Scribd Logo
Upload

Welcome to Scribd!

  • 188 views

    Secret Life of Walter Mitty

    Uploaded by

    Sangay EvilBand Ktwo
    The short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" follows Walter Mitty, a daydreaming man, as he drives his wife on errands. [1] Walter frequently escapes into elaborate fantasies where he is a heroic figure such as a Navy pilot or famous surgeon. [2] His daydreams are often triggered by something his wife says or a noise he hears. [3] Walter sinks deeper into his fantasies until his final daydream where he faces a firing squad, leaving it ambiguous what is real in Walter's life.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Secret Life of Walter Mitty

    Uploaded by

    Sangay EvilBand Ktwo
    188 views2 pages
    The short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" follows Walter Mitty, a daydreaming man, as he drives his wife on errands. [1] Walter frequently escapes into elaborate fantasies where he is a heroic figure such as a Navy pilot or famous surgeon. [2] His daydreams are often triggered by something his wife says or a noise he hears. [3] Walter sinks deeper into his fantasies until his final daydream where he faces a firing squad, leaving it ambiguous what is real in Walter's life.

    Original Title

    Secret Life Of Walter Mitty.doc

    Copyright

    © © All Rights Reserved

    Available Formats

    DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Did you find this document useful?

    Is this content inappropriate?

    The short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" follows Walter Mitty, a daydreaming man, as he drives his wife on errands. [1] Walter frequently escapes into elaborate fantasies where he is a heroic figure such as a Navy pilot or famous surgeon. [2] His daydreams are often triggered by something his wife says or a noise he hears. [3] Walter sinks deeper into his fantasies until his final daydream where he faces a firing squad, leaving it ambiguous what is real in Walter's life.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    188 views2 pages

    Secret Life of Walter Mitty

    Uploaded by

    Sangay EvilBand Ktwo
    The short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" follows Walter Mitty, a daydreaming man, as he drives his wife on errands. [1] Walter frequently escapes into elaborate fantasies where he is a heroic figure such as a Navy pilot or famous surgeon. [2] His daydreams are often triggered by something his wife says or a noise he hears. [3] Walter sinks deeper into his fantasies until his final daydream where he faces a firing squad, leaving it ambiguous what is real in Walter's life.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as doc, pdf, or txt
    of 2

    Secret Life Of Walter Mitty

    The outline of the secret life of Walter Mitty The story is about Walter Mitty, a henpecked and
    daydreaming urban man, who often depends on daydreaming to escape real life. As the story begins,
    Walter Mitty is driving his wife to town for an appointment at a beauty shop. Triggered by the wild
    storm, he begins to imagine himself as the commander of a Navy hydroplane. He dreams that the
    plane is in trouble but the members of the crew have complete faith in his ability. One member of the
    crew says, “The Old Man'll get us through”. Mitty is brought back from this daydream by his wife's
    voice, as she says, “Not so fast! You're driving too fast! What are you driving so fast for? His second
    daydream is activated by his wife’s suggestion to see Dr. Renshaw and put on gloves. In the second
    daydream, he fancies that he is helping several famous physicians save a millionaire by fixing a
    complicated machine that no one in the East can fix. He even envisages that he finally acts as
    operator. He is pulled back into reality by the shouting of a parking-lot attendant. Annoyed by the
    embarrassment at the parking lot and the failure of his memory and stimulated by the shouting of a
    newsboy about the Waterbury trial, Mitty sets off the third daydream in which he is on trial for
    murder. In the trial, he accurately recalls and valiantly admits that he has killed Gregory Fitzhurst
    despite the efforts of his attorney to prove his innocence. He was aroused to reality by his
    subconscious murmuring of puppy biscuit and the laughing of a passing woman. Sitting into a big
    leather chair in the lobby, he starts his fourth daydream by looking at the pictures of bombing planes
    and of ruined streets in an old copy of Liberty. He fancies that he heroically volunteers to undertake a
    risky task of bombing the ammunition dump. His wife’s sudden appearance and scolding him like a
    mother terminate his fantasy. Mitty sinks deeper and deeper into his secret life until he faces the
    firing squad. Here it is hard to judge what is real and what isn’t. What is clear is that he is no longer a
    hero, but a little, helpless boy. Word Count: 382

    My Lessons and Links on The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

    James Thurber—The more James Thurber became blind, the wilder his fantasies became. Snoopy was
    originally based on Walter Mitty’s character and several of his daydreams correspond to Mitty’s
    dreams in the story.

    Vocabulary

    Distraught (troubled, anxious)


    Haggard (having a very exhausted appearance)
    Duct (a tubular structure in the body through which substances pass)
    Craven (very fearful, cowardly)
    Vault (an underground room or cave with an arched ceiling)
    Insolent (bold in a reckless way)
    Insinuating (arousing doubts and suspicions)
    Pandemonium (wild noise and disorder)
    Derisive (mocking)
    Inscrutable (mysterious)

    1
    Questions to consider while reading:

    1. Characterize Walter Mitty using the concrete details and elaboration method.
    2. Something from life would always spark Mitty’s daydreams, what caused at least three of these.
    Give a brief description of the dream and what caused the reality.
    3. Describe Mrs. Mitty. Use the same form that you did on Walter. Do you think that she intended to
    act the way that she did?
    4. Why did Walter Mitty imagine himself facing a firing squad? Evaluate what he was saying about
    his life with such a statement.
    5. Compare and contrast the movie and short story. Which did you prefer? What made the movie
    more interesting and comical than the story? (omit this question if the school board forbids the
    viewing of the movie)

    Notes:

    Walter Mitty is driving so fast so he thinks he is a 1) pilot. Mrs. Mitty brings him back to reality. The
    noise (pocketa, pocketa, pocketa) is repeated in most of his daydreams. Mrs. Mitty is characterized
    mostly through her interaction with Walter and his jolting back to reality. She is going to the beauty
    parlor and Walter is going to get overshoes and have the chains taken off the tires from winter.

    Dr. Renshaw is Walter’s doctor. Mrs. Mitty wants his to go and have a check-up because he is acting
    so strangely.

    Walter drives around a while and passes a hospital. Then he begins to fantasize that he is fixing a
    machine in the hospital with a broken piston with a fountain pen. 2) He is a famous doctor.

    The garage attendant jolts him back to reality. The attendant makes fun of Walter and embarrasses
    him. He said that next year he would wear his right arm in a sling. Then leaves to get the overshoes.
    He had forgotten the other item that Mrs. Mitty had wanted him to get.

    3) On the street he hears about a trial and fantasizes that he is on trial for murder. Finally during the
    fantasy, he remembers the puppy biscuits and said it out loud. A woman passing on the street
    laughed at him because he was talking to himself. He goes in the A & P and buys the biscuits whose
    name he has also forgotten. All he remembered was that “Puppies Bark for It” was on the box.

    His wife would be finished in 15 minutes, so he goes to the hotel where he meets her and begins to
    read an old magazine…probably published during WWII. 4) He dreams that he is a general in the
    war. His dream is shattered by the arrival of his wife who begins immediately to nag him about
    hiding from her and not putting on his overshoes. She thinks he is ill because he is acting strangely.
    She is going to take his temperature when he gets home. She has forgotten something and darts in the
    drugstore to get it.

    5) Walter’s final dream is he is facing the firing squad. Mysterious to the last, no handkerchief, and
    smoking a cigarette.

    _ End -

    You might also like