8th+-+Southern+Stories+-+Magic+and+Mystery

Ana The story "At the Other end of Nowhere" uses a lot of figurative language. For example her mother being a mermaid and the men becoming sea horses. This story is surrounded by metaphors, perhaps because the narrator dosen't want to remember the reality as crude as it is of loosing a mother in the conditions she did and just wants to remember her as a "full time" mermaid. It could also be that she really dosen't remember and is just trying to remember her mother in the way that she would have liked to.

4th Block Edward Diaz In the story __"At the Other end of Nowhere''__ there is alot of figurative speach. For example when the narriator says her mother was a mermaid and the others were sea horses. She was trying to disguise a painfull time in her life. She doesn't want to picture her mom and other people dead in a river so she disguises the image with a less painfull,imaginational image.Instead of thinking of her mom dead, she thinks of her swimming as a mermiad. Basically the use of Magic and Mystery is used to disguise what has happened to the narriator's mom and the community.

5th Block Rico Kelley In "At the Other End of Nowhere", magic and mystery commonly appear.Most likely the reason for this is because all of the horror sourounding th story. The girl narrating witnesses intense tramatizing things that no one of any age should ever have to see! She says things in a way so that she doesn't have to think about what really happened. It is a way of supressing her thoughts. She also does this so that she can make her life more like a fantasy. She makes everyone around her lok like they are not-as-good as her mother in order to make her mother look better. You can see this at her mother's job. All of the men are made to look like they are fat, sloppy, old guys and her mother is a beautiful mermaid stuck on land trying to get away and create a better life for herself and her daughter. After the flood when she finds her mother dead, she makes it seem like she was trying to escape all of the troubles and return to the water as if she were free. So, the girl uses majic and mystery so that she doesn't have to think about what actually happened. Unfortunately by doing this, she can never get over it and move on with her life.

5th Block Carmina Escalante Magic and mystery is a common theme in the short story, At the Other End of Nowhere. For the readers it may be used for the simple objective to add some enjoyment to the story-telling. However, as we can see as we peruse through the story, this element is used by the narrator in order to magic"ify" her life and what has happened to her. Imagine this, you have experienced an extreme tragedy in your life aside from the fact that your life is complete crap to begin with. Your mother died in a recent flood and now, you have no one to turn to except your Aunt and Uncle. You're a little girl, at the age of about ten and you are gliding across the murky waters of what used to be your neighborhood and your find your mother, drowned, lifeless, her skin peeling off of her body and you realize that you are all alone now. This is not the best story to tell, nor the most happy. So, you embellish it. Give it a magical, mystical plot. Our narrator uses this device to make her situation seem better. No, her mother did not die. She merely decided to permanently become a mermaid. Not only did our narrator use this device to embellish her situation, she also used it probably to alleviate all of the tensions, nerves, and shock she probably felt at the time. The narrator doesn't want to think about what happened, it's too painful. So, she tells the story of how her mother was a part-time mermaid who decided to be a full-time mermaid. It's sort of like she's in this sense of denial. She doesn't want to come to terms with reality.

5th Block Susy Soto Magic and mystery is entangled into this story really strongly, all from the perspective of the young girl who's telling the story of her "Mermaid" mother and how she was a part-time mermaid until the flood came and she left her to become a full-time "Mermaid" in the sea. She was young when this happened, and she explains how she remembers it through what her aunt has told her and by what she sees through her silver filmed eye. It's as if it covers up all the bad things, what she didn't like and turns it into something magical, and more believeable to her at her age. Mystery seems to be everywhere for her. She's using these two elements to hide the horrible truth that she hates, things that she shouldn't have seen at such an age, such as the flood and her mother drowning, dieing wrapped up in a barbed wire. She used the magic and mystery that her silver-filmed eye apparently holds to let it cover up what truly happened, to hide the horrific events she lived through that not many would go through at her age, even back then. So, magic and mystery is used as a cover up here, to tell the truth in the least anyway.

Destinee Heard I think the way that the main character kept using magic in this story in particular is to try to sugar-coat the fact that her mother died in a horrible way and that she is young and is without a mom. I also think that she is trying to make it seem like her story isn't so bad, make it seem like a fairy-tale. Like the way she says her mom turned into a mermaid instead of accepting the fact that her mom is dead. Eventhough nobody likes to accept the fact that a close family member like your mom is dead, she tries to avoid it by saying that she turned in to a mermaid. She might say that her mom being found in the flood dead with her "sea apple tennis shoes" could've put her in the mind of a mermaid, but she needs to accept the fact that her mother is dead and is not a mermaid in the ocean.

__GiannisPowers__ In __At the Other End of Nowhere,__ magic is often used in the story. I thint that she uses magic and fantasy to make her life and situtaion better than it really is. For example, when the girls mother dies, she says that the mother has turned into a mermaid "full time". While her mother was still alive, the girl also said that her mother was like a mermaid. This could have meant tha the girl's mother was so beautufil, you had to use magical elements to describe her. She uses magic to sugar-coat the fact that she has no mother, she works at a resturant where she is disrespected by the customers there, and many more things.

5th block Magic and mystery is used a lot in short stories. Its used to make the storing more exciting and used to make people think about why they used the magic and mystery that way. She discribes her mother as being a mermaid after she finds her dead. She wants to remember the good and not the bad about her mom, which i can understand. The mother being called a mermaid could mean she was beautful or maybe she was trying to symbolize something with the fact that a mermaid is have human and half fish. The author used magic and mystery to make you think about the real meaning of the story.
 * //__Alec Housholder__//**