Close reading assignment

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Article Review
The narrator in “The Brown House” employs a unique narrative technique; the double telling aspect and the author’s choice of words are subdued, this intrigues the reader’s sense to evoke meaning through the thematic concerns addressed covertly. The subdued narrative voice in the passage is passive yet illuminates a lot about the narrators American-Japanese culture, the perspective of the woman in that society and the patriarchal culture. Mrs. Hattori is in the background, but the author foregrounds her voice through subversion. The woman in that community was just to be seen and not to be heard; Yamamoto defies this.
There is complete irony in the way she narrates the events in Mr. Hattori’s house, although the ultimate outcome is tense and disastrous, the readers do not clearly see how it develop; Mr. Hattori was viewed as a provider to his family he often went to the gambling house where he develops a gambling culture. Mrs. Hattori in the excerpt was reluctant to the culture her husband had developed. As a female writer she writes in the background just as what her society asserts that women should do but voices out the critical issue in a euphemistic tone. The financial loss that befalls Mr. Hattori is due to his decisive and stubborn character, he does not heed his wife’s advice and, finally, she resorts to adjust her attitude towards the money; they then buy a new car, new rug and first washing machine (Yamamoto 45).

The “double-voiced discourse” certainly confirms how tragic poverty befalls their house, before Mrs. Hattori was against her husband’s gambling but since women had to be submissive to their husbands, she is unable to stop him, it brings out oppression. Her silence depicts something within the cultural and historical context. The first narration aspect brings out the authentic account communicating major overt issues in a quite subtle way.
The word choice used by Yamamoto embeds various stylistic device such as symbolism, irony and foreshadowing, imagery and metaphor. The author’s literary style confirms her poetic way of compressing her ideas; diction should be effected in this; she carefully chooses this. In addition, the rug symbolized the state of poverty the family was left in after taking the best Mr. Hattori’s time it was a meaningless property to own. Yamamoto’s writing is delicate and profound pausing gender-related questions. This style can be seen as a smart way to handle Mr. Hattori’s hubris that later disillusioned his family to live in abject regret and poverty. Alternative words that could be used to create a lasting effect in the reader’s mind “bare weave beneath” meant an unembellished place that is eroded and worn out.
The subjects of this feeling that come out are Mrs. Hattori and her children. The wife is repressed to the extent that she fails on what to tell her husband. The overt theme of repression evidently comes out, to counter this; men are portrayed as rather cruel and irresponsible, the author achieves this through sharp juxtaposition. Mrs. Hattori fails to help her husband recover from the loss, Mrs. Wu terms this as being bleak which can also be termed as being somewhat cold and unforgiving towards her husband. The tension between these words is hidden, and the causal language that is used makes it seem as normal but metaphorically is that Mr. Hattori’s house had been destructed due to the gambling.
Work Cited
Yamamoto H., Heath Anthology of American Literature. 5th ed., New York, 1951. p.45