take a look again at some paragraphs that explain her extreme obsession to the man. “If he were dead, he would be mine.” Or “I would never think of now and the last few weeks”. And then it ends up with she backs to her patience and decides to call the man if he still does not call her; even though it would break her pride as a woman. Woman cannot phone the man first because that is not something that a woman should do. It is shown in the twenty-second paragraph “Suppose he were another girl. Then I’d just telephone and say, ‘Well, for goodness sake, what happened to you?’”. It becomes the main reason why she is so impatient from the beginning of the story and cannot wait for her boyfriend to call her. If the society allows women to lead action in a relationship, the main character here would have called him from the start as soon as 5:00 has passed. The story would be flat and not interesting at all. There would not be such emotions encountered in her heart because of her boyfriend.