The Lumber Room

1.Author

 

The text under analysis is written by an outstanding British novelist and short story writer Hector Munro. Hector Hugh Munro (December 18, 1870 – November 13, 1916), better known by the pen name Saki, was a British writer, whose witty and sometimes macabre stories satirized Edwardian society and culture. He is considered a master of the short story and is often compared to O. Henry and Dorothy Parker. His tales feature delicately drawn characters and finely judged narratives. Saki's world contrasts the effete conventions and hypocrisies of Edwardian England with the ruthless but straightforward life-and-death struggles of nature. Nature generally wins in the end.

Owing to the death of his mother and his father's absence abroad he was brought up during his childhood, with his elder brother and sister, by a grandmother and two aunts. It seems probable that their stem and unsympathetic methods account for Munro’s strong dislike of anything that smacks of the conventional and the self-righteous. He satirized things that he hated. Munro was killed on the French front during the first world war.

In her Biography of Saki Munro’s sister writes: “One of Munro’s aunts, Augusta, was a woman of ungovernable temper, of fierce likes and dislikes, imperious, a moral coward, possessing no brains worth speaking of, and a primitive disposition.” Naturally the last person who should have been in charge of children. The character of the aunt in The Lumber-Room is Aunt Augusta to the life.

 

2.Plot

 

The plot of the story revolves around a little orphan Nicholas who was trusted to his tyrannical and dull-witted aunt. One day Nicholas was “in disgrace”, so he made his Aunt believe that he was somehow trying to get into the gooseberry garden, but instead had no intention of doing so but did sneak into the Lumber Room. There a tremendous picture of a hunter and a stag opened to him. Soon his aunt tried to look for the boy and slipped into the rain-water tank. She asked Nicholas to fetch her a ladder but the boy pretended not to understand her, he said that she was the Evil One (This metaphor shows author’s irony and essential clue to the character).

 

3.Setting

 

The action takes place in house of Nicholas’s aunt.

Summer (sands), afternoon, one day, explicity

 

4.Form of narration

 

The excerpt is homogeneous. The story is narrated in the 3^rd person. This allows the reader to access the situation and the characters in an unbiased and objective manner. This is especially so because the characters are complex, having both positive and negative viewpoints. The third person point of view is impersonal which fits the impersonal atmosphere of the household.

 

5.Plot structure

 

The text can be divided into several parts:

• The exposition, in which we learn about little Nicholas, his cousins and his strict aunt. Nicholas got into his aunt’s disgrace. So his cousins were to be taken to Jagborough sands that afternoon and he was to stay at home. The Aunt was absolutely sure that the boy was determined to get into the gooseberry garden because “I have told him he is not to”. The author uses irony and witty tone throughout the story. For example, Aunt's condescending tone in describing Nicholas’ prank: disgrace, sin, fell from grace. The author is obviously using the Aunt’s own word choice to reveal her self-righteous attitude. This is a subtle criticism of her arrogance which she is blind to. To lay stress on the Aunt’s narrow-mindness Munro uses such metaphors as “a circus of unrivalled merit” and “uncounted elephants”
• The complication, when Nicholas got into an unknown land of lumber-room. Forbidden fruit is sweet and truly the lumber-room is described as a storehouse of unimagined treasure. Every single item brings life and imagination to Nicholas and is symbolic of what the adult of real world lacks. He often pictured to himself what the lumber-room was like, since that was the region that was so carefully sealed from youthful eyes. The tapestry brings to life imagination and fantasy within Nicholas, the interesting pots and candlesticks bring an aesthetic quality, visual beauty which stirs up his creative mind; and lastly a large square book full of coloured pictures of birds. And such birds! They allow Nicholas to learn in a fun and exciting way. The author uses irony to poke fun and criticize the Aunt. For instance, trip to Jagborough which is meant to spite Nicholas fails. Instead of being a punishment for the child, it became a treat for him whereas it became a torture to those who went. The Aunt’s conception of “the paradise”. The real paradise is the Lumber-room not the garden. This reveals the irony that the ideal world of an adult is dull and boring to that of a child.
• The climax of the text. While the boy was admiring the colouring of a mandarin duck, the voice of his aunt came from the gooseberry garden. She got slipped into the rain-water tank and couldn’t go out. She demanded from the boy to bring her a ladder, but he said her voice didn’t sound like his aunt’s. “You may be the Evil One tempting me to be disobedient” – said a little boy deciding the Justice must be done. The Aunt tasted the fruit of her own punishment on the children. She is accused of falling from grace, of lying to Nicholas about jam and thus termed the Evil One. She feels what it is like to be condemned. 
• The denouncement. Dinner takes place in fearsome silence. This epithet stresses the tension of the atmosphere. The Aunt is furious and enforces in the house. She maintained the frozen muteness of one who has suffered undignified and unmerited detention in a rain-water tank for thirty-five minutes. Nicholas was also silent, in the absorption of an enchanting picture of a hunter and a stag.

6.Conflict

 

Here we can observe the external conflict such as man against man between intelligent, imaginative children and repressive hypocritical adults.

 

7.Characters

 

The Aunt

 

In this story the author uses direct and indirect characterization of the main heroes. For example, we can see direct characterization of the aunt – “She was a woman of few ideas, with immense power of concentration…” or “the aunt by assertion”  or “Older and wiser and better people…” that is how the aunt immodestly characterizes herself. We can observe also indirect characterization through her speech, for instance, she is talking loftily in imperious tone, she frequently uses such expressions as YOU ARE IN DISGRACE or DON’ TALK NONSENCE…

The author uses irony and witty tone throughout the story. For example, Aunt's condescending tone in describing Nicholas’  prank: disgrace, sin, fell from grace. The author is obviously using the Aunt’s own word choice to reveal her self-righteous attitude. This is a subtle criticism of her arrogance which she is blind to.

The Aunt’s world is full of warped priorities. She puts punishment and withholding of enjoyment as more important than getting to know and molding the lives of the children. Being cold, lacking of love, she is more concerned with punishing the children: she keeps jam and goodies away from them, she bars them from the beautiful places in the house like the garden and lumber-room. Unable to understand and communicate with children, she is not even aware when her nephew’s feet was hurt. She keeps all the beautiful and creative things of the house locked away in a lumber-room so as not to spoil them but in doing so, the purpose of the objects which is to beauty the house, is lost, leaving the house dull and colourless. To lay stress on the Aunt’s narrow-mindness Munro uses such metaphors as “a circus of unrivalled merit” and “uncounted elephants”. She tries to convince Nicholas about the fun of a trip to the beach, of circus, but lacks the imagination to sound convincing. There are a lot of metaphors (often sustained) in the story:  the flawlessness of the reasoning, self-imposed sentry-duty (characterizes the Aunt as a very strict person), art of fitting keys into keyholes and turning locks, region that was so carefully sealed from youthful eyes, many golden minutes of a ridiculously short range. With the help of these stylistic means the offer unfolds a theme in which stupidity, moral degradation, hypocrisy and ambition play their sorry parts.

In the story the Aunt is represented as a self-righteous and moralistic person. She uses a hypocritical tone and exaggerates a child’s prank comparing it to a grave sin. She thinks of herself as a wiser - she doesn’t like to be in the wrong. She dictates their lives for them, insisting on where they should go for entertainment. It is evident, that the author’s sympathy lies with the children.

There are some similes in the text:  the aunt-by-assertion (The author uses Nicholas’ own word choice to show that he does not accept his aunt’s authority over him. This also may be a subtle criticism of Nicholas’ rebellious attitude.).

 

Nicholas

 

N is characterized mostly indirectly through his actions. All the tricks that he plays with his aunt show him as a ready-witted and smart boy. For example “Nicholas made one or two sorties into the front garden, wriggling his way with obvious stealth of purpose towards one or other of the doors, but never able for a moment to evade the aunt’s watchful eye. As a matter of fact, he had no intention of trying to get into the gooseberry garden, but it was extremely convenient for him that his aunt should believe that he had”. This episode demonstrates how smart and skillful this little strategist is.

The episode in the l-r shows the other side of the N’s character. He is not only a brilliant strategist he is also an investigator and an explorer, as most of the children. Real life where everything is in order is too boring for a child. Children in Munro’s stories are very imaginative. Nicholas imagines the whole story behind the tapestry.

 

8.Style

 

The author’s style of writing is satirical in a humorous way. He uses a witty tone to mimic characters in order to subtly criticize them. The criticism is done in a subtle way that is humorous.

The author uses a large variety of stylistic devices, such as epithets to show us the great difference between the Child’s and Grown-up’s world. Such epithets from Child’s world (grim chuckle, alleged frog, unknown land, stale delight, mere material pleasure, bare and cheerless, thickly growing vegetation) and the one from Grown-up’s world (frivolous ground, considerable obstinacy, trivial gardening operation, unauthorized intrusion) They help the author to emphasize a deep dissension between generations, to convey a thrilling power of child’s creative mind.

The author also enriches the story with a device of rhetorical question: But did the huntsman see, what Nicholas saw, that four galloping wolves were coming in his direction through the wood?; and hyperbole: How did she howl. The following stylistic devices contribute to the expressiveness of the text.

The syntax of the first part of the story is very complicated. The sentences are very long full different clauses. This device helps the author to create an irony. He tells us such trivial and simple things by long composite sentences full of military words (like sorties, skilled tactician, intrusion) and religious words (like evil, sin, forbidden garden). The syntax of the second part is much simpler while describing the l-r. The language is very poetic but not bookish.

The story is written in ironic key and we can observe here the irony of words that is the description of trivial things by serious complex language, and the dramatic irony. The boy was meant to be punished but instead of the boy the aunt was punished. N was meant to be a “prisoner” but it came out vice versa.

 

9.Symbol

 

As for the Lumber room, it is symbolic of fun and imagination of the child’s world which is definitely lacking in the adult world. It emphasizes the destruction of life that adulthood and pride can bring.

Also the dramatic irony can be observed in the situation with the l-r. As a matter of fact the l-r is a place where old things or even trash is kept, but in the story the l-r is described in a very poetic words: “To Nicholas it was a living breathing story…” or “… here there were wonderful things for the eyes to feast on…”, “it was a storehouse of unimagined treasure…”, “… there were other objects of delight and interest claiming his instant attention…”. The l-r contrasted with the real world.

 

10.Title

 

The title of the text serves as a means of focusing our attention on the most relevant scene, it is closely connected with the setting of the text and it helps to understand the theme of the text, which is the ironic description of relations between boy and his aunt and his visiting the lumber-room. Also the title of the text helps us to understand the main character, Nicolas, his romantic nature, bright and curious.

 

11. Conclusion

 

The ending of the story reveals the author’s social comment about the differences between the world of the child and adult. Though the Aunt is furious, Nicholas is thinking about the hunter tricking the hounds by using the stag as a bait. It is a representative of his own life, he is like a hunter able to escape the hound (which represents his aunt and the dull reality of the adult world) by trickery and strategizing.

To sum up, the author’s style is remarkable for its powerful sweep, brilliant illustrations and deep psychological analysis. The story reveals he author’s great knowledge of man’s inner world. The author shows us the child’s world which is extremely beautiful, magnificent, charming and full of fancies and dreams. Giving the author his due for brilliance of style and a pointed ridicule of many social vices, such as snobbishness, pretence, self-interest. The author’s attitude towards grown-ups is a little bit cynical. It’s quite obvious that when describing the hard-heartedness and indifference of Adult’s world he is not indignant but rather amused. Adults shouldn’t prevent children from enjoying the things children like, adults shouldn’t forget that children are children not soldiers and it is very harmful to put down children’s nature of investigator. This story makes me remember “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” by Mark Twain, where the author skillfully shows the children’s nature and the world where only children can live. He shows children’s treasure (cat’s tale, and other trash that is priceless and valuable for children) which, as a matter of fact, greatly differ from our treasures…