The School

Donald Barthelme
 Big ‘L’ vs Small ‘l’
• John Mcrae (1994) classified big ‘L’ as the great literature which is the
classical texts written by authors like Shakespeare and Dickens. It is
considered as an inventive writing with artistic value. It is intended for a
serious reading such as the historical works.
• Meanwhile small ‘l’ is meant to be read as a source of entertainment such as
the fiction, comics, and fables. It requires minimum effort and thinking from
the readers.

Duff, A & Maley, A. (2007). Literature (Resource Books for Teachers), Oxford University Press.
http://www.electricka.com/ETAF/muses/literature/literature_popups/whats_literature.htm
 Plot Summary
• The short story started on the narrator telling the readers about the
failed gardening program conducted by the school involving all
students in the school.
• The program intended to teach the students the root system, the sense
of responsibility and taking care of things.
• Each students were given orange trees to be taken care of but all trees
died.
• They had experience taking care of snakes but they died too.
• They blamed the death of the snakes on the boiler that went off during a
strike.
• Then, they must take care of the herb gardens but it failed as well due to
overwatering.
• The narrator stated that at least the students learnt not too overwater the
plants.
• They thought it was a sabotage going on with the program.
• There were also gerbils, white mice, as well as salamander.
• The death of the tropical fish next was totally predicted.
• Then they have puppy that the students called ‘Edgar’, the same name as the
narrator.
• The puppy died two weeks later and Edgar took it out before the students came
to school.
• Next, they adopted a Korean orphan, Kim who did not survive as well.
• The death of Kim affected the students that they began questioning that perhaps
it was the school.
• The narrator remain steady with his opinion that it was just a bad luck.
• Then a series of parents passed away:
1. 1 suicides
2. 1 drowning
3. 4 killed in a car accident
4. 1 stroke
5. Usual deaths among the grandparents
• Two students Matthew Wein and Tony Mavrogordo died while playing at a
construction site.
• Billy Brandt’s father was knifed fatally by an intruder in his home.
• Seeing all these deaths, the students began question about life.
• Where did they all go?
• “Is death that which gives meaning to life?”
• “Isn’t death, considered as a fundamental datum, the means
by which the
taken-for-granted mundanity of the everyday may be transcended in the
direction of-”
• The students asked the narrator to make love with Helen, the teaching assistant
in attempt to find what gives meaning to life.
• The narrator told them that “there was value everywhere”.
• Helen approached the narrator and embraces him.
• Then, a new gerbil comes in and the children were excited and cheered.
 Point of View
• The story is told from the first person point of view involving the narrator.
• The story is being told in the perspective of an adult observing the children’s
learning process as well as their experience with life and death
 Characters
• Edgar (Narrator)
• Probably one of the teacher in the school
• Responsible
• He is worried that the incidents might affect the children emotionally
• Wise
• He taught the children to plant and keeping pets to cultivate moral values to the children
• Caring
• He cared about the weird situations that keeps on happening within the school
 The children (30 students)

• Naïve and innocent

• Pure hearts
• They are excited when they saw Edgar and Helen embraced each other after they
requested an affirmation of value
• Easily frightened
• Due to the facts that they happened to witnessed all sorts of tragedy that ended up
with death that happened within the school
 Helen

• The class’s teaching assistant

• Edgar has a crush on her
 Other Characters
• Kim (Korean Orphan)

• Parents & grandparents

• Matthew Wein & Tony Mavrogordo

• Billy Brandt’s father

 Theme
• Loss
• Of life, innocence, love, friends, to avoid
• Survival
• Man versus nature
• Fear of Death
• Driven by having to face death and the facts that every human beings need to
experience or deal with
• What happens after death?
 Setting
• Time
• Morning
• It was mentioned that the story happened in the school in the morning

• Place
• Herb Garden
• It was mention that the children plant the trees and water the trees in the herb garden
every day in the story.
• Classroom
• Most of the event in the story happen in the classroom even though it was not really
mention in the story but we can imagine that it happened in the classroom since the story
talks about school and the kids are playing in the classroom.

• It is possible that the school is at an area with a British vernacular based on the use of
‘bloody’ in the text.
 Tone
• Happy

• Sad
 Symbolism

• Trees = responsibility
• Death = hurdles in the learning process
• Request to make love = seeking for comfort when facing death or sadness
• New gerbil = new hope and better times
 Irony
• The children in the school were instructed to plant trees as part of their lesson
(for educational purposes) but every single one of the trees died.
• The children asked Edgar where were the salamander and the trees. However,
they are the one who contributed to the deaths of the salamander and the trees
as the trees might die because they have overwatered them and they carried
the salamander in a plastic bag.
• There is a lesson in the school that uses tropical-fish. They knew every year
the tropical-fish would die but they keep on conducting the lesson.
• Despite a few number of death incidents that the children have faced, they
discovered the meaning of life.
• Even though the students were described as children, the way they discuss
the meaning of life and death was adult-like especially the vocabulary.
 Diction
• Overall the words choice in the story are simple but there are a few high
level words.
• Teacher may use it to teach new vocabulary.
 Language Structure
• Some sentences are simple sentence and some sentences are complex
sentence.
• The sentences are a combination of two or three clauses.
Thank you