Rhetoric Study

This was Christ Church, the Episcopal Church of Gravesend, New Hampshire. Our

Sunday school teacher was a strained, unhappy-looking woman named Mrs Walker.

We thought this name suited her because her method of teaching involved a lot of

walking out of class. Mrs Walker would read us an instructive passage from the Bible.

She would then ask us to think seriously about what we had heard - 'Silently and

seriously, that's how I want you to think!’ she would say. 'I'm going to leave you

alone with your thoughts, now,' she would tell us ominously - as if our thoughts were

capable of driving us over the edge. 'I want you to think very hard,' Mrs Walker would

say. Then she'd walk out on us. I think she was a smoker, and she couldn't allow

herself to smoke in front of us. 'When I come back,' she'd say, 'we'll talk about it.'

By the time she came back, of course, we'd forgotten everything about whatever it

was - because as soon as she left the room, we would fool around with a frenzy.

Because being alone with our thoughts was no fun, we would pick up Owen Meany

and pass him back and forth, overhead. We managed this while remaining seated in

our chairs - that was the challenge of the game. Someone - I forget who started it -

would get up, seize Owen, sit back down with him, pass him to the next person, who

would pass him on, and so forth. The girls were included in this game; some of the

girls were the most enthusiastic about it. Everyone could lift up Owen. We were very

careful; we never dropped him. His shirt might become a little rumpled. His necktie

was so long, Owen tucked it into his trousers - or else it would have hung to his knees

- and his necktie often came untucked; sometimes his change would fall out (in our

faces). We always gave him his money back.

             

             John Irving is an extremely effective writer, and the impact of his rhetoric is seen throughout the novel. The precision of his writing is remarkable- there are few to no passages of A Prayer for Owen Meany that do not contain masterful rhetorical strategies that impact the reader. The above passage, at the very beginning of the story, is particularly effective because is hooks the reader in, one of a writer’s greatest challenges. This passage demonstrates that even in the exposition, passages can have a profound impact on the reader, by introducing the characters, theme, and plot while simultaneously drawing the reader onward.

            The very first clause “This was Christ Church” already introduces and effective rhetorical strategy. By saying “this” instead of “it” or “Christ Church was…”, Irving subtly establishes a first person voice, making the story out to be like a memory. The story-telling quality is important, as it keeps the reader interested (everyone likes to hear a good story). Irving then proceeds to introduce an extremely insignificant character, Mrs. Walker, but manages to convey her personality as concisely as possible, by revealing her one character trait, her inattentiveness to the students, in her name: “her method of teaching involved a lot of walking out of class”. This is an important device, as it introduces a character trait without boring the reader through a drawn out description. As the passage proceeds, a slight paradox is seen, as the teacher tells her students to “think silently”, even though our thoughts are loud in our own heads. In the last few sentences of the first paragraph, Mrs. Walker’s dialogue is dispersed between the narrators personal view of her, connecting the reader to the narrator.

            One effective element of Irving’s writing style on display in the second paragraph: dashes. Less tiresome than commas, less direct than colons, dashes are impactful in that they allow the authors voice to flow more actively, while including important descriptions in context. The remaining impactful elements of the paragraph are how Irving reveals aspects of Owen’s character in an entirely indirect, story-telling way. He draws attention again to Owen’s vulnerability to others, as they “we would pick up Owen Meany and pass him back and forth, overhead” like an animal or toy. Irving quickly makes it clear, however, that everyone, and especially the narrator, loves and cares about Owen, as they “were very careful”, never dropping him. At the conclusion of the passage, Irving reemphasizes an important trait of Owen, his dwarf size, by mentioning that his necktie would have “hung to his knees”.

            Although expositional passages are often viewed as not very impactful, John Irving challenges this notion, by impacting the reader through careful character development. To develop the characters in a way that is engaging to the reader, Irving employs numerous rhetorical strategies. He manages to briefly describe the unimportant characters through their very name, while emphasizing aspects of important characters through the subtle means of storytelling. He also works to keep the voice of the narrator genuine, through consistent first person narration and non-interrupting punctuation such as dashes.