John Updike A & P Essay

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Sometimes when boys see a pretty girl, they tend to get anxious, excited, and maybe even a little imaginative about the girl. There may even be a point when their thoughts go too far and the boy could be seen as a creep. John Updike is an author of many short stories, one being a story called “A&P”. The characters in this short story are Sammy (the main character), Lengel (the manager of the market), and three unnamed teenage girls. The story begins with three teenage girls walking into a market wearing bikinis. Sammy works the checkout slot when he sees the girls walk into the market. As the girls wander past, Sammy’s mind also begins to wander as he takes in every aspect of their physical bodies, from what bikini they have on, to their tanned skin, to their body …show more content…
Sammy tries to defend the girls in order to garner their praise, which makes Lengel angry for contradicting him and leads Sammy to quit his job. In retrospect, Sammy wonders if he made the wrong decisions, both in defending the girls and in quitting his job. The chronological events at the store provide character development for Sammy by portraying his character as jealous, judgemental, rebellious, but ending with a strong sense of self reflection. This self-reflection does not happen until the end of the story when Sammy begins to have a greater understanding of himself. Even though Sammy eventually achieves this self-understanding, there are moments within the story that provide a different point of view. For example, the moment Sammy forcefully tells Lengel he is quitting, Lengel tries to convince him otherwise. “‘You’ll feel this for the rest of your life,’ Lengel says, and I know that’s true, too, but remembering how he made that pretty girl blush makes me so scrunchy inside I punch the No Sale tab and the machine whirs ‘peepul’ and the drawer splats open.”(Updike

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